February is over.  Week 8 is complete, and I feel pretty good about it.  This week’s photo prompt was “forsaken,” so I headed down to my favorite dilapidated building in Linton only to find that it was recently demolished.  Forsaken indeed.  Backup plan was just go to one of the most photographed places in all of Portland and try to take some semblance of an original photo there.

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The first photo I took this roll is one of my favorites.
I love how much it has going on.  So many layers.
The tree frames the scene well,
and the St.Johns bridge makes  a nice cameo in the background.
Also, this Airstream van is one of the most “foresaken” things I saw all day.

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Another thing I have been interested in is taking photos with the sun as a subject.
I really enjoy sun-rays filtering through trees, as well as the shadows of the trees.
having a small aperture, something slightly filtering the sun, and a fast aperture seems to help the photo not be too blown out.
I looked at a lot of photos of the bridge and didn’t find too many that looked exactly like this, so the sun-rays also help set it apart from the millions of other photos taken here.

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Another pleasing photo!
I love the green/blue cool color combo, also I am pleased with the color pallete.
The bridge really is a lovely piece of infrastructure
The clouds do a great job of framing the bridge,
The lines from the bottom left to top right lead the eye through the photo nicely.

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Another photo of the sun.
Again, I am pleased with the sun-rays and the way the sun hits the camera.
This photo was a bit tricky to color-correct due to extremes of light and dark
It’s very high contrast may be better for black and white,
Though I do think it is an interesting photo, and I love how forgiving color film is compared to digital photos.
If I took this photo on my digital camera, I think there is no way I would capture any detail of the bridge across the water, or the subtlety in the two rows of trees or the buildings across the river.

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I saw this couple sitting on the bench and I walked right up to them from pretty far off.
They are very small in the photo, but I like their symmetry and the sense of scale they provide.
The exposure is perfect, the light is good, but it is lacking something…
Maybe it feels like this image or something like it has been made too many times.
Maybe it is too busy, or the trees are missing something.
I’m not sure, there is just something about this photo that doesn’t really excite me.
B-

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Hey!  Another photo taken directly into the sun.
This may be the least interesting of them all.
Though this boat did appear to be pretty forsaken, I don’t think I captured that.
I was obviously more interested in the little golden Roman dude.
The photo itself, kinda interesting, sun is cool, has sun-rays.
Subject: boat/hood ornament… Is it worth taking a photo of?  Maybe.
Is it my favorite photo ever: nah.
Would I choose this photo to show to friends outside of this blog?  mmmaybe.

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I wish I was closer to this Love sign
Also, this boat is way more interesting than the last.
I wish I was closer to that boat.
The dock is private and it belongs to this place called Green Anchors.
I need to go visit this place some time, I think there are a lot of good photo opportunities there.
Water/sky/clouds/reflection and exposure/color are all pretty okay though.
This one is a tossup if it would make it to my Instagram feed.

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Another outsider view of the Green Anchors compound.
There are other businesses there too.
And this photo definitely gives off a forsaken vibe.
I like the sign, a lot, and the barbwire is pretty nice too.
However; everything else seems pretty busy/jumbled.
I think this photo would be better if it was less busy.

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I hate this photo.
I think the shutter speed being so slow did something
Also, the light is weird.  I failed to make it look good.
It kind of falls flat.
One thing worth noting, is there are about 10 people at different places in this photo, I think most of them were photographers.

I am glad to have ticked it off my list of places to photograph, I am happy with some of the first photos I took there.
Though there are many opportunities to take cliche photos like the one above, these well photographed locations have some muse-like qualities to them that inspire and challenge me to create interesting photos.  Just knowing that millions of photos are snapped in one location creates a sense of competition – I feel like I have to work harder in these places to make my photo stand out in some way.  I obviously failed with this garbage photo, but I think my photo with the Airstream is notable and unique. This feels nice.

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O wow.
This is also the best photo of the roll.
Really happy with the exposure, model, creepy eye-holes.
Many of us in the pizza world have taken pizza-as-mask photos.
I think the one that sets this apart is that it was taken outside in the real world,
Not in the safety of a pizza restaurant.

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Another photo of what appeared to be something in the forsaken category.
Car on blocks with busted window and no tires.
Though it probably just belongs to one of these people,
I like to imagine the wheels were stolen
The photo does tell some sort of story though
I was really happy with the light of the setting sun on these houses,
This photo would be way better if the car was lit as well.

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Last photo of the roll is across the street from the car with no wheels.
The sun looked really cool on these buildings.
There is a lot of empty space though.
The photo may have been better if I moved my tripod, not in the middle of the road, as I am wont to do, but off to the side of the road, and focused more on the way the sun hits the buildings and the sunset.
It feels like there is a lot of dead space in this photo, and not the cool minimalist kind.
Well, it was a fun and productive week overall.  I have really enjoyed scanning and editing these photos.  My techniques keep changing, and I like to think I am improving. Tomorrow I am going to the beach and I am hoping for some sort of beautiful Oregon Coast sunset photos.
I have no idea what my next week’s photo prompt is supposed to be, but I do know I will be taking a lot of photos this weekend.