Photo of the Day: 5 August 2016 – Life Force
I never cease to be amazed at the seemingly impossible places plants will find to grow. This man made structure might not seem to be the most promising of locations, but somehow nature has found a foothold there. That plant on the right of shot might be tenacious, but its purchase can only be temporary. The building’s maintenance team will surely soon remove it before it causes too much damage. When I looked at the photo later, I also realised that I had inadvertently included a plane at top right. After some thought, I decided to leave it in.
Fuji X-E2, 27 mm lens, 1/600 @ f/8, ISO 200
This building is a firm favourite with me. A friend took a shot of it a few years ago, which is when I first became aware of its potential. My first image of it was during my 2013 photo-a-day project and I did not intend to do any more than that. A year or so later I was out and about trying a new camera and took a few test shots as I was in the area. To my surprise, they turned out well, although it took a lot of work post capture to get a result I was pleased with. A few months later, a national photography magazine ran a competition with an architecture theme and the image finished third. I won another camera.
Those with long memories of this blog will also recall that the shot was featured in another photography magazine earlier this year – https://lightintotheshadows.proimageblogs.com/im-famous-sort/.
Does the appearance of another image here indicate that I have a new camera? Yes it does. I was offered an attractive deal on an ex-demo Fuji X-E2, which shares a sensor with the X-Pro1 which I also own. That camera produces great results, but does have some handling issues which means some care is required in its use. Being a later camera, the X-E2 largely removes those and has some features which are not on the X-Pro1. In our short time together, I have been happy with it. With the Fuji 27 mm pancake lens mounted, it makes for a pleasingly compact unit.
This is part of my occasional “Photo of the Day” series when I publish any shots which I think might be of interest and tell the story behind them. They might not necessarily be portfolio standard images, nor the final version, but still be of sufficient interest for inclusion in my blog. If I do not show a shot on any given day, it does not mean that I did not take any photographs, just that I did not get anything worthwhile. For me, that is part of the fun of photography, not knowing what you will find on a shoot when nothing is planned.