Looking through the lens of life

Today I felt like going out and photographing buildings and structures that have been left for dead or close to it. I found a house that I was somewhat concerned that squatters might be living in, but fortunately all the windows for the most part had been shattered and there wouldn’t be much warmth for anyone seeking shelter. I also drove down to one of the industrial bureaus that Muncie offers and made some exposures there. Overall, I was pretty pleased with how everything turned out today and I’m glad I grabbed my camera before going on my would-be-rather-boring trip of running errands around town. I’ve really been wanting to shoot more black and white lately, so the this type of shooting lends itself toward that in my opinion. Take a peek, and decide for yourself.

Here is the inside of an abandoned home near Seventh Street and Walnut Street. I thought the inside of the house with the natural light coming in through the windows made for really nice textures and feel.

The entrance to the home was completely shattered and overgrown with small trees and branches that had poked through where the glass would’ve been.

I’m not sure what room this is. Maybe this is the living room or perhaps a looking into a bedroom. There are so many stories that this structure could tell, but it’s now in tatters.

Shattered glass and broken windows are something I like to photograph. I’m not entirely sure why, but I think it might be from when I was younger and like to cause mischief like this myself. Now I can still document it, but l get to look at it from a slightly different perspective.

A mask of a skeleton on the floor of one of the small rooms in the house. There weren’t too many items inside that could date any people being in the home, except this mask and a few beer and soda cans lying on the floor.

Textures are always really neat in a building that has been left to rot in the face of nature’s elements. Wallpaper peels, paint cracks and floor boards start to show the inner skeleton of what is still holding the building together.

Not the front of the home from above, but another property left for someone to either forget about or start doing some serious renovations on.

The street sign on the pole is barely holding on, and I feel like that’s what this place is saying too. When industry leaves a small town that so many of its population worked for, hard times aren’t far around the corner.

Sometimes it’s not what is in an image that makes it.

The only color image of the day, but I like it because the tones are very muted and it really shows what today looked like. Winter in Indiana can be dreary, you just have to know where to look.

There are only a few holiday traditions that I have anymore mostly due to my family getting older, and life in general. One of these is going to Middletown, Ind. to see the lights hanging over the streets and taking pictures while hanging out on the gazebo with my two of my oldest friends Eliot and Matt. We have been doing this for years now, and we always go on Christmas Eve into Christmas morning. This year was no different in that we did our usual thing, and drove into Middletown only to be fairly disappointed when the full-sized bulbs hanging over the street were not turned on.

Here’s what the scene looked like: This is Main Street, and as usual not really anybody out except for the occasional passerby. When the lights are on, this street looks much like what I would imagine Mayberry from the old Andy Griffeth Show.

The gazebo, on what I suppose is sort of like town square. Only there isn’t a square, only Main Street running in front.

Supposedly the gazebo closes at 10pm, but we’ve never had any trouble. Well, that’s not entirely true. Two years ago I was taking a group portrait of the the three of us, and a cop stopped and asked us what we were doing. After explaining to him that we were only taking pictures and we did this every year he didn’t mind and left us alone.

There was a wire Christmas tree with lights on it in the middle of the gazebo that made for nice texture in the photographs. This is Matt.

And here is Eliot.

Hope everyone had a great holiday and will have a wonderful New Year.
Cheers