Morning Walk Shots - 5
There’s something about returning to places again and again to photograph them. It brings a familiarity that helps you overcome the newness of a place. That allows you to gain a deeper understanding of a place and, photographically, it forces you to push yourself to go beyond just the obvious photographs. Sometimes a visit will be incredibly frustrating, sometimes several visits in a row, but eventually you break through and realize that even the same thing you’ve photographed before offers something different, or if not quite different, that you didn’t do it justice the first time. That’s why during our bigger trips, while we always included some new places to explore, we made sure we revisited familiar ones as well. And that’s why places like Brice Creek and the Painted Hills were so great. Different conditions could dramatically change the place, particularly the Painted Hills
So it’s been with that in mind that I’ve continued to bring the Q2MR along on my morning walks, and at the same time told myself I didn’t have to constantly vary my routes. Ann and I have settled on several different routes we take on our walks, but they’re not radical differences and generally they overlap in parts. More importantly, I told myself not to dismiss any images I’d made before because I may well see things differently this time . . . or next.
One of the locations where that was true is a house not far from ours. After I’d made that first photograph of the shadows on the wall next to it, I’d passed by the house and it really seemed like nothing. But then one morning it just looked different. Maybe it was because the light off-camera flicked off and then back on, but I decided that I should photograph it from across the street. Just because.
Shadow House
I think it’s the textures created by the various architectural elements and the shadows that they create is what draws me to this image. Nothing special, but a nice collection of elements that rewards the eye’s investigation.
These images are selected photographs from several different day’s walks. As the newness of photographing things hand-held at night has worn off, I’ve started to become a bit more demanding of what I’m photographing. Like with this image, I’ve photographed it on several walks now, mostly unsuccessfully. I think this is the closest to what I was originally thinking, in terms of a night photograph
Cristiano’s Circle
Though I still have an image in mind that must be made in the early morning. This is an odd building that Ann and I have talked quite a bit about. It seems out of place, a modern, reflective curved cylinder that doesn’t really look like much, unless it’s early morning (or we suspect right towards sunset). Then its walls come alive with colors and, when there are clouds out, textures. I don’t know if that can be captured in a black and white image, but I’ll try. For now, that feeling of this massive structure at night and the interesting mix of lines and curves and signs that surround it, was enough for me to make several attempts to get it right.
Other images come from roughly the same location, but looking in another direction. I’ve photographed down-hill on this stone street, this time I decided to walk from the end of the alley and photograph up-hill.
Rua do Outeiral
And then there’s the post office (CTT) building that I’ve photographed several times before, and will again and I’m sure will again after that. For such a nondescript building, it offers so much. And that’s the point, to look at something again and again and to discover more and more. We actually “see” so little that is there around us that the effort to do so is incredibly rewarding.
Do Not Enter
The same is true for the alley across the post office. It is nothing more than a short cut for cars with no side walks for pedestrians, but it’s a route Ann and I take all the time because, at least for me, it’s an interesting space.
Travessa Fonte Seca a.k.a. Rua de Valbom
And then there are things you see totally anew, that make you wonder why you never thought about them as images before. Like this recently completed circle not far from our house. The graphic nature of the concrete islands and painted stripes grab the eye so much, how could I have not really looked at it that way before?
Worten
And then there are images that you realize are mere feet from what you’ve photographed before, and while they may look the similar, it’s not really the same image nor has the same qualities. And that’s not just because of the religious festival decorations.
The Three Churches (and one unseen)
And then sometimes it’s as simple as the advertisers changing the advert sign at the bus stop that gets you to look at a subject yet again.
Full Moon Over Obi-Wan
There’s nothing wrong with that!
So I suspect I’ll keep carrying my camera along with me on my walks just in case my eye decides it wants to explore something.