For that old-time feeling...

I am particularly fond of this image because of how much it turned out the way I imagined it when I took it.

Not long before I took this picture, I had seen a number of images (I can't remember exactly which, now), where the backgrounds, which were mostly street scenes, were rendered in a sort of washed-out middle-gray, which drew attention to the subject of the photo, instead of distracting the viewer into looking too much at the background. I think these were older pictures, because I came to think of that look as being kind of "old-fashioned".

When I took this picture, it occured to me that I might be able to pull off that same look, and it worked out really well, I think. The main area of the stadium is rendered pretty flat, without much contrast, and in a hazy sort of middle gray, which I think gives it a sense of spaciousness. The people in the foreground are in strong contrast, which emphasizes them as the subject instead of just some annoying people standing in the way of the shot.

You can't see it on this small reproduction, but I deliberately emphasized the image's grain in processing to give it a high-speed black-and-white film look, too.

Update: This image was entered in the Photo Friday Challenge under the theme "Retro".