The theme of my Lazy 365 challenge is this: See a shot, then get out the camera and get that shot.
H is for Highrise!
A slightly different view this time... I'm beginning to think I should just own the fact that I love these buildings that I drive past every day, and work my way toward a series of South Waterfront shots. Maybe something like Hokusai's Thirty-Six Views of Mount Fuji. Each day, both directions, the buildings are a different color. Since they are all so reflective, the colors of the sky (which are affected by the time of day and the weather) and the colors of the river (also affected by the weather and by the sky) play a huge part in the colors of the buildings. Of course, I also like to play with those colors a bit once I get those shots onto my computer, but I'm not adding colors that aren't already there. If you look closely at the SOOC shot below (left), you can see the pink, purple, blue, and yellow sky colors reflected in the shorter building.
This shot was taken from inside my car, through a rain-drenched passenger side window, from the driver's side. You can see a couple of blurry spots that must be droplets of water on the window. Can't fix those, but I can do other stuff. What I did to this shot in Photoshop Elements 3:
The theme of my Lazy 365 challenge is this: See a shot, then get out the camera and get that shot. Exactly that shot.
So, there I was, stuck in traffic again. This time it took me 45 minutes to travel a distance that Google Maps says should take me 4 minutes. Normally that's true, but every once in a while the traffic gods want me to take some photographs, I guess.
And since this qualifies as not planning to take a photograph, but then seeing a shot I just couldn't pass up, I'll file it in my Lazy 365 category. If I had passed up this shot, it would have been ridiculous, since I was sitting there, inching forward, for forty five minutes! My three favorites from my commute, leaning out my unrolled driver side window with my camera are below. I'm pretty sure I like the one above the best, but I'm open to critiques.
The high-rise buildings that have sprouted up in the South Waterfront area have always seemed a bit out of place to me. The tall steel and glass structures don't seem to match what springs to mind when I think of places people might live in Portland.
I mean sure, it's green, but it's just so tall and glassy and modern... And yet, these last few weeks as I pass by the development on my commute, I find that the collection of buildings, together with the tram are, in their own way, beautiful. It doesn't seem like they fit with the landscape, until you realize that the landscape isn't what they're supposed to fit. They fit in with the sky and the river. Even on the greyest of days, in the least interesting mid-day light, the glass buildings make shimmers from the river reach up toward the sky, as silver light from above trickles down toward the water. Each building is different, and each alone might be an ugly tower, but collectively and from nearly any angle, they form a cohesive work of art. And when it's not the greyest of days. When it's, say, near sunset, and I find myself in slowing traffic as I exit I-5 to navigate the maze of turns that form the approach to the Ross Island Bridge, those tall glassy modern buildings reflect simultaneously silver and the hues of the darkening sky. Today's traffic was slow enough that I was able to take these shots out my driver's side window, occasionally taking my foot off the brake to inch forward in line for the bridge. |
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