Thanks very much guys!
But... why the low Technique score of 3.5?

Hans, you are asking five people who commented and probably gave you high scores in Technique why the eight people who rated you and didn't comment may have given you lower Technique scores. :>)

In my opinion, a score of 3.5 is not "low" but, rather, not as high as one would wish for an image that is about to be featured (IMHO).

Was this a hand-held shot? Could it possibly be sharper overall? That's the only thing I can think of.

Hans, what church is this? Where is it located?

King,
I dunno, but I'd be happy over my ass if i could take such sharp pictures handheld...

@bioLarzen...
Just practice going all corpse-like for a few seconds at a time.

It's not a matter of sharpness, but depth of field. The edges of the frame don't appear to be as in focus and sharp as the center. With a tripod, one could easily stop down to f22 to solve that problem.
It's just a guess, anyway, and I have no complaints with this wonderful photograph.

King, I see what you mean... but this was shot at f11, the Nikon 12-24's "sweet spot," and so f22 have only made it worse. Edge softness is especially annoying at 12mm.

Or perhaps everyone's noticing that I didn't get the exact center point (the perspective on the right is different from on the left). Ah well, the overall score is creeping up.

King,

I see. Thx.

Hans, I think you may be mistaken. The so-called "sweet spot" is determined by far more critical criteria than a church interior. Are you taking the f11 seet spot on faith? or did you test your specific lens yourself? Lenses vary.

At f22, I'm pretty sure you would see NO DIFFERENCE in sharpness in the center (as displayed here), but much more sharpness around the edges.

Hans, This is stunning. Only wish I had seen it early enough to rate it, and yes bump up that score of 3.5. I have also been wondering for a while how images get featured with these scores which appraently indicate that they are between average and just above average? This image is tops whatever the numerical value assigned to it.

Woo! Featured!

Sorry King, but trust me, it gets ugly at f22, especially in the center; everything gets reeeeally soft.

That said, to me everything looks nice and crisp, even in the corners.

@hans...you tested! Good for you! and congratulations--this wasn't featured as I wrote my last comment.

@bslomovic...Three 5's from perceptive folks like us and one 1 from an anonymous crank = 3.67 average. Variance in scores sometimes confuses folks when they seen only the average. My analysis of my own ratings indicates that scores above, say, 3.6 are pretty good and that averages above 4 (even for my featured photos) are not the norm.

...sorry, make that two 5's and one 1. Same idea, though.

Simply fantastic!!!

Oops, somehow one of my comments disappeared...?

Anyway, to answer King's question, this is the ceiling of Southwark Cathedral in London, UK, just south of London Bridge.

Thank you everyone!

Really great, it would be interesting to see a higher resolution version of this shot!

btw, I just ordered that same lens!

ChriZ: You certainly won't be disappointed. The first few days blew my mind. 12mm is a whole new world.

A higher resolution (though lower quality) version is here: http://lumilux.org/2006/12/20/022135

Han,

I had a second question that you didn't answer. Was this a hand-held shot?

That was probably in the same comment I wrote; I guess I closed the tab too early!

No, this was taken with a tripod and a remote shutter release. So if there's any softness, either the church was shaking or it's the lens' fault!

Hans,

Good for you regarding the tripod and remote release.

I don't think I suggested there was any softness and there may be no difference at all. On my monitor, the edges don't look quite as sharp as the center, but is as like to be a problem with my eyes or my monitor as anything else.

Back to focus, I don't want to take the focus away from this spectacularly beautiful image.

Looks great to me, though, we'd need to see it BIGGER to really know. Beautiful image nonetheless.