Ran out this morning, on Father’s Day, to grab a few brackets before heading to church with my family. I found this cool graffiti in one of the underground metro stations here in Berlin. Loved the colors and symmetry and thought you might enjoy it as well. By the way, Happy Father’s day to all the dads out there!
I decided to play a little bit in my post-processing today, as I was not sure where I wanted to go with this particular image. While not a strong composition (I would actually have liked the chairs over on the right side of the frame), I did not feel like rearranging things when I was on-site for the shoot. I was also not really sure what I wanted to say with this image (don’t you hate it when that happens), so I used the shot as an opportunity to play around in photoshop by bringing a lot of black into the edges of the frame to focus the eye on the chairs, and the light on the rear right wall, leaving the room suspended in a void. Guess this’ll have to do and I’ll owe you all a stronger effort in my next post!
…enjoy! Yeah, that’s right. It’s all about me having fun! It’s the reason I love photography so much, and how I have the patience to endeavor to create a vision my camera does not have the soul to produce. I enjoy it all! Photography, HDR, software, gear, blogs, you name it. I enjoy the act of creating something from merely an idea, and I enjoy getting out there to show to others. If I were a painter, I would paint; If I were a poet, I would write. I am neither, but I CAN use camera and I CAN use a variety of post-processing tools to mold the RAW brackets my camera produces into something interesting. By the way, I’m listening Björk’s Post album as I write this. Talk about poetry!
Don’t be silly? You want to know what that means? It’s the answer I’d have for someone if they asked me if I would ever be willing to stop photographing urban environments, particularly disused urban spaces. Not on your life! I’ll stop shooting such places when they pry my camera from my cold, dead hands! And, if I can’t make it to an actual abandoned site to shoot, I’ll find something that looks like it very well might be abandoned. It’s just something to which I’ve become rather addicted. Why? Because it speaks to me. I ponder all that these spaces have seen over the years, whether an abandoned building, an empty alley, or something like this metro tunnel. I think of all the people who have passed to and fro through this place, and I wonder what it has seen: day and night, dark and light; children and the elderly, the strong and infirm; cops and crooks, priests and prostitutes, life… yes, life… and death too! These halls have seen it all, and, thanks to my camera, forever too will I!
Don't be Silly!!
Some of you know that I recently had to deliver Christine, my beloved Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 lens, to Nikon Service Point (NSP) Berlin for urgent care, following a mishap amongst the ruins of the abandoned sanatorium of Beelitz-Heilstätten. Well, she came back to me last week, truly better than new. NSP Berlin (actually they ended up sending the lens to the Nikon GmbH in Düsseldorf) so impressed me, that I decided to give them Nikki (my trusty D700) for a good once over. To be honest, I have had her as long as the D700 has been out, and she has never been in for maintenance (routine or otherwise). Even though I regularly clean my sensor and mirror box, there Nikki really needs to be seen by a qualified Nikon service person to ensure she is in top running order, so I can keep delivering tasty HDRs! In the interim, I will be shooting with my pocket camera, Leila (my Leica D-Lux 4, Safari Edition – love the color). So, without further ado, here is what Leila helped me deliver to you today. And, as for you, Nikki, I miss you already!
