The Avant Guard

The tunnel under the train tracks in Alexandria, VA always looks damp and forbidding.  I’ve walked past it many times and it always seems to draw my attention.

Weekly Photo Challenge: Wanderlust

On a recent trip to New York City I visited the Rockefeller Center Observation Deck.  From there you can see most of Manhattan.  It’s a pretty incredible view.

https://dailypost.wordpress.com/photo-challenges/wanderlust/

Tiger Longwing On Coneflower

I recently visited the Butterflies LIVE! exhibit at Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden.  This photo of a Tiger Longwing on a red coneflower was one of my favorite shots from the trip.  If you’re in the Richmond area Lewis Ginter is definitely worth a visit.

Back Alley, Richmond, VA

The other side of the building on the right is a lovely little downtown restaurant.  It’s funny how quickly the scene changes when you walk half a block, around to this end of the building.  Despite the litter and trash, I like the lines, the flow and the contrast of this image.

If you click the photo above you can see a larger image of it.

GlobeHopper

There’s a lot of character in the building housing the GlobeHopper coffee shop: stained glass, murals, and even a little neon light.

Morning Paper

Passing through Piazza del Campidoglio we saw this man reading his newspaper.  When I returned the next day, he was there again, on the same step, reading his paper.  It struck me as very Roman.  I’m betting if you were to go there on just about any morning he would be perched on these steps enjoying the weather and catching up on the latest news.

Statue in Piazza del Campidoglio

My friends and I were pass through Piazza del Campidoglio in the late evening when I captured this image of one of the statues in the piazza.  We walked by it earlier that day but the statue was in the shade so the lighting was very cool and flat.  The evening sun cast its warm, hard light on the statue in a way that made for a much better photo.  I considered converting this image to black and white or even just desaturating the colors.  Eventually I decided I liked the warmth and intensity of the colors just the way they were recorded by my camera.

Via Luigi Petroselli

Long after the sun goes down traffic continues moves along Via Luigi Petroselli in Rome, Italy.

The Markel Building

Whatever you might think of the Markel Building in Richmond, VA, you have to agree it’s pretty original.  I lovingly refer to this architectural anomaly as “the Jiffy Pop building”.  If you’re familiar with Jiffy Pop, no further explanation is required.  If not, here’s a link to the Wikipedia article on it, complete with pictures: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jiffy_Pop.  I don’t know much about the building but I believe it was originally build for Reynolds, the aluminum company, when they were big in Richmond.

 

Self Portrait

The bright red doors contrasted with the cool green grass and warm stucco wall brought together enough color and texture to peek my interest in this simple building.  The late afternoon sun and the white fence behind me provided the perfect lighting for this self portrait.