GETTING WEIRD WITH TREES

Early last December, just before an extremely harsh winter descended, I had some success with my camera at a tree farm south of West Bend and also took some interesting shots at a horse farm in western Mequon.  I hadn't been back since the weather improved and thought I would see what these spots had to offer.  It was pretty disappointing, to be honest.  The trees had already started to leaf out, and the sun was too high in the sky (another way of saying that I should have gotten there a lot earlier in the day).  Even so, having driven all the way to the tree farm, I took some shots, visiting the horse farm on the way back.

Even though the shots were disappointing, I decided to do what I could with them in post processing. In the first couple of shots below I modified both their contrast and sharpness to produce images that look like pseudo-HDR, even though they actually represented a single, unblended shot.

 This gives them the appearance of drawings, especially in the look of the grass.

I converted the next couple of shots to black & whites and then, not satisfied with that look, selectively brightened what the camera had recorded as green.

This tactic not only provided more contrast with the dark tree trunks, it gave the grass the appearance of snow or frost.  Not realistic, but an interesting effect, I thought.  I also liked the balance in the first of these shots.

As I said, I stopped at the Oldenburg horse farm in western Mequon on my way back.  Again, conditions simply weren't as good as they had been in the fall when conditions had included a dense fog to provide depth to the shots.  Because I was disappointed with conditions, I again fooled around with the images in post processing.

In this first shot, that I converted to black & white, I again selectively brightened the green shades to create the following somewhat surreal image.

Weird and almost with the appearance of infrared photography.

Here is a second shot, which included in the foreground a grass field in which the dandelions were in full bloom.  In this case I darkened, rather than lightened, the green but lightened the yellow (dandelions), creating a polka dot effect in the foreground.

I'm not sure I like the foreground effect, but I do like how the false shading of the colors affected the woods in the background.

Just trying to make the best of a less than ideal situation.

John

DECREPITUDE AS ABSTRACT

Two subjects that I find myself returning to are scenes of decrepitude and recognizable abstracts, and sometimes I am able to combine the two, as in the following.

The first is of an ancient grain elevator on the old Pabst Brewery campus northwest of downtown Milwaukee.  The elevators are built out of individual ceramic tiles, each perhaps a foot and a half square and slightly curved.  What caught my eye was the fact that the tiles were different colors and exhibited different levels of deterioration.  I also liked the silvery patina covering some of the tiles.

Here is another photo from the same area, which shows a foundational crack at the base of those grain elevators.

Across a narrow alley from the grain elevators was a small building exhibiting a good deal of paint failure, as illustrated in the following shots.

This area is undergoing extensive renovation and I probably should have not been there.  But I visited after work hours and wasn't getting in anyone's way.  There was not a lot of light in the alley and I took these with the help of a tripod.  Because paint failure occurs in a more or less random fashion, one of my choices was the image's composition.  In the first shot I wanted to be sure I included all four coats of paint.  In the second I wanted to position the darkest area toward the upper right corner of the image.

Below is a shot from the interior of one of my other favorite locations, the Solvay Coke Plant on the south side of Milwaukee.  This is a shot of a plastered wall.  The one recognizable item in the shot is the light switch in the lower right corner.  Again, there was little light, and I was using a tripod to ensure adequate exposure time without worrying about camera shake.  This was taken at f/5.6 for 1/10 second at a 200 ISO.

I'm confident that the switch has not been operational for at least 25 years.

Another case of paint failure was actually a graffiti site in Milwaukee's Walker's Point area on the former grounds of the Sprecher brewery (before it moved to Glendale).  Here are a couple of the shots that I took at that location.

Again, I was most concerned with color and overall composition.  The primary warehouse for the former brewery is pretty much totally derelict.  The large (locked) double-entry doors to the building were in a serious failing state, and I chose to take a shot of the bases of doors, which were in particularly poor condition.

The upper portions of the doors had been painted a brilliant blue, and I liked the overall look of the graffitied doors, handles, and lock.

When I returned to this area a few days later, I found that the doors had been painted black to cover up the blue paint.  Perhaps a subsequent graffiti artist had painted something that the property's overseers objected to.  In any event, while I was busy shooting some of the graffiti, I was approached by a young man with the word "Security" on his shirt.  Nice guy who had been watching me on surveillance cameras and had mistaken my camera equipment for a graffiti spray gun.

© 2014 John M. Phillips

MINNESOTA VALLEY NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE

Last weekend we were up in Minnesota, and I decided to get up early Saturday morning to visit a nearby wildlife refuge with my camera, the Minnesota Valley National Wildlife Refuge, which is just east of the Mall of America.  It was a calm morning and there was a good deal of fog hanging above any open water.  I missed a number of opportunities on my way to the wildlife refuge, about 10 miles from where we were staying.  Later I regretted that, as by the time I was returning much of the fog had dissipated.

I did get a few landscape shots in the early morning sun.  I'm still learning my way around panoramic landscape opportunities, and it shows, I'm afraid.  I took about 40 shots that morning but kept only four.  That wouldn't be all bad if they were really good, but that's not the case.

Here is one of the early shots that I took.

I've learned that it often helps to incorporate something of interest in the foreground.  That would the tree in the above shot.  Doesn't work well here.  The only saving grace in this shot is the Minneapolis skyline in the background.

I tried again in the following shot, featuring the tree on the left.

Actually a little better, I thought.  I cropped all of these shots horizontally because I felt that would emphasize the panoramic quality of the scenes.  Besides, the sky didn't really have anything to offer.

In the following shot I thought I wanted to take advantage of a layering feature--a more saturated foreground and a foggier background.

In retrospect, it might have been better to have incorporated the sky, if only to establish some sort of context.

That is what I attempted to do in the following shot.

I thought this was the best of the bunch.  But I really should have included more of the sky in the image.  The little sliver of sky just doesn't make it, but that's all I had when I got to post processing.

In the last three shots, although I increased the contrast a bit in post processing, the early morning sun was providing the nicely saturated colors.

John

WALKER'S POINT: ALTERNATIVE SCENES

As I have stated before, Milwaukee's Walker's Point is an older neighborhood of an older industrial Midwestern city.  It includes sections that are undergoing a rejuvenation and sections that aren't.  And both offer photographic opportunities.  Here are a few.

This first is of an antique shop.

In the past when I have tried to shoot this building, there has generally been one or more cars parked in front.  This time the street was clear, except for an orange traffic cone positioned in front that I was able to partially crop out.

What were more interesting were the store's antique posters.  Here are portions of a couple of those.

And then there was the paintwork above the entrance.

I thought it worked better to treat these as abstract opportunities rather than trying to capture the entire entryway.  The resolution on these shots was actually quite good.

And here is another storefront that caught my eye for its colors.

One of my favorite Walker's Point spots is on the campus of an old tannery that has been converted to a combination of housing and office space.  For me the more attractive portions are actually those that still looking for renovation.

Here, for example, is an entryway for what I believe is an apartment building.

This is the second time I have shot this same entryway, and both times the same motorcycle was parked in front.  I think the motorcycle makes this composition, but I wish the motorcycle had been facing into the shot rather than out.

And a couple of more shots from the same neighborhood: a building plaque that I liked for its corruption . . .

and a doorway for its obsolescence.

The archway over the door creates an imbalance in the composition, but otherwise the shot held a lot of interest for me.  Again, the resolution on these shots was really good for handheld, I thought.  Shutter speed was 1/25 second and 1/80th second, respectively.  Having a camera lens that is capable of compensating electronically for camera shake helps a lot.

The following photo isn't really much of shot, but I liked it anyway.  I think the light striking the brick wall contrasted nicely with the dark window openings.

I decided that the tree actually helped the composition providing some perspective.

One of the places I like is a thoroughly neglected area situated next to an abandoned building in the same neighborhood.  The location has been a site for graffiti artists in the past.  But what attracted me were the older graffiti that had weathered away and that offered opportunities in abstraction, including the following.

This area adjoins a railroad spur leading to a switching yard.

Note the track--not exactly a high speed rail.

Finally, the Walker's Point area is in the shadow of the Allen-Bradley (now Rockwell International) clock tower.  

For nearly 50 years this was the largest four-sided clock in the world, with clock faces more than 40 feet in diameter.  But then in 2010 the Saudis built a four-sided clock with faces more than 140 feet in diameter . . . just a tad larger.

John

ABANDONED FARM HOUSE: VARIATIONS

I have returned to the abandoned farm house that's a few miles from our home.  I have shot and posted this place a number of times in the past.  The house is situated on what was formerly a small dairy farm and now is land awaiting redevelopment.  The property is posted with numerous "No Trespassing" signs, but I have assumed those are intended more to protect the owner than to keep casual photographers away.

Spring is really the best time to visit this place.  In the winter (at least this past winter) snow can be a serious impediment.  And in summer and into fall, there is an unfortunate sapling growing right up against the north side of the house that leafs out, creating a significant bushy distraction.

Here is one of the first photos of the farm house that I took this year, on a bright and sunny morning.

The house faces east, and the sun was nicely lighting up that side of the house.  One of the great features of this place is that there are simply no distractions in the background--no utility poles or wires, no other structures to distract from the house itself.  I say that last with one major caveat:  This was a working farm, and there are numerous outbuildings, including a barn and silo.  Those are to the north of the house, and that is why I kept finding myself shooting toward the southwest.  There are a couple of small outbuildings directly to the southwest of the house, but I can generally "hide" those behind the house.  The problem I see with this shot is that it is too upbeat.  The house is a shambles, but it almost looks inviting in this shot.

Here is a similar shot that I converted to a black & white.

Now this is a bit better.  And I thought the clouds added some interest to the shot.  But overall it still seems too "positive."

So a couple of days later I returned to try again.

In this case, in addition to converting the shot to a black & white, I also darkened the nearly cloudless sky and darkened the exposure a bit.  I thought this worked well, particularly because the sunlight striking the front of the house contrasted nicely with the darkened sky.

Here is similar shot that I cropped more linearly.

I like this shot because it emphasizes the empty area around the house, enhancing its abandoned quality.  The big drawback to this shot is that pesky little sapling in the left portion of the image.  For a moment I even considered cutting it down, but then thought better of it.  I know that in Photoshop there is a way to remove the sapling, but I don't have the technical skill (or patience) to handle that.

And then there was the toilet.

I don't know how it got there.  It certainly wasn't there last year.  (I would have remembered that.)  I did "cheat" just a little on this shot.  The toilet was lying on its side and I admit to standing it upright and lifting the lid (using my foot and not my hand, by the way).  A novelty shot.

And here is another novelty shot of the house that I took through a glass-block window in the dairy barn.

Here I focused not on the house but on the seams between the glass blocks.  There were some dead vines that complicated the composition, but I didn't think they distracted from the overall effect.  I shot this at f/14, which increased the depth of field.  But because I was so close to the window, the house was thrown somewhat out of focus.  However, I thought that actually added to the shot.  My only regret is that I didn't leave enough of the seam on the far right when I took the shot.  Still, I did like this shot.

John

DOMES: A DIFFERENT APPROACH

I recently read an article by another photographer about how he does nature macro photography in public venues.  He stated that he used a telephoto lens rather than a macro lens.  In addition, he did everything handheld rather than using a tripod and set his camera to adjust the ISO level and shutter speed automatically depending on aperture and light level.  I thought this actually might make some sense.

The theory behind this approach is, first, that a tripod might get in the way of other patrons of whatever public space is involved.  However, with handheld shots, one may need a much faster shutter speed to avoid camera shake.  That translates, in turn, to a higher ISO in some cases to establish the desired depth of field called for by the composition.  Finally, using a telephoto gives you the opportunity to capture shots further away than would be available with a macro lens, which is generally limited to very tight closeups.

I have a (mediocre) 70-300 mm telephoto lens, and my camera does allow me to set a combination of ranges for shutter speed and ISO and the camera then does the calculations to establish the proper overall exposure.  So I decided to give the technique a try on my next visit to the Mitchell Park Domes.  This was my experience.

First, I soon found myself looking for photo opportunities that were further off the paths that run through the botanical domes than I had been looking in the past.  This was the biggest advantage of this approach.  On the other hand, there were also disadvantages.  One was that my telephoto lens is more limited in its largest aperture setting than is my macro lens.  In short, the telephoto is not as "fast" as my macro, and as a result I needed to increase the ISO more than would have been the case with my macro.  Compounding this issue was the fact that, because everything was handheld, I had to keep the shutter speed relatively fast, and this also required raising the ISO rating.  As a result of all this, there was a lot more ISO "noise" in the shots I got than would have been the case with my macro, though this noise is hard to detect at the resolution I use for the blog.  Moreover, I "cheated" a bit on the shutter speed and some (actually quite a few) of the shots evidenced camera shake.  Finally, my macro simply has better resolution than does my telephoto, and so the shots I got weren't quite as crisp as I would have gotten with my macro.

OK, so what did I get?  As anyone knows who has visited the domes, there is a show dome, a desert dome, and a tropical dome.  In the show dome spring floral displays were in prominence (something that is a long way off still for anything growing in the great outdoors).  That included a profusion of easter lilies.  In this case I decided to take a shot of the backs of a couple of blossoms.

Not bad, actually, and at an aperture of f/5.6, I was able to isolate the flowers adequately from the background.  Technically, this was one of the better shots.

And here is a shot of a multi-colored tulip (as well as others).

In this case, even with the lens at a wide-open f/4.5, I felt the background was too distracting.  Just too many flowers.  However, this tulip was several feet off the path, and I never would have considered shooting it with my macro.

I took the following shot in the Desert Dome of a tangle of vines (or whatever).

Not exactly a macro shot, considering the size of the vines, but again I would not have taken this shot, which is at least mildly interesting I think, if I had only had my macro.

On the other hand, I have taken the following shot any number of times.

I found out I had to keep backing up to get this shot in focus, as the minimum focal distance for the telephoto lens is just under five feet (compared with a minimum focal distance of under three inches for my macro).  This was shot with the lens at f/5.6, which was plenty to blur out the background.

And here is a shot in black & white of a desert plant that was probably 35 feet away and that I never could have gotten with my macro.

I just liked contrast between the spikes that are projecting toward the camera and the vertical spikes serving as background.

Then it was on to the Tropical Dome.  The following banana leaf simply would not have been available with my macro--too far away.  On the other hand, the image is not as crisp as it could have been, due mostly to camera shake.

Nor would I have taken the following shot which was essentially a vertical shot of the top of one of the tropical trees in the dome.

I liked the following shot of interwoven ferns.  This was probably my favorite shot of the series, and frankly could have been taken with my macro and tripod.

And here is shot of a tropical leaf that I liked because of the way it was opening up.

Finally, I intended the following shot all along as an abstract.  

I set it up with a wide open lens at f/5.6 focused on the front edge of one of the leaves.  This allowed everything else to go out of focus, creating the soft image I was seeking.  I felt I had to establish at least one point of focus to prevent the entire photo from looking like just a poorly focused shot.  I think it worked.  

I'm not sure I am going to repeat this experiment.  If I do, I will bring along my tripod to improve the technical quality of the shots.

John