HDR Photography
I recently returned to this shot from 2015 to reprocess the original raw for a calendar of B&W images for St. Lawrence. While it may not have Iwan Baan‘s level of people in the image, the bicycle adds a nice sense of quiet, human scale to the setting.
A visit to my home town of Clarendon Hills brought a surprise: the unremarkable train station from the mid-twentieth century has been replaced by a modern station and platform with a lot more greenery and some really interesting materials.
The station itself uses both lacquered rails (on the left) and wooden slats at odd intervals (Fibonacci-esque, but I didn’t measure to be sure.)
A Saturday morning rain left streams of water through Berkeley’s Normandy village and smudges on my camera lens, but when it was done, the sunlight perfectly spotlit the entrance to my apartment beneath a blue sky.
Berkeley’s Normandy Village was constructed as a sort of “Disneyland version” of a French village, but being constructed in the early twentieth century, it included covered car parking spaces. The challenge, of course, is that the size of the average automobile has grown substantially in the past 100 years. “Compact” and “mid-size” cars barely fit; only the Mazda Miata at the left size of the image looks properly at home in its bay.
From its perch in the hills above New Paltz, Mohonk Mountain House has an exceptional view on clear days.
Unlike the generally empty dorms of St. Lawrence over winter break, Sykes is home to many of our international students who remain on campus. The traditional architecture seems natural under a crust of ice, with a sort of “Harry Potter staying at Hogwarts” vibe.
While Prague Castle’s position on a hilltop is apparent from the south side, the opposite side of the fortress is equally isolated from its surroundings by a steep and wooded hillside.
This greenhouse was adjacent to the Royal Gardens in Prague Castle. Though I assume that its mission is to nurture and prepare specimens to join the garden, the exotic incongruity of a geodesic cylinder amid centuries-old castle grounds makes it a far more exciting find than I expected.
Bright stone buildings on the banks of Prague’s Vltava River contrast with the deep blues and greens of the surrounding nature.
Can you guess which of the buildings in this shot is referred to (mostly accurately) as “the only new building in Old Town”?
The buildings of Prague at dusk have a warm glow that I think the HDR technique captures perfectly.
As the evening grows chilly, is anything more welcoming than a Bohemian café?
Though it may be a semi-intended consequence of Manhattan’s zoning rules regarding floor space, setbacks, and public space, public art in downtown Manhattan is still refreshing. Jean Dubuffet’s Groupe de Quatres Arbres and its curving lines fits so nicely against the linear structure of the building behind it that I’m naturally drawn in.
Human structures—food trucks and skyscrapers—side by side on a Manhattan Sunday morning provide a striking statement on the possible scales of fabrication.
I often show what I think of as the front of Johnson Hall of Science, but inspection of this image (particularly the top of the brick wing on the left) shows that the building’s name, and thus its front, are on this side. The dramatic glass structures extending between and out from the wings lend credence to the idea.
Cityscapes were the images that first really drew me to photography—those images with seemingly infinite detail. Zooming deeper and deeper reveals trees and cars and people down at street level. Surpassing the current limits in this respect will probably mean a new camera (or a real commitment to multi-shot panoramas.)
