AT SINSINAWA MOUND CENTER

Last night I attended the opening reception for “Driftless Depictions”, an exhibition of beautiful photographic works of local artist and photographer Henry Matthiessen III, in the Sinsinawa Mound Center over in Wisconsin. This place is the home of the Dominican Sisters of Sinsinawa. It was the first time I have been there and took the opportunity to visit also the Queen of the Rosary Chapel under the same roof. Here is what their website has to say about it:

No visit to Sinsinawa Mound Center is complete without a stop in Queen of the Rosary Chapel. The setting is tranquil, inspiring, and surrounded in simplicity by the mahogany pews, marble floors, and limestone altars. Visitors are awestruck with this architectural treasure and its unique circular shape, fluted ceiling, and the 37 diamond and half-diamond shaped stained glass windows. The true beauty is in the story of Christ’s redemption that is told through the brilliant mosaic of biblical scenes through rhythm in glass.

Being in the chapel not much before sunset was quite impressive. When I saw the reflection of one of the stained glass windows on the floor and on the backs of the pews, I knew I had a photo. Sure, with HDR techniques applied every detail would be visible, but I often prefer the approach with exposing for the highlights only.

Henry Matthiessen III, The exhibition “Driftless Depictions” can be visited until October, 23. Highly recommended!

Detail shot of diamond and half-diamond shaped stained glass windows in the chapel.

ICY ART CONTINUES

Life prevented me from getting out and shooting a lot of pictures this week but there is always something on the hard drive of the computer that deserves to be published. Earlier this month I tried to draw the attention to one of my winter projects, called ICY ART. Here is another image that I like to contribute.

ICY ART IN 2022

The long time readers of my blog may remember that I started a little gallery project on the website in January of last year, called ICY ART. I tried to contribute to this gallery during the last two months with some new photos, but just didn’t find the right subject worthwhile for being published. Today I discovered a promising ice pattern but the water beneath was actually quite murky. I gave it the ‘artsy-fartsy’ treatment with white balance and contrast enhancing measures and got a result that satisfied my artistic sensibilities. Here is a shortcut to the ICY ART gallery. I hope you enjoy. You all have a great weekend!

COMPARING LENS PERFOMANCE

Swing railroad bridge across the Mississippi between Sabula, Iowa and Savannah, Illinois

One of my last pictures of the railroad bridge across the Mississippi River down in Sabula, Iowa, was a black & white photo, shot with the incredible Zeiss Distagon T* 2/35 ZF lens in March last year (feel free to have a look at that image right here: Sabula Bridge ). This prime lens with manual focus is the best standard I can apply to compare rendition and sharpness between other pieces of glass.

The question I tried to answer was, can the new Nikkor Z 24-70, f/4 S, that came with the Nikon Z6II mirrorless camera, outperformed the old Nikkor 24-120, f/4 AFS, which I traded in for the new lens. Shooting a well known subject, like the Sabula bridge, is my way to find out what can be done in regards of sharpness with a new lens. I looked at the original RAW files and compared them with some shots with the Zeiss 2/35 and also the 24-120 AFS from last year under similar light and weather conditions. And here is the verdict, the Z 24-70 is at least equal to the prime lens and quite a bit better than my old “walk around lens”, the Nikkor 24-120 AFS. This doesn’t make me a better photographer, but it is good to know that the new tool in the camera bag, the stunning Nikon Nikkor Z 24-70 f/4 S, is capable to deliver results that at the end help to become one.

Nikon Z6II, Nikkor Z 24-70, f/4 S,   @ 57 mm, 1/125 s, f/16, ISO 100

ADOBE STYLE IN DETAILS

Adobe style details, Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico

I haven’t created any interesting photos during the last couple days but I still work with some of the images I made in October last year during our road trip to New Mexico. Long before we went there I have been fascinated with adobe buildings and the way they are designed and built. Many places in New Mexico have adobe style architecture, even if some newer ones use modern construction materials but are made to look like the historic churches found in the area.

All photos in today’s blog post were shot just around the famous San Francisco de Asís Mission Church in Rancho de Taos, New Mexico. We visited the church on two days at different times and with different light. Many of my detail images were made while strolling around the church, apparently with black & white in mind, and this will certainly happen. However, some pictures live also from their colors or color contrast and triggered my desire to develop them the way you see them here. I hope you enjoy!

COLORFUL SANTA FE

Santa Fe Plaza - Fall colors right at downtown

Santa Fe, New Mexico is a wonderful city, with history, culture, and art everywhere you go. It is not difficult to find interesting subjects to photograph. As so often, there wasn’t enough time to explore everything but we had a very nice day, fully packed with sightseeing, looking at art, and of course, good food and drinks.

With more than 250 galleries to explore in Santa Fe you have a lot of choices. There is one I had on my list to visit since a long time. The Monroe Gallery of Photography specializes in 20th- and 21st-century photojournalism and humanist imagery and even if this is not your field in your own photography, it is a very inspiring place. Highly recommended!

Synonymous with New Mexican cuisine, chile peppers are part of New Mexican identity. These decorative clusters were hooked to each lamp post at the plaza.

This wedding wasn’t the only one we saw in town. The traditional march by the newlyweds and their guests through the streets to their venue is led by a Mariachi band.

New Mexico Museum of Art - The style of the building, called Pueblo Revival, uses modern construction materials made to look like the historic adobe churches found throughout the state's Pueblos.

Some souvenirs need a little more space in your luggage than others…

LONG TIME ON MY LIST

San Francisco de Asís Mission Church, Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico, 2021

Years ago, when I saw for the first time Ansel Adam’s photo Saint Francis Church, Ranchos de Taos, from circa 1929, in one of his books, I put this great architectural monument on my mental list of things I wanted to photograph sometime in the future.

Construction of this church began in 1772 and it is an example of a New Mexico Spanish Colonial Church. The San Francisco de Asís Mission Church is a large Adobe structure with a cruciform plan and it has attracted many painters and photographers in the past. It is the rear side of the church with its massive buttress and its adobe plaster surface that inspired many artists, like Georgia O’Keeffe, Ansel Adams, or Paul Strand.

We visited the church on two different days and at different times and each provided its own challenges with lighting and keeping unwanted elements out of the frame. In fact I zoomed with my feet a lot and went relatively close to the structure and with the 16-35 mm lens on camera.

The photo above was made at our second visit during late afternoon. The side light gives the structure depth and the adobe plaster surface reveals its texture.

Ansel Adams describes the front aspects of the church in his book Examples: The Making of 40 photographs as being “moderately impressive” and points out that “the rear elevation defines the building as one of the great monuments of America”. I only can agree and also realized that the surrounding of the church on either side is probably a lot busier than it was more than 90 years ago when he created his famous photograph.

Photographed during late morning on our first visit. The only way to work from the rear side was to keep the powerful sun behind the building and use it as a backlight. I darkened the sky a bit and used the sun to outline the structure at the top. The Saint Francis Church is a wonderful subject to photograph, but as so often, back at home and in front of the computer I find out what I missed and want to go back again…

BRIDGES ACROSS THE RIO GRANDE

Taos Junction Bridge, Rio Grande del Norte National Monument, New Mexico

Our first campground in New Mexico was right next to the river in the Rio Grande Gorge, which is part of the Rio Grande del Norte National Monument. The Monument includes 245,00 acres (991 km2 ) of public land, and was designated by Presidential Proclamation in 2013. The Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, northwest of Taos, NM, is the fifth highest bridge in the US (650 ft / 198 m). The design of this truss bridge is by far more impressive than the much smaller Taos Junction Bridge near our campground, but one evening the light on bridge and trees was just gorgeous and much better than what we had at the more famous one.

Rio Grande Gorge Bridge, near Taos, New Mexico

At this point the National Monument is very small and includes only the Rio Grande Gorge

MISSISSIPPI RIVER STORIES 2021 #9 - TRAFFIC ROUTES

Black Hawk Bridge across the Mississippi River, Lansing, NE Iowa

While returning from a business trip last night I had to stop at the Black Hawk Bridge that crosses the Mississippi River in Lansing, Iowa. The light on the scene was just too good to be ignored. The website historicbridges.org describes this wonderful cantilevered truss design of the bridge as following: This bridge is among the most unusual and significant large scale cantilever truss bridges in the country, on account of its excellent historic integrity, relatively old age, increasing rarity, and unusual design.

It is a photo I always wanted to make while driving through the town of Lansing or across the bridge several times each year. Yesterday the time was right. No, I wasn’t standing on the railroad tracks, just right next to them, but using a wide angle, 16 mm focal length allows to include the tracks in the photo and make them part of the storytelling about traffic routes in the Mississippi Valley. Sure, it would be nice to have the real warm light just before sunset for a photo like this, but due to the steep bluffs that form the Mississippi Valley in northeast Iowa the sun sets almost an hour earlier on this side of the river. 

WRONG TIME, SAME TOWER, BUT CLOUDS…

Cirrus clouds above the clock tower in Dubuque, Iowa

If you think, I have seen the tower just recently in July on this website, you are absolutely correct. Last Friday was another concert under the clock tower in Dubuque, Iowa. The former ‘Dubuque and all that Jazz’ is now called ‘Music on Main Street’ and this was the event for the month of August in 2021. One of my favorite Midwest bands, the Minneapolis based “10 of Soul” played again. I have photographed them already three times since 2014 and their performance is always very energetic. If time allows I still may post a few photos here in the blog. Today it’s all about the clock tower again, which by the way didn’t show the correct time. The hands rotated the whole time in ‘high speed’ around the clock face. I guess the guy in charge of the software for the clock was on vacation…😉

It was the cirrus clouds that triggered my desire to aim the lens at the tower again. This time the color version of the photo was just right, making the clouds the subject, and the tower stays kinda subdued because the setting sun didn’t threw much direct light at it anymore.

ARTSY-FARTSY SUMMER FUN

Although I do not publish a new blog post every day, I still try to make a few clicks with the camera daily. Sometimes just to practice or try out new things, and other times to keep the creative juices flowing. Most of these pictures will never be seen by the public eye but for me they are part of the ongoing learning process in photography.

We had finally some rain today and the air cooled down a little bit, but two days ago it was very hot and muggy and I just sat in a chair outside with the camera in my lap. The sun had already set but there was still a little glow touching our flowers, ferns, and grasses in the front yard. I played around with some long exposure times between two and ten seconds while keeping the camera in motion. This became more interesting when the lightning bugs (some call them fireflies or glowworms) started their performance. The slow movement of the camera duplicated our purple coneflowers while the short appearance of the bugs made for sharp little light trails. Just some artsy-fartsy fun with the camera… 😊

Nikon D750, Sigma 150mm / f2.8 APO EX DG HSM, @ 8s, f/5, ISO 100

LAST FOR THE SEASON: ICY ART

With winter coming slowly but surely to an end I thought to wrap up my little project for the season. I had fun to find patterns, shapes, reflections, and colors in ice, on rivers, lakes, on glass, or even just at the surface of a frozen bird bath. Not all pictures made it into the new collection but I thought a few were worth to be shown. If you like to see the whole gallery, just click on the photo and it will open the ICY ART collection for you. Have a marvelous weekend!

MISSISSIPPI RIVER STORIES 2021 #2 - A FAVORITE

115 years old swing railroad bridge across the Mississippi between Sabula, Iowa and Savannah, Illinois

You may have seen photos of this old railroad bridge here in my blog before. No wonder, any time I head south along the big river to Sabula, Iowa’s only town on an island, I have to stop and take a look at this nice piece of engineering. This single track swing bridge between Iowa and Illinois was opened in 1906. It hasn’t lost any of its charm to me and is still one of my favorite men-made subjects for a photo along the Mississippi River.

Last weekend the ice started melting around the bridge and made for a more interesting foreground than at other times before. I put my only manual focus lens, the Zeiss 35/f2 on the camera and set the picture control of the D750 to Monochrome mode. I always shoot in RAW and if I would change my mind later, a color image can still be extracted from the recorded data of the RAW file. But setting the picture control to ‘Monochrome’ allows to view the results immediately in black and white on the screen of the camera. 

Nikon D750, Zeiss Distagon T* 2/35 ZF, 1/160 s, f/11, ISO100

GET IT RIGHT IN CAMERA

Ortenburg castle, Bautzen / Germany

There are different ways to fill a window and as you can see I found a few over the years. It seems to become popular to replace the sky or other elements of a picture in Photoshop. There might be sometimes a reason to that, but I still prefer what I learned during the ages of film, “get it right in camera”…

Window in Aminas Fork, an old mining ghost town in Colorado.

Prague, Czech Republic

Chicago, Illinois

INTENTIONAL?

Sometimes things take a weird twist. Quite often a click is made with a good intent but the results are just not even close what the photographer had in mind. I guess everybody who puts some thoughts in their photography can relate to that statement. But here is a story how it can become just the opposite.

Last Friday night, while sitting in a chair and some good music coming out of the loudspeakers, I made some test shots with high ISO settings. I saw the light from the lamp beside me reflected and distorted in a window across the room. The blossom of a house plant in front of the window was my subject to test focus and handholding the camera and lens in low light. There wasn’t really an intent for a good picture. While evaluating my shots on the computer screen I realized the shadow of the flower on the glass of the window and I liked this effect. The lamp is just normal incandescent light, with other words very boring, and so I tweaked the white balance of the image into the extremes you can see here. Hey, now we have an artsy-fartsy-like-shot, or not…?? 😊