A Little Art With Your Parking

My little one and I had some fun exploring Cincinnati one morning after the Taylor Swift shows. While we were walking around town on our last morning I saw this cool wall with a little parking lot in front of it. This is not my normal kind of photo to make, but I really like how this turned out. I forgot how much fun it is to go out and explore when you are somewhere new.

Having Some Fun

I have been writing blog posts here for nearly twelve years now. During that time I have posted at least one photo a day to the blog. Lately I have been getting a little lazy and not writing so much. With my sports posts I have been just putting them out there, and not writing a post for them. The summer ball posts have not been doing so well for whatever reason. I does not feel good to spend hours at the park and editing and then nobody sees your work. I love sports photography, but I might alter how I cover it for a while. I will still put my gallery up on the blog, but I am going to try to have another photo go up on here as well every day. That will get me out in field making photos a little more and not relying on sports for content. I have some ideas that could be really fun with that in mind. They are photos that only I will probably like, but I am excited about making them so that it what this is all about. This blog was started with the idea of making and posting a photo a day for a year. In that year I grew so much because I was always looking for a photo. I would like to keep that spirit going with my new project.

The House Of Adam Building In Cincinnati, Ohio

While out walking one night in Cincinnati I saw this building down the road. We were headed to eat in the other direction, but I stopped quickly to make this photo. I love these old signs that you find in big cities. Businesses that have been around for so long that the sign has a certain look to it. Depending on how you look at it this sign has a good ending. The store was opened in 1955 and closed in 2016. You could look at the closing as a sad thing, but the store had a long run.

Letting The Whites Go White

In the past I would never have made this photo. The building was in shade and the background was very bright. As I made it though I knew that it would be a black and white image, and that I would let that sky go white. On the spot I debated making the photo, and I am glad that I did. I was able to capture a moment in time for this store.

A Textured Photo From Cincinnati

As I have talked about on here previously the trip to Cincinnati was my first time out of the state since before the pandemic. One thing that I always did on vacation was to combine photos. I would find cool textures around the city and incorporate them into photos. For this photo I took a photo that I made on our last day that I knew would be black and white and combined it with a photo I made of the floor in the basement of our hotel. I like the way that it gives the photo a weathered look. It also is kind of a cool way to keep me looking everywhere while on vacation.

Wrapping Up The Taylor Swift Weekend

I have posted a couple of photos so far from our Taylor Swift adventure, but I never got around to posting the rest of them. One of these days I need to do a wrap up from the shows from my vantage points. I love music and I love photography. So often they are intertwined while I am editing. For this weekend. I had a great soundtrack as I was walking around the city making photographs. I need to dive into that on this blog one of these days.

 A Cool Hardware Store In Cincinnati

While I was out walking with my little one on our last morning in Cincinnati we walked past the Woods Hardware store. This building did not look like any hardware store that I have seen so it caught my eye. I made a couple of photos of it, and we moved on. Later I discovered that this building used to be the Republican Party headquarters in Cincinnati. The doorway now makes much more sense with the elephants and the bald eagle over it. It was really cool to see that I had found some history and didn’t even know it. It was just a cool scene that we were walking by.

Inspiring A New Project

There were a few little things that all happened around the same time that inspired me to try a new project where I learn a little about a local building. I decided to have a post where I dig into the history of a building that I have walked by many times in the past. It is kind of neat to have something new to look at when you walk by the building the next time. On a campus like Purdue especially you are constantly walking by buildings with a little history to them.

Who Is The Lady Looking At Us?

That was the question as my youngest and I walked down Walnut in Cincinnati. I had no idea, but I made a photo of this building next to a parking lot so that I could find out later. When we got home I looked it up and it was Cincinnati native Elizabeth Nourse. Nourse was a painter who gained fame and travelled the world during the course of her life. She lived in Paris during the first world war, but she never forgot where she came from. This mural is a recreation of a self portrait that Nourse made in 1892. This is definitely a building that will stop and make you look at it for a while while walking down the street. If you are in Cincinnati I believe the work that this mural is based off of is located in the Cincinnati Museum of Art.

The Joy Of Exploring Somewhere New

I have been to Cincinnati many times. My little one has been there a few times as well. This was our first time in this area though. We had fun taking a morning walk and checking out everything that was near our hotel. This was just one of the fun things that we saw along the way. I miss exploring new cities. This was my first trip out of the state since the pandemic. I need to get out and travel more than I have recently.

The Roebling Bridge In Cincinnati, Ohio

The Roebling Bridge is such a cool bridge. When it was built the Civil War had just ended. At the time it was the longest suspension bridge. John Roebling would use some of what he learned here to design the Brooklyn Bridge years later. In previous trips to Cininnati I have made a few photos of this bridge from the other side so it was nice to get a walk in to this side of it. Standing here thinking about what was going on while this bridge was being made was pretty crazy. Construction was halted on the bridge a couple of times because of the Civil War. It is pretty amazing that we are still using it, and it is a testimony to the design.

A Great Soundtrack To Make Photos To

Just off to the left of this photo was a Taylor Swift concert. We walked across the bridge to Kentucky and watched some of the concert from Roebling Point. For my little one it was a fun time walking to another state while listening to Taylor. I have made many nighttime walks in big cities and I will admit that this walk was a unique one because of the concert.

A Look Back At My Favorite Stadium Photos Of 2023

This is always a fun list to prepare for every year. It combines my love of landscape photography and sports photography. This year the list looks a little different than it has in years past. What I am doing is shifting and therefore so are the venues that I am in often. It is always fun to see something cool happening and plan for a photo to

We will start the list with an amazing moment for the Purdue women’s team. They had not sold out a game since I went to school at Purdue. That was a long time ago if you don’t know. I really think that this team is on the rise, and it will be amazing to see if they can start filling up the stands even more. I imagine when Caitlin Clark comes to town they have a decent shot to get close to a sellout.

This is the third time at least that this photo has appeared on one of these year end lists. I really like that I made this with a film camera. I had to wait a while to know if it turned out. That is not something that I am used to with sports photography. I also got to make this photo with my Canon 11-24mm lens which I used to love to use. It is a heavy beast, but man does it give you good results. I need to work that lens and some film photos into my games more.

It was so cool to see Indiana State hosting the NCAA Tournament this year. That baseball program has worked its butt off, and they were rewarded with a first round hosting chance. They actually could have hosted the next round as well, but that is another story. I made this photo during the National Anthem to show that amazing crowd in all blue that showed up for their team. I have been lucky enough to photograph this tournament five times now. The fifth time was the most special because it was in a place that I have made a lot of photos. Lets do this again soon!

I make so many photos in Loeb Stadium that I am bound to make a good sunset photo at some point. It is a great way to spend my summer every year. I still don’t know if I have made a great sunset photo here yet. I need to find that special angle to do something really cool.

The Mackey t-shirt game is one of my favorites to photograph. I have photographed it every year since they started doing them in 2013. Last year I didn’t have a pass to get my camera in for most of the season, but I was lucky to get one for this game. It is fun to look at the design and decide where I should stand every year. I can’t wait to see what the design is this year.

This year Ross Ade Stadium had a very new look to it. I tried to make some photos from different angles to show off the new look. Above are some of my favorites from the season.

This year I took the drone over to Bob Friend Field to make a few photos of the senior numbers on the field ahead of senior day. I covered this team the entire season, and it was sad to see the seniors go.

This year I was lucky enough to cover the Big Ten Tennis Championships that were held here at Purdue. This was one of the events that was cancelled in 2020 when everything shut down so it was cool to get to finally do it. One night after a long day of photography I walked out to see this awesome blue sky. I pulled my camera out of my bag to make one last photo.

I was in Bittinger Stadium photographing for the opponent when this opportunity came to make a fun photo during blue hour. A home run celebration with that awesome sky was too cool not to make a photo of.

John Wooden is a popular feature of campus that I photograph. Above are two of my favorite images from the past year. The first is a long exposure from a cloudy, windy day. I liked the clouds streaking by. The second was during a lunar halo. I was trying to find anything that I could put in the foreground of this thing, and John was a very good subject. He always takes direction very well. Here I needed him to sit still for a long period for both photos, and he did a great job of it.

The Boilermaker statue is another place that I like to drive up to make photos of. It is fairly close to home so when something is happening I can get there quickly. Here are a couple of my favorites from the statue from this past year. The first is a long exposure of the international space station flying overhead. A Boilermaker was in the space station so I thought that the Boilermaker statue was a good place to photograph the space station from. The second is one of those nights when I saw a sunset about to happen and quickly got to campus. I can park fairly close to this part of campus so it made sense to make this photo there.

Tyler Trent passed a little over five years ago now. His mark is still all over campus. From the people that he touched to the memorials that we have put in place for him. I love how they moved his gate over a big allowing me to make this photo.

I have to end this list with a stadium photo, but no game happening in it. This year we travelled to Cincinnati, Ohio to be a part of the Taylor Swift Eras Tour that was there. On night one we joined many people outside listening to the concert. On the second night my oldest and a friend went inside of the stadium, and we were outside again. The great part about seeing the show outside two nights in a row is that I knew what to expect. I had a spot picked out, and I made this photo a Karma the final song was playing. It is technically a stadium photo, and a great night and weekend for our family. That was a very fun trip that I was happy to make a photo of. The fun part about this photo is that I made a similar photo to this on night one. I knew to wait in this spot though for the finale for an even better photo.

As I look at this list I realized that for the first time in a decade that Holloway Gymnasium and Folk Field are not on the list. I really didn’t spend much time in either of them this year. What I do has slightly changed moving me away from those venues. Alexander Field is also missing from the list. Maybe it is a good thing to make these lists a little fresher. As I said above this is always one of my favorite lists to make photos for, and to put together every year.

My Favorite Photos From The Road In 2023

This was the first time in a while when I left the state. I have gone from someone who travelled all of the time to being pretty content with where I am. One thing that I missed in that time though was exploring new places. This year I started getting back out there to try and find new places to make photos of. I have done an amazing job making photos basically in town for four years. Now it is time to get back out there to make photos.

I love this photo. It combines a lot of what I worked on this year all into one place. I spent part of the year learning film photography and then emulating that film in Lightroom. Here is one of the presets that I liked used on a digital image. The location in Reynolds is also awesome.

I made this photo on the way back from Indy. I stopped in Lebanon, Indiana with a sky that was pretty cool. I used Portra 400 and my Canon AE-1 to make this photo. This just has everything that you expect from small town Indiana all in one photo. I love how this turned out.

This is the kind of photos that I like to make in big cities. You have the beautiful art on the wall against the parking sign for the lot in front of it. I like the way that this tells you big city, and even better I like how my daughter spotted this on our walk.

Later today you will see this photo again. This whole week I have been looking at some of the small town post office buildings. This is one of the more unique buildings that I have seen so far with that awesome mural on the side wall of the building.

This trip was an audible from the start. I was on 52 heading to Indy when I saw the blue water tower of Clarks Hill. I drove to the town to see what I could find. I ended up finding a gold mine of photos that have been on the blog in the days since. This one of the old car lot is my favorite. I just like how everything worked out here.

This photo involved a lot of luck. I was down the road in Otterbein for a family get together. I went out a little early to make some photos as it was an amazing day with the sun out. Sometimes in the winter any day with sun is a good one. I decided to stop by the Pine Village gym to make some photos of it. It was an amazing old gym that I never was able to see the inside of. the day after I made this image it was gone. I really cut this one close.

This is something that I used to do all of the time when we travelled. I would make an image from the town, and a texture that I found somewhere in our hotel. I would marry the two photos together in Photoshop for one photo that told a story of the trip. I like how this one turned out.

We can thank Taylor Swift for this photo. With the roads shut down after the Roebling Bridge it slowed traffic down just enough for me to walk out and make this image. I should have walked further up for one other idea, but there was still a little traffic from time to time, and I didn’t want to end up out there with cars coming. Maybe next time Taylor plays Cincy I can make the photo.

This photo really sparked my idea to get out and photograph more of the small towns around me. My daughter was playing softball in this town, and I used the last light of the day after her game was over to make this photo. I started to wonder what other little towns had I never heard of that were great for photography. The rest of this list is probably due to this night.

This was one of the hottest days of the year when I made this photo.  The sun had already set, but the light was great to finally make this photo of this door in Otterbein.

I made this photo on my way out of the state for the first time since 2019. That is hard to believe that it had been that long, but absolutely true. The week the pandemic hit we were planning on where I was going to follow the Purdue women’s team in the NCAA Tournament. Over three years later I finally left the state. This is a simple iPhone photo, but I like the way that it symbolizes that trip. You have the highway with an RV on it, and the gas station where I made the photo from. Those clouds would bring some rain right after I made this photo.

Coming home from Terre Haute after seeing Indiana State win a NCAA Tournament game I stopped in Williamsport to make this photo. I have been to the town before, but never stopped to make this photo. I was always fixated on making photos of the waterfall in town. Here I finally stopped to make a photo of the courthouse.

I have to end this list with a stadium photo, but no game happening in it. This year we travelled to Cincinnati, Ohio to be a part of the Taylor Swift Eras Tour that was there. On night one we joined many people outside listening to the concert. On the second night my oldest and a friend went inside of the stadium, and we were outside again. The great part about seeing the show outside two nights in a row is that I knew what to expect. I had a spot picked out, and I made this photo a Karma the final song was playing. It is technically a stadium photo, and a great night and weekend for our family. That was a very fun trip that I was happy to make a photo of. The fun part about this photo is that I made a similar photo to this on night one. I knew to wait in this spot though for the finale for an even better photo.

This was a fun year getting back out on the road to make photos. This list is not what it once was back in the day, but it is far better than the last few years when I barely left the county. This year hopefully the list grows and I can add a couple of more states to the list.

My Favorite Photos Of 2023

This was a fun year of making photos. I think that I tried to branch out more than I ever have before. I tried some new things that informed the rest of my photography. Nothing did that more than a little foray into film photography. I never meant to shoot film. They made digital to make the whole process much easier than it used to be. Why would I go back to film to make it harder? It made me think a little and slow things down. I think a lot of this list is an example of slowing things down in some way. I am really happy with what I was able to do this year. I hope that I can add to that in 2024 to keep myself growing as an artist.

This is a one second exposure taken long after dark of the resident screech owl of the bog Ruby. This year I was really inspired by Matt Zuro and his long exposures of owls. I was in a rut thinking that I was making the same photo over and over again. The long exposure aspect got me back out there making photos. This is a concept that I would love to keep working on this year. I made this photo on my first trip out which was the definition of beginners luck. I never came close to anything like it again, but that is what makes photography so much fun. Chasing that next great photo.

This year I set a goal of trying to add more detail images into my sports work. This was my favorite photo of those details. Here Jake Parr tells his mother that he loves her during the National Anthem. These are the little things that make what I do so much fun.

I like this image from Indy made with my film camera and Portra 400. I was in town to celebrate my brothers 40th birthday, and this old building was just asking for a photo to be made of it. I really like how this turned out. This was the year that I rediscovered film so I wanted a couple of film photos on the countdown.

This photo was made thinking about emulating film. I had an idea of the preset that I would use when I made it, and it turned out exactly like I had hoped that it would. These are those little small town businesses that I have been trying to make more photos of.

I made this photo during my first game working for the local paper. I wanted to do a good job, and when I saw that I had this image I knew that I had at least one good photo to turn in.

This photo is proof that you don’t have to go too far to make a good bird photo. I made this in my front yard this past summer. I had my chair out there waiting for the goldfinches and hummingbirds to show up. I saw both of them, but this hummingbird stole the show. I had an audience watching me out there too which is pretty funny. I bet that I do look a little out of place sitting in a camping chair with my 200-600mm lens pointed back at the house. If I am making photos like this though it is worth it.

I made this photo on the way back from Indy. I stopped in Lebanon, Indiana with a sky that was pretty cool. I used Portra 400 and my Canon AE-1 to make this photo. This just has everything that you expect from small town Indiana all in one photo. I love how this turned out.

A lot of luck went into this photo. The first part was that the play happened in front of me. The second is that his eye shows up on the other side of the ball. The third is that the Tiller Tunnel shows up in the background. This year I wanted to work that into as many photos as I could. Luck helped me put it in this photo.

I love this door in Otterbein. I have wanted to photograph it a few times over the years, but the light was never right. Here it was perfect to make this photo. This is here to represent the random door series that I started this year.

This photo is of the International Space Station flying over the campus of Purdue. A Boilermaker had just joined the crew up there so I thought that a photo with the Boilermaker state was appropriate. I am not the best at planning these things out, but here things worked out for a photo that I really liked.

This photo of Triple XXX was made with Ilford HP5 400 film. I love the way that it captured this night scene. I am still on the fence about black and white film. I convert a lot of my photos to black and white. I actually like the look. I also like color images at times, and if I can convert them to black and white it does not take much. Here though it was the right film at the right time.

This year I saw one of the best football comebacks that I have ever seen. Down 21 at the half things looked bleak for West Side. Their sectional title chances were looking bleak. The stormed back in the fourth quarter to win the game in overtime. I love these two photos from that game. The first photo was made in pregame. It was the product of working that idea for a while. The second photo was made after the game was over and the players were celebrating with their reward.

I only got to get out to the eagles a few times last year. They did not show up in the numbers that they have in the past. Here though one gave me a good enough flyby to make this photo. I love the detail on it.

This year they put a lot of work into Ross Ade Stadium. One of my goals was to make as many wide photos of the stadium as I could. This was my favorite of those efforts. I love how everything came together here. Next year it would be cool to have a better team playing more late night games with sunsets.

This is here for one reason only. I was at dinner outside with the sun really coming into our table. I saw the way that the light was coming through the tea of my oldest so I grabbed my phone and made this photo. This was part of a fun thing this year seeing that I didn’t need to think as epic for every photo. There were photos all around me. It made the year feel a lot like the first year of this blog. I have been having some fun making photos of all kinds of thing this year.

This year I saw an amazing soccer match that saw no scoring until there were a couple of seconds on the clock. That is when Abby Titlow decided to put one into the back of the net. That goal gave Harrison the win and the sectional championship. In the celebration that ensued the player came off the championship trophy leading to another of my favorite images from this past year.

This summer when the temperatures were at a ridiculous level I would wait to go out until it was nearly dark out. I would make my photos at night when it was at least a little cooler. One subject that I really worked was the Dog n Suds down the road. I kept trying but there was always a car in the way or the sky wasn’t quite right. On this night everything came together for a photo that I really like. There is a sweet spot in the summer when they are closed and the light is good with all of the lights on. This year I would love to catch a sunset in this conditions.

I love this old barn. Early on in the life of this blog it was a frequent subject. Now I try and pick nice days to photograph it. I happened to be in the area on a nice winter blue sky day so I stopped to make some photos of it.

This old bank was designed by Louis Sullivan who was the mentor of Frank Lloyd Wright. It is one of his jewel box banks that people come from all over to visit. We are lucky to have it in our backyard, and this year I made a point to photograph it more.

This year my focus was on scenes a little more. I wanted to find photos that showed a little bit about the area that I live in. Here things worked out just before Christmas near the Lafayette theater. I really like the light here all around.

This is a fun example of working a photo idea. Early in the year I made the top photo. I liked how it turned out, but the moon was a bit small for me. I then planned a photo down the road with the moon a little larger in the frame. I had to use a little more glass and be much further away to pull this off. I have one other option that can get me 1200mm of lens that I may try if I can get it to line up next year. It will be hard to top this photo though. If I can get far enough back to have the moon over the entire bell tower I will have done that. We will have to see what next year brings to see if I can pull that off.

This year I learned a bit more about this old theatre and even saw a great comedy show inside of it. This is a classic building that I need to highlight more than I do.

My last photo of the year also happens to be one of my favorites. If you follow this blog then you know that I love making snokeh photos. Snokeh works best with a dark sky. It is amazing during blue hour. Here everything came together for a photo that I really liked. I started my little walk at the theater. I really didn’t have the snow then. When I came back the snow was perfect. After I made this photo I went home knowing that I had made one last good photo this year. That is always a great feeling.

I have to end this list with a stadium photo, but no game happening in it. This year we travelled to Cincinnati, Ohio to be a part of the Taylor Swift Eras Tour that was there. On night one we joined many people outside listening to the concert. On the second night my oldest and a friend went inside of the stadium, and we were outside again. The great part about seeing the show outside two nights in a row is that I knew what to expect. I had a spot picked out, and I made this photo a Karma the final song was playing. It is technically a stadium photo, and a great night and weekend for our family. That was a very fun trip that I was happy to make a photo of. The fun part about this photo is that I made a similar photo to this on night one. I knew to wait in this spot though for the finale for an even better photo.

Those are some of my favorite images from 2023. As I said above it was an amazing year where I saw growth in a lot of areas. It all about getting better everyday. When I was in the can industry we always talked about kaizen. It is the art of continuous improvement. Every year I hope to improve a little more. This year I really felt that I did improve with my photography. We have spent the first 23 days of the year looking back to 2023. I always like to take stock in the past year to help me improve into the current year. Now we go eyes forward though. If I am being honest these posts have been written since before 2024 started. It has been full speed ahead this year already. I have made a couple of photos that I know will be on this list next year at this time. Thanks for coming along on all of these best of posts. As always you can find all of them in the categories below this post or by clicking here. It makes the end of the year a little more work, but it does help me improve every year as well. Here is to a great 2024 and all of the great photos and photo opportunities ahead of me this year.