Dark Arch

She stands in the corner, waiting with her children.  The darkness of the twilight is beginning to press down upon them and although it is still very warm outside a chill runs up her back and she pulls the children a little closer.  Her man is out on the battlements, he is not a soldier, he is a tailor, but there he is, when the pirates come everyone is a soldier and she wonders if the night will leave her a widow.  The wind starts to pick up and she can hear the flags start to snap in the breeze.  The sound is distinct, too loud, and then she realizes that it is no longer the flags she is hearing but the crack of muskets.  The battle has begun.

Establishing mood and and emotional tone within an image can be a tenuous thing that is difficult to grab in the moment in which the image is taken.  Often this is easier to manage in post as the light and circumstances of the shot may not suit the story that you are trying to tell with the image.  This picture was taken right around midday, on a blazing hot day but my head was full of stories of marauding pirates and guardian priests as we walked around Casco Viejo in Panama City.  I wanted an image that carried with it the fear and ominous portent of an approaching invading force.  I was standing inside rock walls that had witnessed the terror and confusion of a people under attack and I wanted to be able to look up into the image and feel those emotions.  I pulled the image into Nik Silver Efex Pro and started playing with some extreme changes to contrast and texture, then I started to work on the undersides and lower levels of the rock wall to produce a dark and heavy visual weight to the image.  The perspective of the very wide angle lens puts you right at the base of the wall looking high up into history.

-Russell Berg

The Wall

I was walking around downtown Vancouver recently, very much enjoying that I live on the west coast of Canada as many of my friends and family who live on the prairies were suffering through and extended winter.  I have always enjoyed construction sites as places of potential photographic interest and as I walked past this one I was struck by the contrast of colour and form.  The architect appears to have designed a new building that will preserve the facade of very much older one and the construction is growing up around this wall.  The blue green windows in the background provide a contrast with the gritty greys, browns, and reds of the old wall.  Not only are the colours working in our favour but the windows curve into the background on the left side of the frame in a very modern style when compared with the square blocky windows of the old wall.  When I got the photo home I punched up the texture, contrast, and saturation of the stone, wood and glass in Nik HDR Efex.  I wish that I had been able to frame the picture from a little further to the left so that I was taking the image from exactly 90 degrees to the wall.

-Russell Berg

Elbow on the Sill

I have found the city of Victoria and it’s architecture to be a significant inspiration for me.  There is something that strikes me as I wander those streets with my camera that pushes the photographer in me to see things differently.  I find the parts of a city that are on the edges of survival to have a truth in them that is so much more beautiful than the manicured lawns and refinished driveways of suburbia.  The texture of this wall jumped out at me as a wonderful background to the three black openings of the windows.  The texture of the glass that remains in the windows provides an interesting counterpoint to the yawning darkness below.  The rusty stains around the edges and the lichens growing on the window sills bear silent testimony to dozens of winters, to hundreds of eyes looking out, to the arms resting on summer evenings watching the city walk by.

Other Victoria images here, here, and here​

-Russell Berg

Up Into History

In Casco Viejo in Panama City there are many 17th century buildings that are open to the weather and tourists.  The brick walls are very, very thick and have some really interesting textures.  Finding an interesting way to produce and image of them was a bit of a challenge.  I wanted something that would give a sense of their age and permanence, something that would put the viewer in the building.  It was right around noon so the sky was a very washed out light blue so I was thinking B&W right from the beginning.  I walked into a very narrow square room and looked up; the small size of the room made it darker than the open courtyard and the light from the bright sky lightened the window sills providing some contrast with the rest of the room.  When I pulled the image into Nik Silver Efex Pro to do the B&W conversion I increased the texture and this also had the effect of giving the skies an almost surrealistic smooth gray.  I only wish that I had stepped back a little to allow a little of the sky to peak in through the upper window.

-Russell Berg

Pushing Down

Looking up a brick wall into the lamp. Canon EOS 7D EF-S 10-22mm at 10mm f/22 1/20 ISO 160

Looking Up 3

(Cont. From Previous Post)  The light turned green and she pushed off the curb, walking quickly at first then running.  There was an insistence in her stride that propelled her forward.  The sense of purpose in her eyes was reflected in the rapid sure step of her feet and the set of her shoulders.  She took a quick glance around, he wasn’t over across the street or in the intersection she was crossing but she couldn’t be completely sure.  She had almost reached the alley when she felt hand on her bicep, she wrenched a way turning quickly.  It wasn’t him… it was Phillip.

This image, in some respects, brought elements from each of my first two images in this series together.  It has the strong visceral pull of the colours combined with the form elements of the ivy.  I felt like having the lamp looking down on me brought a dynamic push to the image that was lacking in the first one.  It almost seems to push down against the viewer.  Here we also see again the benefits of image stabilization and good camera position to eliminate shake.  I am still constantly amazed by the benefits of image stabilization.  When I shot film I would never even think about going below 1/60 of a second.  Now part of the benefit is a result of pushing the base of the camera against the wall but this shot is a 1/20 of a second and it still is very sharp.