Cold and grey

Here are yesterday's Inner City photos.

I haven't explained what I'm doing posting photos here, but since there are now a few people dropping by who don't know me, I'll take a moment to let you know what's going. on.

Often, I am just walking around my usual circuit, carrying a camera, and I take snapshots of anything that looks interesting. Anything that looks like it was shot in a Botanic Garden, Park, or Museum probably falls into that category. I'm not putting these out there as great work or anything, just tourist photos essentially, with the occasional inclusion of kid pics for friends and family. The big baby picture below doesn't even fall into that category. That is a straight up picture of someone else's art. Every bit of the creativity that went into it came from the sculptor. I was just using it as an illustration, not as an example of my work.

Other times I am working on photo projects. The ones I've been calling "Inner City" fall into that category. At this stage, these pictures are no where near to being finished. They are first drafts. I look at them for awhile, consider whether I will use them in a final product and if so, better ways to process them. Most of the photos I display here never make the final cut, but my hope is that you may find them interesting anyway. They are, after all, free in this medium and I imagine that these are things you've never seen before. If you have, then I hope I am framing them from a different perspective.

Although I will take a picture of anything for a variety of reasons, things like pretty flowers or beautiful sunsets, there are a few big themes that I pursue in my serious work. I am not about to tell you what they are, but there is usually something a bit deeper than what you see on the surface. For me, photography is more of a storytelling method than a presentation of the abstract or the beautiful, though not exclusively. Of course it's best when the story contains beauty and abstraction. Sometimes a picture stands on its own, but more often than not it is the series that is important. And from a decorative standpoint, I find myself more and more seeing things in pairs.

Anyway, I didn't want you to think that I am putting these things out there as finished products. In addition to the processing, if I find a scene I like there is a good chance I will go out and shoot it again in different light, or season. Yesterday, for example, the light was horrendous, barely a cloud in the sky and the sun at a harsh angle. There was a good gray scale range, however, so I converted them to black and white. This is not a black and white project though, so if I want to use any of them, I will go out on a rainy or cloudy day and reshoot them. Seems like this city just looks better under a cloud.

And I'm not hawking my work here, especially the above examples, but if you see something you might like to hang on your wall, let me know and it's something I can make a good print out of I'd be happy to sell you one at cost + a six pack, pretty much as a favor. Most of them look nice at 8 x 12 and work best in a pair.