Photographer in Colorado

Yesterday was the end of another week of rain. Last night I headed down to the Metro State College Campus for some late evening and night photography. Soon after arriving, I made my way to this fountain located outside one of the English Department cottages.

Fountain, Metro State

As I made photographs, the rain started. That was the second rain storm that caught me during the day. In the early afternoon, I was in downtown Denver when hail and rain fell. At one intersection, there was a pool of water some 12 inches of water — water was erupting out of a manhole cover in the street.

Back to last night. I took shelter on the porch of the cottage to wait for the storm to pass. While waiting, I noticed the S-shape of the path in front of the cottage; the street lighting was reflected off the wet sidewalk.

Raining On Path, Metro State

After the rain passed, I resumed walking through the campus. At this location, a line of street lights lead to the tower in Elitch’s.

Looking Towards Elitch’s Tower

The tall buildings in downtown reflected the twilight remaining in the sky after the sunset.

Downtown Denver, After The Rain

Here is another image with three outdoor sculptures lining the walkways.

Sidewalk Reflections, Metro State

I headed in the general direction of the Elitch’s tower. As I walked, I noticed the image on the back of the camera that showed out of focus bokeh on the monitor. This looked interesting, so I setup the camera on tripod and created the following composition of the lights and walkway reflections.

Reflections And Lights, Metro State

Continuing down the walkway, I arrived at the Tivoli. After scouting some locations, I composed this image, with the two rocks in the foreground.

Tivoli, After The Rain

This was the last image before heading back home.

This last week has been full of Spring storms. Yesterday morning, storm clouds starting building over the Front Range. This would mean that the Eastern Plains would get stormy weather during the afternoon. So I headed off to Kiowa to experience the stormy weather among wide open plains. South of Kiowa, it was raining. I waited by a single lane bridge along country road 102 until the skies cleared to make this image of the water glistening on on the bridge, with the clearing storm in the distance.

Single Lane Bridge Over Road 102

I meandered through the plains, heading in a south eastern direction until I encountered country road 90. Along the side of the road were trees that were starting to leaf. At this point I started shooting infra-red to capture the bright green grasses, contrasting against the clearing blue skies.

Trees And Departing Storm Along County Road 90

On the north side of the road was a depression that had filled with water.Red-winged blackbirds were busy among the cattails. There appeared to be a carcass floating in the water near to the tree on the left of the pond.

Pond Along County Road 90

It always pages to take a look in all directions when shooting images. The storm was moving off towards the east. In this image I captured the low clouds above the grassy plains, below the dark skies.

Departing Storm, At County Road 90

Further along I found an abandoned ranch house on 85 road. I last visited this location in June of 2012, where I made images inside this same house. See Abandoned House on 85 Road, for more images.

Abandoned Ranch House On County Road 85, No 2

After shooting in this location, I headed back in the late afternoon. Along road 81, I stopped to make some images of this barn.

Barn Late Afternoon, County Road 81

At this time of day, the light was magical. By now the skies had cleared to reveal blue skies that I captured above the road in this image.

Big Skies On Eastern Plains, County Road 81

Heading north, I eventually reached the highway east of Kiowa. The sun was setting at this point, lighting up the clouds with a fiery red.

Clouds At Sunset, Kiowa

This week has been a week of wet stormy weather that culminated in a snow storm last night. Yesterday night after leaving the gym, I made these images of reflections from the wet parking lot. I added an intentional blur to spread the reflected street lights over a larger image area.

Parking Lot Reflection Blur

The rain had just started to change into snow. I made several images, including the following one with a diagonal blur.

Stormy Reflection Blur

Here is another image without intentional blurring. One can see the streaks caused by the falling snow in this image.

Glow In The Parking Lot

After leaving the parking garage, I headed down Colorado Blvd. I shot this image through the windshield as the lights changed.

Colorado Blvd Traffic Light Reflections

Spring in Colorado usually has lots of stormy days. This last week was no exception. Today I headed out to the eastern plains near Bennett. To the south were spectacular storm clouds. Stopping along County Road 30, I made this image.

Storm Over County Road 30

I walked further down the road to find a composition that included rows of corn.

Storm Over Corn Fields, Near Bennett

After exploring some other roads in the area, I headed back to Bennett and then to Watkins. Both towns have grain elevators, but there was less clutter around the elevators at Watkins, where I made this image.

Watkins Grain Elevator

Along the railroad is a row of silos.

Silos, Watkins

Soon after making this image, I heard the horn of an approaching Union Pacific freight train. However, I failed to get a decent image as it thundered through the town.

Yesterday, I headed to downtown, across Cherry Creek from Sunken Gardens Park. After parking the car, it looked like this might be an interesting area to make some images. The following teaser image was made towards the end of the shoot in an alley behind Santa Fe Blvd.

Santa Fe Boulevard Alley Mural

After parking, I made my way across Cherry Creek and picked a street. An apartment block was under construction, where I found these pipe ends. Looks like they are part of scaffolding to support flooring or ceilings.

Pipe Ends

Meandering through the neighborhood, I found street lights that were lit under dark overcast skies.

Downtown Street Lights

The alley ways served as entrances to many parking garages serving apartments. I was intrigued by these two “eyes” looking down at me. The mirrors were located right outside the doors to a garage.

Parking Garage Mirror Eyes

Nearer the art museum was a shuttered building that had some interesting backdoor graffiti.

Backdoor Graffiti

After circling through some streets, I found myself back near the pipe ends. The street and surrounding sidewalks were covered with markings. Someone must know what all those marks mean!

Need More Color On The Street

Later I headed towards the Convention Center and across back to the other side of Cherry Creek heading down Santa Fe Blvd. Here I passed next to “Play and Bark”, a dog boarding house. This mauve/purple color really made this building stand out.

Bark And Play

Heading down Santa Fe, I reached the art district. Here is an area where there are many murals in the alleys. The following is the end of the mural that appears on the top of this post.

Santa Fe Alley Mural, Continued

After heading down the alley, I made my way back to the parked car. Across the street from a school, I found this pair of camping chairs on the porch.I carefully composed this image so that one can see the reflection of the school bus. Also making sure I was not reflected in the window glass.

A Pair Of Camping Chairs

That was the final image that I made before heading out to the airport to meet Angela on her return flight.

Did you know that Denver has so many blue buildings? Yesterday afternoon, I headed to downtown Denver to make find something interesting. As I passed by Union Station, where previously I have made many images — mostly at night. This time I headed up the stairs at the eastern end of the station. The station has an interesting roof that has an oval opening over most of the platform. With a wide angle lens I made this image that attempts to get the roof with the distant buildings.

Union Station, Under Overcast Clouds

The roof is supported by cantilevers. At the base are rows of arches. While walking through the arches, a biker rider following behind me had to make a detour to go around. In this image, I waited until he passed back through the arch in front of me.

Bike Rider, Threading Through Arches, Union Station

Leaving the station, I made this image, with the blue building in the background.

Union Station Arches And Blue Windows

Heading over towards the light rail station, were another two blue apartment buildings. These two blue buildings now became more noticeable!

Blue Buildings Near Union Station

The rows of skylights in the foreground above, cover a below street walkway from the Amtrak station to the light rail station ahead of me. At the end of the walkway, escalators lead back to street level. I waited patiently outside the exit for a pedestrian to emerge. Shooting through the glass, I made this image.

Leaving The Escalator, Union Station

Crossing the mainline rail tracks, I stopped at the top of the bridge. Those blue buildings caught my attention again. Here is the blue Da Vita building across the street from two newer blue buildings!

Da Vita And Another Blue Building

I headed over the the skateboard park, where I attempted some poor attempts of capturing skateboarders and then crossed the Platte River. Walking back through the park, some more blue buildings!

Blue Apartment Buildings, Downtown Denver

I wonder why I never noticed all these blue buildings before. Then I remembered that I passed by them either at night or during the day with blue skies. Of course, yesterday was overcast, so the blue of the buildings really contrasted against the gray of the overcast skies!

Last night was the monthly Illuminate Workshops night shoot. This time we met at the Denver Art Museum, the same location that we did last year. I arrived early, before sunset, to make some images before dark. The Art Museum has pointed roofs. In this image, it looks like the roof has pierced the cloud!

Art Museum, Piercing The Cloud

Close to the museum, is one construction site where a redbrick build is being renovated. After walking around the block, I made this composition where the red brick contrast against reflections of a blue sky.

Red Brick And Windows

Clouds lit by the setting sun were reflected from the Alps building in the following image.

Alps Building At Sunset

While waiting for the photowalk to start, I made several images in the sunset light. In the following image, I used a longer lens to compress the perspective and included the clouds.

Public Library With Sunset Refections

The streets of downtown Denver have been offset from the remainder of the city by 45 degrees. This allows some interesting reflections to be captured. In the following image, the “Cash Register Building” (Wells Fargo Building) is reflected. I included the glow from a window in public library for this image.

Reflections Of Cash Register Building

Finally we got started with the photowalk. After making group shots, I made this image of the columns of the public library, making sure to include the sky at “blue hour”. Traffic lights were reflected off the side of the building, so I waited until the lights had changed from red to green for this image.

Public Library Columns, Blue Hour

In the following image, I used a wide angle lens, closing the aperture down so that the lights are rendered as starbursts in monochrome.

Denver Public Library Columns

We crossed the street to get to Civic Center Park. The amphitheater is lit with a mixture of tungsten and sodium lights.Lighting with different color temperatures provide for some interesting night shots. In this image, showing the curves of the granite steps, these were lit by orange from sodium lights above mixed with cooler tungsten from the side!

Civic Center Park Amphitheater Steps

The Denver City and County building was lit in red, white and blue. After making several images from different vantage points, I was intrigued by the building as seen through the trees. I made this image of the trees, with the tower of the building in the background.

Denver City And County Building Through The Trees

This was the final image that I made that night. It was time to get home for something to eat!