Lunchtime In the Rain

Today's post includes  photos from Carondolet Park in South St. Louis and images from a classical public library in South St. Louis the Carondolet Branch of the St. Louis Public Library at 6800 Michigan Ave. Hope you enjoy. Please leave me comments if you like or dislike my work. I am working on slowing things down an making compositions. These images have had minimum post shoot processing. I willl adjust the contrast, crop, do some aligment. I have recently been removing the camera distortion much the way you might with a large format view camera that has shift and tile. I am planning on working with the Graflex Super Graphic that I have now very soon. I am interseted to see how I can manipulate selective focus with the view/press camera. Thanks!

Footbridge

Tall Pine

Footbridge and Ducks

Classical

Public Cornice Black and White

Public Cornice Color

Column Capital

JEAN-CLAUDE BERENS

Urban Visions Web Site



In my many searches for inspiration I came across this site. These are meticulously crafted HDR images of urban decay, architecture and landscapes. He is a self taught European photographer who lives in Luxembourg. Amazing stuff.


http://www.urbanvisions.lu/

Today's post is again from the garden of death. Bellfontaine Cemetary.

Today's post explores a wide interest in the built environment and architecture as seen through the camera lens. Taken on a crisp sunny Saturday morning and within close proximity this series of photos display a wide range of imagery. From urban shotgun houses to silver chemical storage tanks to a stately classical gate denoting an elite neighborhood. If you like these images please comment. I would love to know you impressions of my work. As a photographer I find the images compelling. The tanks are very sculptural. Like modern abstract sculpture they are pure in form. They remind me of organ pipes on a distorted scale. The column capital is pure classical architecture from a time when rules and specifics defined art and beauty. Rules that are no longer applicable for either art or architecture today. Yet these classical, formal details do posses and convey  a very real sense of order that cannot and should not be ignored.

Flora Place Gate

Corinthian Capital

Details

Hey Brother!

Organ Pipes

Tanks

Factory I

Factory II

Lone Shotgun

Keeping up with the Jones's

For those who are familiar with St. Louis. The tanks and the shotgun houses are in the Forest Park Southeast neighborhood. a neighborhood that is seeing considerable redevelopment and revitalization. Yet the "old" neighborhood and the "new" are in great tension. There was a double homicide one block away from where the "shotgun"  houses were photographed. Reminding us that our city and our society are in constant push pull of evolution.

Photos From the Dead of Winter

Baroque

Very Crisp

Patchwork

Factory Color

Factory Black and White

Nothing left to advertise!

Storm Day

Clouds in the Garden

Chapel

Cornice

Tonight's post contains a number of photos I have taken recently. The lighting at this time of  year has long shadow and sharp colors. The weather has been unusual for December and January, brighter, warmer and clearer then normal. These shots include more from the "garden of death" as I call it as well as architecture from around St. Louis. Included some shots of an old factory now imprisoned in chain link.