construction

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Hi,

Sorry, long time no blog. I realize that my last two blog posts were about the Black Lives Matters protests in Washington DC. It is such a large subject to document and I really wanted to frame the posts in a way that wasn’t political but my experience at each of the protests I had gone to. But after a while, I was not sure how to transition away from that. I had gone to more protests and wanted to share the images, but I did not know how to present the images in a different way. One thing led to another and I sort of felt like I was in a creative rut. So I just didn’t write any blog posts and barely went out to create more pictures to share.

BUT I’M BACK BABY! After spending some time for myself and reflecting on the type of work I want to create, I found myself getting more excited about capturing images and sharing them.

But to automatically switch gears from the protests posts to my favorite road trips from Washington DC, seemed a bit of a weird transition. Don’t get me wrong, I have my favorite road trips blog post about 70% done already and that will probably be the next post after this one, but I figured this blog post can give a little update of what has happened since last time I blogged…

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So the Thomas Jefferson memorial is still under scaffolding. It’s been like this for more than 6 months and I don’t like it.

There have been times when there’s been scaffolding around other memorials and monuments that I don’t mind. But the scaffolding around the Jefferson is just so much that it’s very difficult to find the good out of it. It’s there because the roof is getting restored and clean so it may not come down until later this year.

Until then, I’ve been purposely avoiding the tidal basin because it’s just so distracting. However, I met up with a few friends on Sunday to capture the moonset and the best spot to watch was the Tidal Basin. So on my way to the location, I tried my best to try to think of it differently and make the best of it.

I found this puddle that had very interesting textures in the mud and thought it went well with the sunrise clouds. I also like how you can see the entire memorial and see that it’s not entirely covered by scaffolding. Maybe next time I’ll just go to the back and take pictures of that. LOL.

My camera settings for this image are F9 at 1/5th sec and ISO 1600 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide-angle lens.

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Last week was a pretty awesome week for storms. I’ll post more on that soon. But that doesn’t go so well with trying to capture the full moon rising.

Fortunately, I was out with my friend, Zack to capture it. It was his idea to head to Freedom Plaza to try to get the moon over the Capitol dome but things didn’t go as planned. It took a while for us to actually see the moon because of all the low hanging storm clouds. So I’m glad Zack was there to hang out with while we waited. If it weren’t for him, I probably would have just given up and left before we were able to see it.

I love how the moon looks like an orange ball of light in the sky. It’s a nice centerpiece to all the other lights going on in the image. By the way, I could have done without all the construction cones and lights. It seems like everywhere you turn there’s some kind of construction in Washington. This is along Pennsylvania Ave.

Anyways, I’ve made it an appoint to mark my calendar for the rest of the year for full and new moons. The best moons always happen in the fall time so I can’t wait to capture some more 🙂

My camera settings for this image is F5 at 1/5th sec and ISO 800 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm on a tripod.

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Taken from the top of the parking garage, this image definitely took a lot of patience.

I made my way to Union Station for sunrise and figured the parking garage may be a good place to start the morning walk. It has such a great view of the US Capitol that it’s a stop I make pretty much every time I visit the train station.

As I was shooting, I kept on thinking about how there had to be another composition that hadn’t been done before. So I kept on walking around, each step getting further and further from the parking garage wall when I noticed the parking lights. I figured if anything, I could get repetition or something out of them, but when I put my camera up to my eye, I was surprised that the dome was peaking out too.

So I moved to a position where I could frame the dome with the lights and loved the way it turned out but it needed something else. There was too much empty space. So I was actually waiting for a bird or something to fly into the frame because like I said, it was early morning and the very top of the parking garage isn’t as busy as you would think it is. No way did I think someone was actually going to go all the way up to park when 15 minutes later, a car ACTUALLY PARKED! I was so excited. I was across the parking lot waiting for him to walk to the elevator. I felt a little stalker-ish but he put on his vest and went straight to the elevator and it turned out way better than I could have imagined. I love how perfectly everything lines up!

My camera settings for this image is F4 at 1/320th sec and ISO 1600 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens.

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Washington DC is starting to warm up and everyone is enjoying the weather! Especially this guy on the Lincoln Memorial ROOF! I mean what?! How can I get up there?

But I love this image because you can just feel the warmth. This was taken during sunrise. It was a particularly beautiful sunrise and it was very bright too. So I knew if I turned around from looking at the Reflecting Pool, that the Lincoln Memorial would probably be glowing as well. I was right. I think I may have been the only one with my back towards the colorful sky but I think that photographing the warm tones on the white marble is just as beautiful and sometimes even more difficult to capture. This glow probably lasted for 5 minutes before the light went back behind the clouds.

It was a total surprise to see that man on top of the roof. Everytime I see a guy up there, I always want to capture them because it’s just such a unique thing to see. But now that construction is in full swing, it’s becoming more and more common. I thought it would be interesting to use the scale of the columns and the Lincoln statute itself to show the scale of everything. Plus I really enjoy looking at that little sliver of orange that’s in President Lincoln’s hair.

One day I would really love to get up there. It has to be the coolest view of the city. This guy knows it because I could definietly tell he was taking pictures of the sunrise with his cell phone. Lucky. Hopefully roof repairs mean that we can go up there one day? I doubt it but fingers crossed.

My camera settings for this image is F4 at 1/80th sec and ISO 500 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens.