Photographer in Colorado

On Wednesday, we had an unusually late Spring snow storm. This year, winter hung around for a long time, so spring was very late. There was not much more than an inch or two of snow. On my way to work, my attention was drawn to the contrast of the white of the snow against the green of the grass.

May Snow Storm

The lateness of spring was especially noticeable with the absence of leaves in the trees. These trees usually have a mass or rich green leaves at this time of the year.

Spring Leaves In Snow Storm

Passing by Samson Park (see last week’s post) there was a Winter Wonderland, with mist still close to the ground with a dark sky as a backdrop. The white of the snow on the ground contrasted with the shiny wet, orange-brown path. The snow also allowed the blue fence behind the statue to stand out from the background. The street lighting was still powered on, giving the globes a hint of orange.

Samson Park In The Mist

Getting close gives a slightly different perspective of this snow covered steel bench.

Snow Bench In Samson Park

Leaving the park, and crossing the street, I spotted these folks on smoke break.

Smoke Breakers In The Snow

Down by the office, were this pink blossoms, sprinkled with a covering of snow.

Pink Snow-Covered Blossoms

Up close, these blossoms were dripping with melting snow.

Pink Blossom With Melting Snow

Time to leave the outdoors behind… to the day job.

Returning from work, I passed this Canada Goose. Reminded me of last week when the geese were agitated. Perhaps this is the same one?

Goose And Pond

Returning from work, I pass Samson Park every day. This park has statues and scenes from “Alice In Wonderland” (I made images of some of these in an earlier post — see Queen of Hearts). This structure had been erected last week.

New Building Style

Like Alice, I wondered what it’s purpose was. I was sucked in through this novel doorway. Looking out, this is what we see. Maybe it is incomplete, like the exterior?

Novel Doorway

There are some unusual structures in the park, including this nest-like sculpture. Of course, several birds had decided to build their nest in the upper reaches.

Nest In Wonderland

By the time I reached the light rail station, the light was low enough to cast these shadows onto the overpass wall. This reminds me of a similar image that I made some years ago, where a tree cast a shadow on a brick wall, with both the tree and shadow in the image.

Light Rail Station Shadows

Here is a view of the light that cast the shadow on the wall. I rather like the graphic nature of the patterns of the underside of the overpass with the foreground lights.

Light Rail Lighting

By the fountains were these folks sharing a story. Or perhaps a picture on a cell phone?

Meeting At The Fountain

By this time, I could see the train approaching the station, so I hurried to board. After making my way back to the parking garage, I was captivated by the setting sun falling on the DU buildings. The gold roofing of the spire reflected the warm sunlight.

Denver University At Sunset

Wednesday, last week, Joe McNally came to Convention Center to present his “Location Lighting Techniques” seminar. Having read and enjoyed both of Joe’s books, I took the day off work to attend this presentation.

His books are written in a conversational style, just like this seminar. We got to see Joe and his assistants setup lights and shoot photographs. He was shooting tethered, so images we projected onto two giant screens for all to see. The seminar covered the use of off-camera strobe lighting with speedlights – “The Strobist Way” – see here. Joe covered everything from single flash to two flash setups, right up to multiple flash units.

Joe had two models, Lindsay and Solomon, who were subjects for the duration of the seminar. During the course of the seminar, one of Joe’s assistants made one image, that you will find on his Twitter site. Joe had tweeted the event and put a link to some of the images that he made on his blog. You can see images of his two models on this site.

I took the opportunity to make some images during the course of the day. Outside the Convention Center is this Blue Bear.

Blue Bear

I made these images shortly after arriving at the Convention Center. It looks like the bear was admiring the “saucers” behind the glass.

Blue Bear And Saucers

Here we can see him looking in.

Blue Bear Up Close

I had forgotten to bring a writing implement for note taking. During the lunch break, when I took the opportunity to walk over to 16th Street where I bought a pencil. Returning to the Convention Center, I passed the strata bar.

In The Stratosphere

Arriving back at the Convention Center, I noticed the reflections of a building under construction in the rectangular glass panels.

Convention Center Reflections

After the seminar ended, I meandered back to 16th Street. I noticed the spring flowers growing from these colorful pots.

Springtime Pots

On the way to the light rail station, I heard calls from the alleyway. Here I met three colorful characters, Hodge, Rico and Mad — I hope I got their names right. They insisted I make some images of them partying in the alley.

Colorful Characters

Finally, I arrived at the station to take the train back home.

When walking back from work this week, a pair of resident Canada Geese were chasing one another. Perhaps one of them was making a move on the third goose. Maybe they are part of an immature flock. By the time I reached them, this one goose was visibly agitated, shaking its tail from side to side. It is probably too late in the season to start mating. There are other geese outside our office building that have been sitting on the nest for over 3 weeks — incubation is about 4 weeks, so they should be hatching soon.

Agitated Goose

Continuing back to the light rail station, the Freshii deli had packed up for the day. These new chairs were neatly stacked outside the deli.

Freshii Chairs

Here is close-up showing detail around the shiny new chrome work.

Freshii Chrome

Looking backwards, I framed the wing of the building with one of the arches, also revealing the stormy sky reflecting from the office windows.

Stormy Sky Reflections

Looking up, the blue sky was reflected from these windows.

Office Window Detail

Outside the light rail station is this tower that has display panels showing a slide show. Here I made an image of the reflection of this tower in the office windows. “They Went That Way” proclaimed the child on the display monitors.

They Went That Way

I made my way down to the station for the trip homeward bound.

Thursday started out with a drizzle. While waiting for the train at DU, I noticed that bike racks had been installed at one end of the station. This is one of several bike racks scattered throughout the city that offer bikes for hire. Soon after spotting the bikes, I noticed the train entering the station, and had to work quickly. Later while walking to the office, the drizzle turned into driving rain, drenching my clothes and filling my shoes with water. Most of the day was spent wearing socks while the shoes were drying. A tornado warning was issued that afternoon, forcing everyone to take to the stairwells. Thursday was “Bring Your Child To Work Day”, so we had several children that had made the office their playground for the day.

Denver Bikes For Hire

On Friday, while running an errand after work, I drove past Pearl Street, where I noticed some murals. After the errand, I returned to get more bicycle material! The wall of the bike store is adorned with a mural advertising their wares.

Bicycle Mural

Meandering down Pearl Street, several brick walls were painted with murals.

Where Are My Leaves?

Signs of spring were all around. This bush, covered in yellow blossoms, is located near another brick wall that has several murals advertising several stores.

Old South

This last weekend was “Doors Open Denver”, an event held downtown every year to celebrate architecture and history. I was hosting an informal Photoshop and Lightroom workshop on Saturday. One attendee mentioned the event, so Angela and I decided to take the opportunity to visit. We must have been hiding under a rock, because we had only heard about the event the day before! On Sunday, we took the light rail to downtown and took the shuttle to Union Station to collect an events program. From there, Angela and I meandered through Lodo, visiting some of the older buildings.

This included a visit to the Firehouse on Blake Street. The last time that I had been there was when our office was located there (ROIDirect.bomb, 2000). The first floor is now occupied by architects. Way back in 2000, we occupied this floor and also offices on third floor.

Eventually, we got to the Daniels and Fisher Tower. The tower houses several offices. Tours to the top floor were held on this weekend. The lobby of tower has these European classic style ceilings, in white with blue, pink and beige accent colors.

Daniels and Fisher Ceiling

Here is another view of the ceiling and one of the pillars.

Daniels and Fisher Ceiling and Pillar

We had joined an un-ticketed line of visitors, hoping to take an elevator ride to the top floor. Unfortunately, we had arrived too late to get tickets and probably would probably not be able to join the tour since closing time was approaching. We decided to bail, continuing to visit other sights. Outside on 16th Street, the D&F Tower made a dramatic reflection in the opposing building.

Daniels and Fisher Tower

We made our way towards the Platte River. Several visitors from nearby neighborhood were making use of Commons Park. Several dogs were being exercised by there owners, chasing branches being tossed into the Platte River.

After taking a break, we headed back to 16th Street, passing the Millennium Bridge. This is an interesting structure, pictured here with a streetlight in the foreground. More information on this structure can be found by searching Wikipedia.

Millennium Bridge Mast

The Tattered Cover bookstore was a port of call, where we had some coffee and cookies, and browsed through some books and magazines. After leaving, Angela stopped by this western store while I hung around. Outside the store was this clothes rack, stocked with colorful shirts.

Colorful Clothes Rack

Horses and carriages ply up and down 16th Street, waiting for fare paying customers. They were parked outside this store.

16th Street Horse (and Carriage)

Another horse appeared to be rather skittish and would not keep still. Despite this, I still managed to capture this image of his (or hers), feet and shoes.

Furry Feet

Finally, on our way back to the light rail station, we passed this street artist, busy creating a work of art. He had an array of cans of spray paint that was his media of choice. Surrounding him an audience had assembled to view his work and his progress.

16th Street Artist

We decided that next year, we would have to make an earlier start to the Doors Open event.

Earlier this week, I purchased several bell peppers at the grocery store. I took care to select some peppers that were contorted. This morning, at breakfast, I took two of these bell peppers out of the fridge. Later after they had warmed up, losing the layer of condensation, I decided to try my hand. I had been pondering Edward Weston’s Pepper No 30. I set out the peppers on a sheet of white foam core and used a reflector to fill in the shadows. I made several images with this set up on the dining table. The white background offered by the foam core was not a good idea. So I came in closer to isolate a smaller area.

Two Peppers

Edward Weston shot his peppers in monochrome. I wonder how that would look?

Pepper Number Two?

Later this evening, I reviewed Edward Weston’s image. The dark background makes a huge difference to the success of his image. I will have to try something darker the next time. The one pepper is no longer whole, having been chopped up into a salad.

Earlier in the week, I purchased a bunch of irises. Our cat, Jasper, loves to play with fresh flowers, so they were placed in a vase well out of reach. Down came the vase for some experiments. I always enjoy photographing irises; we have planted in the garden and see them bloom every spring. Irises reveal many sensual shapes — this flower was no exception.

Sensual Iris

From another point of view…

Another View

“Good Morning” greets this cheery flower.

Good Morning!

Finally, here are two irises dangling from the vase.

Dangling Irises