A Batch From Bellevue

Back from a week staying in the great city of Bellevue, WA. Very little time to get out and shoot. The Lamborghini Gallardo from the previous post was certainly a highlight. With some spare time one evening I took in some of the local architecture - lots of glass and steel.

This one makes me think of Frank Lloyd Wright. It's nothing more than a modern office-plex shot on its side. But has a FLW kind of feel:

A couple more scenes caught my eye as the sun got lower in the sky starting with this trio of receding buildings, overlapped and compressed...

In addition to all the steel and glass Bellevue has an abundance of greenery as is to be expected in the Pacific Northwest. The organic and inorganic are always butting up against each other...

There is a WHACK of glass in that town! In contrast, I noticed this garbage can against a monolith of concrete. Nothing overly exciting, but I took a gamble that it might look interesting with another HDR treatment and converted to black and white.

There's actually not much grit at all in Bellevue. Helluva nice place.

Suh-weet!

There are some certainties in life... Death. Taxes. And seeing an amazing street machine parked in front of my hotel-of-choice in beautiful Bellevue, Washington. Take this latest example that stopped me in my tracks this evening...


Money can't buy happiness my a$$. I can guarantee you wouldn't be able to wipe the smile off the face of whoever owns this piece of art.

Somebody Get Me a Bicycle

So I'm wandering the streets of Monaco when I stumble upon a set of rustic, old-world, concrete-and-stone stairs. They immediately struck me as a heavy black and white candidate, and I snapped this...


Aside from looking cool, with leading lines and graphic elements and loads of texture, the scene also reminded me of my favorite photograph by the late Henri Cartier-Bresson. Witness "Hyères, France, 1932":

© Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum

In my mind this is a perfect image. It has everything. And it reflects Cartier-Bresson's pursuit of the "decisive moment" where everything falls together in a single, fleeting instant.

Now, I'm not suggesting I have even an inkling of Cartier-Bresson in me. But if I would have had the time to wait for someone to walk through the upper left corner of that frame...

Another Lake, Another Dollar

After a couple of weeks back from vacation and with an otherwise open long weekend ahead of us we headed back to the lake. A very calm affair, and hopefully these sunset shots reflect that. More rocks. More long exposures. But a little bit of Zen as well.

Farewell

Going home today. Last chance for an early shoot. And, of course, not a cloud in the sky. As sure as death and taxes the day we leave is typically pristine. Not totally excited about what I captured this morning - still on the long exposure bandwagon and should have pushed this puppy further. But despite the lack of interest in the sky there were some nice colors to be had.

Now off to pack.

Tick Tock

Time flies. Incredibly, we're already at the last full day of our two weeks at the lake. So what better way to show the passage of time than with another hit of long exposure?

While biking around the area I noticed this information hut at the shore. Winds were (and still are) heavy, blowing thick cloud and white caps onto the beach. I had been waiting for these kinds of conditions and came back shortly afterwards with gear in tow. These exposures are each just north of two minutes long thanks to a stack of neutral density filtration (2-stops from a polarizer to define the clouds, another 10-stops from the Lee Big Stopper, and three more from a second Lee ND).

What I'm now trying to figure out is which composition I prefer. For now I'll stick with three variations on a theme while I enjoy the last of our time here.

Where Is the Sun?

I'll withhold the expletives as we "enjoy" another sub-standard day of weather here at the lake. Started out nice and sunny and then these clouds started rolling in about mid-morning. Has been up and down ever since and now the rain is falling yet again. I guess these images reflect some of that gloom.




That said, it's still vacay. We're still at the lake. Sounds like Miller Time.