Haunted Graveyards

As I mentioned in my last post, I've been experimenting with some horror photography. I stumbled across the reverse color and black and white settings on my camera and have been snapping photos of castles, cathedrals and graveyards. On a recent visit to Escomb church, the oldest surviving Anglo-Saxon church, I took some photos in the graveyard. The church was built in 670 and I'll be blogging about it on Gadling next week. These graves are from the 17th-19th century. I like this one above, in a reverse black and white image.

Here's the same grave in a reversed color image. Check out the skull. It looks like something my kid would draw!

The trees make a nice backdrop to this shot.
I like the fade out to the left.

Here are some buildings on the River Wear at Durham. The greenery came out an interesting color. I have plenty more images of castles, stone circles, graveyards, etc., mostly normal shots rather than products of my fiddling with the settings. If anyone's interested in using them for their own projects, get in touch.

Horror photography!

I just got back from hiking the East Highland Way in Scotland. While I was up there I discovered a new setting on my camera. In the "text" option for taking photos of print, there are four settings. One looks indistinguishable from a regular portrait setting, one is black and white, one is negative black and white, and then there's this one, a reversed color image. Looks like a cover for some Gothic horror novel! This is the cathedral at Durham in northern England.
Another view of the same cathedral. Not sure why the sky changed color.
Julián, my four-year-old son, took this one of Papa emerging from the grave.
This decayed tomb is carved in the image of a knight. What horrors lurk beneath?

Next time: more mucking about with the camera!

The first photo of a person

This photo shows the Boulevard du Temple in Paris and was taken by Louis Daguerre in late 1838 or early 1839. While it isn't the first photograph (that honor went to Joseph Niepce in 1826) it's the first to show a person. Early photography had very long exposure times and thus it was hard to take photos of people. In fact, this photo took more than ten minutes and Daguerre didn't intend to capture any images of people at all. This busy street looks deserted because everyone passed by too quickly to make an impression on the emulsion. But if you look to the lower left you can see a man with his foot up. Apparently he's getting his shoes shined, and he stood still long enough to be captured on film.

This is a historically important shot and makes it into most studies of photography, but what most people seem to miss is that there are in fact two people in the photo. You can see the shoeshine boy as well, although he's not as clear. I've blown up the image below.

Poor people and children tend to be written out of history, and it's a shame that this kid, struggling to make a living and probably doomed to an early death in some nineteenth century tenement, has been ignored by later generations. So here's a bit of belated recognition. Sorry for being overlooked, kid. I hope that guy gave you a good tip!

The first image is courtesy Wikimedia Commons. If it isn't public domain by now then I don't know what is!

Christmas in Swaziland

Like I mentioned in my last post, my friend Thomas Tomczyk is riding a motorcycle across Africa as part of his Africa Heart Beat Project. He started out in Johannesburg, broke down in a shanty town 25 km into his journey, got his bike fixed, and is now on his way.

Right now he's in Swaziland, a small country nestled between South Africa and Mozambique. Actually, he may be in Mozambique by now, or somewhere else entirely. The last I heard he was in Swaziland. He recently posted an interesting article about animal conservation there and there are more articles to come as he will be featuring a different project for every country he visits.

You can follow Thomas' journey on his website and Facebook page, and here of course!

I'm off on an adventure of my own soon. From Feb. 9-March 27 I'll be in Ethiopia working on a book and a series of articles for Gadling. Almudena will be coming for part of the trip so we can celebrate our tenth anniversary!

I'm going to get back to studying the map of Ethiopia. Merry Christmas, Thomas, wherever you are!

First photos of a three year-old

My three-year-old son Julián wanted to learn how to use our digital camera, and this is his first photo. Not bad! This is, of course, yours truly and Almudena. We're at the cafe at St. Mary's church on Radcliffe Square, Oxford. Julián wanted to take a second picture and told us just how to pose.

Yeah, we have a Ph.D. and three Masters degrees between us and this is how he wants us to be remembered. He even made Mama put on his little green hat.

Cool Travel Slideshows

The folks at Nachofoto have an interesting blog for travel slideshows with some amazing photos. My personal favorite is one on the 7 Most Amazing Caves in our World, which reminds me that I haven't gone caving in a while. I also liked the Top 10 Trekking Vacations, which reminds me that I haven't been trekking in even longer. I need a trip badly!!!

(I'm thinking Gambia. There are cheap flights from Madrid)