City - Silverton State - CO Country - United States
About
Taken in an old jail in Silverton, Colorado.
I guess this goes along with my train valve series that I took last year. I've gotten to where I really like shooting valves. Everybody touches them, they see so much use, yet no one really looks at them.
Don't know why the image appears so pixelated... Looked fine on my PC... I may have to yank this shot and repost it.
Here's another thing you may find helpful. I plan the total snot out of a location as best as I can. I do a lot of google searches and AAA helps a lot with guides to find neat trails or hikes. I use Google Earth to find which way locations face for sunrise and sundown planning.
But when I get there, it's all MacGyver baby - total improvise with the equipment I have. To be honest - I have the best kit I could afford. Macro lens, 50 mm 1.8 for crisp arch or low light; then a 12-24, 18-70, and 50 - 500 with 2x teleadopter for the full wide to full tele experience. The Bogen Tripod weighs in at 12 lbs and comes along if I can manage.
Most of the time though, it's just me without tripod or 50-500 running around looking for those images in my mind.
And I keep the basics in mind. Ask questions if you see something you like and I may hit one of these rants again and actually spew something useful.
And while I'm Wifi sitting here waiting for a plane, I might as well as lay it all out and say that that zen state is wonderful, but I often only get there shooting very quickly and with a lot of "obvious shots" out of the way.
I tend to stick to the rules - get the balanced shot out, exposure is good, the F-Stop has the right DOF, think - think - think - think...
Then I tend to start seeing things as - that's great! Click! That's neat! Click! I never thought about that! Click!
Rest assured that there is a lot of loss here, but that is what practice is.
Nowadays I tend to start thinking of styles.
I am a landscape photographer. I resort to my style with landscapes. However, I'm here in Kansas, not the most magestic sweep of land. So, sometimes I walk around and look at downtown buildings and think of Jeanette H or Todd M. I think of Carol Watson, and pull off the road sometimes to bag some barns or rural objects. I think about Hugo and get the same sweats that you do - think, think, think.
I'd keep ranting but I think it's time to just burn some more time waiting for this plane commenting on some other photos.
There really are not rules - just things that seem to work. The flip side of usefilm apart from the comments is if you see something that you think is incredible, you can sit back and try to figure out WHY it's so incredible. Sometimes it's that lucky moment, a chance expression, but other times it's purely technical achievement and can be learned.
In those cases, you have the advantage by asking questions - saying - this is why I like it, but "HOW did you ever think of doing this?" Or, in some cases - "holy @#$^ how did you DO that?!" Kostas is one of these photographers - insanely creative, transforming the average and normal to art. There are others of course.
Something to consider about photography, now that you are taking a LOT of shots, is that practice really grows into a routine. That is, I'm glad you are really thinking about every shot, but also realize that if you keep that left eye closed long enough you may enter the zen state of where you are really rolling.
Yeah? Well that's all your fault. :) You don't know how long it took me to crop this shot just right, thinking all about thirds and "is that close enough?", "is that really a good alignment?", "should I try to recrop it?"... All because of YOU. ...so thanks! :)
Seriously though, your comments are among the most useful comments I ever get. They actually give me feedback on what to improve and I highly value that. It's too bad I don't know more about photography in terms of rules, etc. I could be a lot more useful.
Same commentary as above - growth in use of DOF, strong subject, toning in line with the jail theme. Older is better from an object perspective, and I can see your composition skills growing stronger by aligning items by their visual weight on an off-center comp.
Morgan, another great shot. I see what you mean abou the pixelation, I noticed immediately some aliasing around the valve handle, though that's the only place i'd say it's a real issue. I probably wouldn't worry about reposting, as long as the original isn't suffering from the same problem. Love the tones and the color cast.
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