Fall – Photo 52 Project [Week 44]

I tried my hand at HDR again this week and it just didn’t work out. I am bracketing shots from -3 to +3 and the end result always looks fuzzy and poorly defined. That is the opposite of what HDR is for. I tried a few different places but I think the leaves were moving on the trees too much, or maybe I just didn’t have enough light. It was late afternoon and the daylight savings time change threw me off a bit.

I vow that before the end of my project, I will post an HDR image I can be proud of! Here are some leaves instead.

Progress – Photo 52 Project [Week 43]

Memorial Hospital is adding a huge addition and Mari Ann said I might be able to get a good shot. As you can see, a lot of my photos are at night. That must have something to do with my proclivity towards procrastination. Really, I have always enjoyed the beauty that only nighttime can show. Other than star photography, most of what you can photograph is man made. We can only see what we are meant to see, or what we have chosen to make visible. Everything else is covered in the shadows.

I can’t help but think about the view from a plane at night. Everything appears so orderly, and so peaceful. Most of the Midwest is dark, peppered with concentrations of amber luminance. There are cars slowly moving around inside towns, like they are being drawn via Etch-a-Sketch.

The Memorial Medical Center Expansion Project will add new rooms, ORs, and other features to the hospital while also managing to piss of my girlfriend while she struggles even more to find a parking place. The thing I find most interesting is their initiative to move to all private rooms. When you are sick, that last thing you need is to have a shitty roommate to make things even worse.

Decorations – Photo 52 Project [Week 42]

For about 5 years now I have been passing a house near my office that goes all out for Halloween.  Tonight I decided to head out there and get some photos. It felt strange taking pictures of someone’s house. I kept to the public sidewalk and setup my camera and tripod. Not too far into shooting, I could see people inside looking out the window at me. Just a quick glance and back behind the curtain they went. I waved to hopefully show that I was taking pictures of admiration, rather than disgust. Just a few moments later I was greeted by the creator of these decorations. I let him know that I was doing a photo project and just wanted to add his house to my collection.

It turns out that the guy was very hospitable and even offered to let me get a better shot up close. He talked to my girlfriend and me about how the decorations worked and that, closer to Halloween, each item would become animated. Apparently, his display has stirred up a bit of controversy in the past. While most of the neighborhood seems not to mind, some have been offended. He mentioned that the SJR wrote about it a couple of years back. Sure enough, a bit of Googleing led me to this article in the paper. He received complaints that he was being racist and insensitive to people who have had loved ones commit suicide by hanging. I have no doubt that some people would find the display offensive but there still seems to be a clear line between realism and fantasy.

I got the impression that his goal was to be spooky and to provoke a little harmless fear in us for October. The dummies are wearing masks and there are snarky tombstones sprinkled about the property with corny sayings written on them. This exposition seems to be all about fun and getting people out of their comfort zones rather than attempting to be intentionally controversial. Halloween is fun, so why not have a little fun with it?