Tagged: church

 

At some point in life, most of us realize that we don’t have time for everything that we’re interested in – we’re forced to drop a hobby because we don’t have time.

Photography reached that point for me a few years back; I used to photograph anything, but I discovered that I wouldn’t edit certain photoshoots or would be annoyed at editing certain shoots. I enjoy certain subject matter and certain photo topics and would like to spend more time with those.

Old, abandoned buildings is one of those topics; it’s not that I don’t like the photos that I come up with, it’s that I’d rather be photographing something else. This was true on our trip to Southern Illinois with Keith French; on two days, we visited abandoned churches and barns, and I found myself wanting to wander through the woods instead.

I do like these photos, but …

 

 

 

 

 

There are some photos that I like that I don’t want to “define” why; the crosses photo fits in that category – I love the symmetry and texture of the image.  As we walked along Spring Street, I saw my shadow walking along the brick but it took me a bit to capture the right photo since normally my elbow would be extending from my head when I click the shutter button.

I loved the way the evening light played with the reddish bricks on the steeple, but when I saw the shadows on the RR Donnelly building? The way the straight shadow played across the rectangular windows and contrasted with the darkness of the second building’s window reflection? That was simply too good to pass up!

 

We crossed the street at Dexter for the express purpose of the church photo; it was obvious to me that the street lamp and raised bricks were a perfect composition.  But I spent quite a bit of time working on the exact composition for the vines; I wanted to keep the sparse vines to the right, but the light pointed to the left … and I ended up with a photo that I wouldn’t normally take that I really enjoy.

My friend and I took a nice slow walk around one of Elgin’s historic neighborhoods. Our meandering path matched our meandering conversation as we talked about life and pressed our shutter buttons. I remarked to him “I’m just not really feeling it”, but I continued to capture interesting images. As I tried to pick 7 images to post for this week, they all seemed to be missing something; but as pairs of photos?

The strong red-ish light of the sun played strongly across each scene, but was most evident on the brick buildings leading to the wonderful hues in these photos.

 

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…view older images with the thumbnails below…

 

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…view older images with the thumbnails below…

 

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…view older images with the thumbnails below…

 

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July 2021 (remaining images)

July 31st, 2021

 

 

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For the second full week of Black & White February, I decided to follow up on an idea that I’d had for a few months – to shoot light trails in Elgin.   I enjoy capturing long exposures, but the added challenge of capturing light trails in downtown Elgin instead of Chicago (where there’s more traffic) seemed challenging.  

While we were out in the bitter cold for the January Lunar Eclipse, I realized that Elgin’s parking garages would make a great vantage point for some light trail images.   I’d taken images from the top of the Spring Street garage, in fact, I’ve led photo walks in downtown Elgin and used the Spring Street garage as a vantage point.  

However, I decided to add one more aspect to the week’s photos: I would attempt to shoot 7 images and capture 7 photos that I was proud of…I didn’t quite make it.   Capturing light trails of traffic when there’s very little traffic turned out to be a bit more challenging than I expected.   But I took 14 images, from 6 vantage points, and captured 7 images that I’m proud of.

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29 frame composite image