RustyBug 
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 p.1 #16 · No Moonrise Over Hernandez... | |
Maybe if you change your vantage point.
Could you shoot from the other side of the crosses, use a low and foreshortening perspective of the crosses with a portrait orientation that then leads upward to the traffic light with the intersection / blurred car in the background.
It would of course change the shot relative to the church and whatever might be in view that we currently don't see, but I might try to increase the dominance of the crosses by changing my perspsective.
One thing I like to do with a scene is to do a 360 degree walk around it clockwise, then reverse and do a 360 counter-clockwise. Once I find a vantage point that frames the scene the way I like, then I get as low as I can (lay down if appropriate) and work my way up to as high as I can get (sometimes a ladder helps). Somewhere in that spectrum of surveying the scene, I'll find the vantage point that helps me tell the story. If not, then I'll reconsider what Focal Length I'm shooting with and move farther back or closer in.
Often times, I'll see a scene and stop to scout it without a camera ... knowing that I'll come back to it when lighting matches the mood that I'm trying to impart (stormy/ominous weather, foggy morning, new fallen snow, etc.) . It doesn't have the romance of the "hurried, inspiration" that we sometimes attribute to worthiness, but it still is inspiration driven.
Ours is a 3D world, that we try to capture in a 2D medium. By moving your feet and bending your knees, etc. you can impart a bit more of that spatial reference that helps us get a sense of volume to an image. Reversing your vantage point can change whether you seem to be converging or diverging on your subject/background relationships. To borrow from Pirates of the Carribean ... "Gents. Take a walk." 
To my way of thinking, the "Dangerous Intersection" storyline warrants the "Danger" as the subject (i.e. crosses) and the "Intersections" as the amplifying environmental background information. The fact that the space from the intersection to the traffic light is so much larger than the crosses ... you current perspective serves to reduce the dominance of the crosses even more as they are more distant. Changing your perspective can give you an opportunity to 're-balance' the scene relative to your primary subject.
Your shot, as is, tells me a very different story (with the auction sign IN or OUT the scene). It draws a parallel (a bit more photjournalistic vibe with the sign IN) between the death of the individuals as signified by the crosses and the death of the church/building as signified by it's condition and the auction sign ... as darkeness falls upon both.
Of the other ones with the cars in the scene, this is the composition that I get the most "dangerous" vibe from.
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