A Photo A Day [Vacation Edition Part Deux]

Never fear, these are the last shots from my trip. I've been using them as fillers for the past few days as I decided to use the time I'd ordinarily spend photographing and processing that day's photo to instead sort through and process my vacation shots instead. Otherwise I suspect those pictures would still be sitting on my hard drive weeks from now.

Dead End

I'm so pleased with how the processing turned out on this one. I had an imperfect shot of a West Virginian road and couldn't figure out how to make it more interesting, until I stumbled across the ghoulish picture I had saved on my hard drive from a previous project.




Another one from my husband's former elementary school, now a charmingly dilapidated building falling apart and peeling to pieces.

On a Pale Horse

One of the best things we did on the trip was go for an hour-long horse ride through a state park. I can't remember the last time I rode a horse, probably not since the few pony rides I took as a child. We both had a blast even if my horse was a bit of a slowpoke.

A Photo A Day [Day 333]

Can't you see my walls are crumbling?

During our trip to WV my husband was eager to see some of his old haunts. Unfortunately, because his childhood was so long ago many of them are more likely to be the home of haunts and ghosts than living persons now. We intended to merely poke around the outside of this building, one of the elementary schools he attended, but upon finding an unlocked door he was curious to see inside. The building was full of debris, peeling paint, and abandoned furniture and fixtures. Not to mention some extremely curious graffiti honoring Bob Hope. Don't ask. I have no idea why either.

Unfortunately, I didn't make the most of those prime conditions so most of my shots were too dark or blurry as a result of the darkness. A shame because I would have loved for my first attempt at photographing a derelict building to have turned out better. Oh well, at least now I have some idea of where I went wrong and I learned the #1 most important lesson about traipsing around an abandoned building: make sure to wear close-toed shoes. I'm lucky I didn't slice my feet open on all of the broken glass everywhere.

A Photo A Day [Day 335]

The Tree of Life

Another shot from my trip, this one taken on the road from Berkeley Springs to our rental cabin.

Ok, now it's time to prepare yourself for a pseudo rant. Ready? Read on.

So I once read an interview with a photographer saying that with the proliferation of inexpensive digital cameras many folks fancy themselves to be good photographers without having any actual training or skills. To him, a proper photographer understands how to set up a shot and takes the time to do so, whereas those of us clicking away with our cameras hoping that one shot out of ten will be usable aren't real photographers. I believe it was the same guy who said that if a photo is taken from a moving car while driving down the street it's not going to impress him as any idiot could take the same shot. I'm not terribly offended by this assertion but I do have to wonder if what he's talking about is all there is to photography. I will admit that I took over 50 photos while my husband was driving down the road as much of our trip was spent in the car. I will also admit that most of those were blurry, composed badly, focused on the wrong thing, etc. But doesn't it take some sort of skill, some sort of artistic eye to be able to sort through the duds and find one worth using? I feel like I managed to do that with a few of my shots, figuring out how to crop or process it to bring out the beauty of the scene. Which I hope is what I did here. Anyway, rant over. I'll go back to my haphazard method of photography and hope there's some merit in my work after all. :)

A Photo A Day [Vacation Edition]

I'm skipping around when it comes to processing my photos so here are a few from my trip with a gap or two in between. In other words, more are to come. I know you can hardly contain your excitement.

Our West Virginia adventure took us from Harpers Ferry and Shepherdstown (seen here) to Fayetteville, Oak Hill, Beckley, and Charleston. Finally we've made it to the tail end of our vacation in Berkeley Springs. Most of those are tiny towns in one of the nation's least popular states so you'd be forgiven for never having heard of them before.

Tuesday found us in Beckley where we finally saw the final Harry Potter movie (yes, tears were shed) and we revisited a little bistro we'd enjoyed over four years ago when we were last there.


This is but one example of why I'll probably come home from this vacation ten pounds heavier.

I've never been one to shy away from a challenge, especially when it comes to eating. In this case the challenge took the form of this gigantic piece of rich chocolate peanut butter cake. I suspect it's my mother's post-war upbringing that was in turn instilled in me that makes it impossible for me to throw any food away uneaten. Because my husband's not a fan of chocolate I was on my own here and our plans did not allow for a doggie bag. It was quite a battle but I persevered in the end. :)


On Wednesday we headed to Charleston and poked around the city. Just as I was beginning to fret that none of my pictures from our trip to the state's capitol was worthy of sharing online I discovered that combining a horribly overexposed shot of this downtown building with one of the better shots I took resulted in this funky final product. Looks almost like a sketch, doesn't it?


This last one was taken yesterday here in Berkeley Springs. This is what passes for a mansion in West Virginia and I suspect this one comes with a ghost or two to boot. You gotta watch out for those hillbilly ghosts. They're usually so drunk on moonshine that it only makes them meaner than regular ghosts.

We're heading back home tomorrow so it's back to reality for me then. It was a fun vacation while it lasted.

A Photo A Day [Day 329 & 330]

Greetings from my West Virginia vacation. Yesterday saw us pass through Harpers Ferry on the way to Shepherdstown, where we stayed in The Bavarian Inn and noshed on German food. This is the view of the Potomac River from Harpers Ferry.



Before leaving Shepherdstown this morning we stopped in an old cemetery with lots of interesting Civil War history.