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Red Door – Photo 52 Project [Week 2]

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This week I decided to go for a trek in downtown Springfield, IL on Saturday afternoon. We were due for a cold front later in the day so I figured I had better get to it! I originally intended to get my passport then stop by the Hilton, Springfield’s only skyscraper, to go to the 30th floor to get my ears to pop. My right ear has been ringing for about a week now and it is starting to get to me and I thought maybe it just needed to pop. I went up and it helped until I came back down. Oh well, I had some camera gear with me so I decided to get some images.

At first I took a few perspective shots of the Hilton with bracketing for HDR. I didn’t have a tripod so the HDR didn’t come out. I was hoping that maybe the software would correct for no tripod but not what I was using. I got a decent single capture though and was pretty happy with that.

Being a relatively nice January day in the 50s or so I decided to venture out a bit farther. Just down the street I was waiting for a WALK signal and noticed a peculiar door on a Church. It was round, bright red, and beautiful. I zoomed in from across the street, dead center.

I later looked up the location and found that this door belongs to the First Presbyterian Church of Springfield. The door seems to be a focal point of the church as it is even incorporated into their website logo. I would like to see and photograph the inside some day as they apparently have some beautiful Tiffany glass.

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Hot Coffee – Photo 52 Project [Week 1]

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Let’s start the year off right with a nice hot cup of coffee on this cold winter day; brewed properly with our Bunn MCU I might add. I used my brother’s Canon 7D with the kit lens. It was very bright outside and that made for descent light conditions. I had to adjust the angle of the camera to accommodate for the steam. I needed to set it against the fence to give it some contrast and allow it to show up at all. Mari Ann helped me by pouring the milk in while I shot several photos. As luck would have it, some milk splashed just at the right moment. I like how the milk is a little blurry to give the photo a little more movement. I didn’t mean for this, and at 1/250 shutter I didn’t expect it either.

I have a long year and plenty of photos ahead of me. Don’t expect the rest to be posted within the first 24 hours. In fact, it might be better to expect a lot of down to the wire postings.  Technically, since I posted this one so soon, my next deadline is not until Friday, January 18th. I will have to shoot before then though by the end of the 14th.   I am keeping a list of ideas and have about a dozen already. Please comment with any suggestions.

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Photo 52 Project for 2013

Idiot's Guide to PhotographyThe new year is on the horizon and what better way to celebrate than by starting an unrealistic project I will never actually complete! For those who are unaware, a photo 52 project is when someone who want to be creative but like to procrastinate sets a goal of taking one picture a week and publishing it somewhere. In my case, my dusty blog will be my medium.

Here are the things that will most likely cause this project to fail:

  1. I an not good the whole “consistency” thing.
  2. I tire of my projects easily.
  3. I do not own a decent digital camera. (I will have to borrow from my brother)
  4. I am unorganized.
  5. I lead a boring, uneventful life.

Here are the things that will most likely cause this project to succeed:

  1. I got a wild hair about it.

I know if I don’t setup some sort of structure now I will make it up as I go along and that is a very bad thing.

Rules:

  1. A “week” will start on Tuesday and end on Monday. The 1st of the year is on a Tuesday.
  2. All photos must be published by the following Friday.
  3. All published photos must be taken within the week stated.
  4. All photos must be given a title.
  5. Exactly 52 individual photos must be published. No more, no less.
  6. I must take and produce each photo myself.

Hopefully, I will create a photo blog that I or people who know me can look at long from now and see how one year in my life went. I hope I make it through all right.

By the way, I am totally and unashamedly stealing this idea from my good friend, Nick Overstreet.