Maybe too Low Key?

Here is an even darker version of yesterday's post. After reviewing my first attempt it just didn't seem too dark. I lowered the exposure level mainly in Adobe Lightroom thinking that this might help preserve as much detail as possible until I decided it was dark enough. I think from a modern digital point of view the approach to taking a photograph, at least that I've been exposed to (pun not intended,) it to try to capture as much detail as possible in a photo, and then make artistic decisions about it, such as the one described in this project later. But perhaps this is a misconception on my part, or perhaps the leaning of my own personality to want to hold on to as many options as possible until I've explored the possibilities.

My fear with this project is that by taking a photo that is underexposed from the get go I would be giving up information I could capture and then selectively discard later AND that I might be at greater risk for introducing NOISE to the photo. I won't attempt a long or accurate definition of noise here, but just describe it as lighter colored or toned pixels in an area of the photo of darker pixels when the lighter toned pixels should not really be there. I want an image that has low noise just like I want a radio station to come in clearly on a tuner. Capturing a photo with the histogram shifted to the right might be like trying to get the station to come as clearly on a tuner and once it is adjusting the volume (down in this example to keep with the low key theme.) Capturing a photo with the histogram shifted to the left (underexposed) would seem to me like trying to adjust the voulme lower on a radio by using the tuning knob to gradually move the tuner from the strongest reception to weaker reception. Perhaps this is not a proper metaphor, but at present seems to capture how I am thinking about doing the project in the digital age vs doing it "the old fashioned way" by just underexposing from the moment of image capture.