Lonely

[Steaphany]

Mamiya RB67 Pro SD + Mamiya K/L 65mm f/4.0
Film = Kodak Ektar 100, Shutter = 1/125th Second, Aperture = f/8

[Shadowman]

Nicely captured.

[Dave A]

What a great subject to shot. Good eye.

Dave

[IzzieK]

The image and pp is very nice, but I'd rather that we know the story behind it with a bit more description...maybe I am biased, because I like an image with not just the title with it??? Thanks.

[bnnrcn]

Hi Steaphany I find the crop a bit tight, it would be nice to see some of the surroundings to feel the loneliness of the building more.

[Steaphany]

The crop I've chosen is because there are none of the needed elements to aid in the setting. This old church, possibly also may have been a school sits on private property that is usually all over grown by weeds. The land owner mows around the property maybe once a year which is why I had such a clear view of the building. Due to no land use, not even by live stock, there are none of the typical leading lines. The church is located in a barely there town of Markley Texas, I believe the population may be 25, 50 at best, so the area surrounding the church is un-mowed brush, wild shrub, and small-ish trees. If not for this crop, the setting would be a disorganized and multiple distracting element mess. The town has few actually occupied and maintained buildings, but there is enough to easily loose focus on what would be the subject of the scene.

I felt the building would tell it's own story. The roof shows damage from years of storms, windows and window elements are in various states of disrepair or have been broken, there are even electrical fixtures broken and hanging from the building. Unlike abandoned buildings in more developed areas, there isn't even any signs of vandalism. Unlike my other photo in this theme, "Falling Down", below, this building could be brought back into a long productive life with maybe a days worth of work and maintenance, which is why it's just Lonely

Falling Down

For some reason I do not understand, people here in Texas just let things go into ruin when they aren't immediately needed and once damage starts to set in, they never are restored.

There will be more along this theme

[Wavelength]

Nice

[Manfred M]

Stephany - while I understand your explanation as to the treatment of this shot, I tend to side with Binnur and Izzie and that deals with the context of the image. This can be an issue with architectural images as while they sometimes can stand by themselves, at other times they cannot.

I ran into this issue when I got up early one morning to photography the old Dominion Observatory during morning "magic hour". I was cold and tired when I got home, and while the shots were technically very good , they just did not do anything for me. I repeated the shot some time later after thinking through my approach and unfortunately came back with similar results. Sometimes a shot just does not pull together the way we had hoped...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dominion_Observatory

The issue was very much similar to what I get out of this shot and while it is technically well done, but somehow there is something missing and that is "context". Have a look at Trevor's (tbob) work on old barns and that will give you sort of where I am coming from.

I very much get your point about there being nothing else to tell because of the background. But I also feel that an interesting abandoned building like this should have more of a story to tell.

[jcuknz]

Travelling by AMTRAK on many of the major routes the abandonment of buildings is an 'American thing' as I saw them both in the country and cities .... so much space to date people simply move on?

I guess the tidying up/ recycling is too expensive in a large country.

[IzzieK]

Travelling by AMTRAK on many of the major routes the abandonment of buildings is an 'American thing' as I saw them both in the country and cities .... so much space to date people simply move on?

I guess the tidying up/ recycling is too expensive in a large country.

No...it is the culture...