I was almost home last night when something caught my eye on the side of the road. There, glowing in the darkness, was a massive pile of construction barrels with their yellow lights still shining. Barrels that once took up residence on my street as it was being widened, now huddled together in abandonment, 30 feet from the road. I took a double take as I passed by on the opposite side of the street, it was such a unique site.
As I pulled into my apartment complex just a block down from the scads of glowing barrels, I knew I had to go back there and photograph this peculiar image. So, I ran to my apartment, grabbed my camera and tripod, then headed back to the site on foot. As I drew near to the pile, I stepped off the side walk onto bare ground. I noticed as I walked that it was really more sand than anything as is most of our “dirt” down here in Florida. It brought back memories of being a kid actually, because it smelled like a sand box in this area.
It was now just me and the mound of lighted barrels, off duty from the stretch of road that had just been completed! A few dogs that lived near by through some trees sensed my presence and began to bark occasionally. Once in a while, a car would go by, they were probably wondering what in the world I was doing, or maybe just thought I was with the construction company, who knows?
Since I was using a tripod for a long exposure, I set the ISO on my camera at 50 to prevent as much “digital noise” as possible. One thing that annoys me, is digital noise, the equivalent to “film grain”. For normal shooting, I usually use an ISO of 200. I then set the camera’s shooting settings to “aperture priority”, this would give me an automatic reading of how many seconds the camera wanted for proper exposure. It said “8” seconds first with a wide aperture. So, I tried 8, but ended up shooting most of the images at 4 seconds like the one above.
I guess the construction crew wanted the batteries of the lights drained by morning? Whatever the reason, it created a photo opportunity for me!
14 comments:
this picture reminds me of fireflys!
wheeeeeee!
Dude, what an awesome picture!
I wish I knew what it was like to have my neighborhood smell like a sand box. :-)
What a great photo. And thanks for telling how you did it. I hope I happen upon something like this sometime - and that I go back to see what I can capture. And then, of course, I hope I capture something worth looking at, like you did.
This is awesome! I love it, you were so lucky to have seen it so close to home and been able to get your gear to capture it. Fantastic - I almost feel sad for them...
Awesome Shot! To think they guided people at night to keep them from danger, and now they sit abandoned waiting for there next construction assigment!
I have an Antique light Iv'e had since I was a boy. Makes me want to go home and put some fresh batteries in it and turn it own.
Great Job!!!!!!!!!!
Good shot. I think you will find the lights have no off switch and flash all the time while the battery is installed. I suppose if they had switches some hooligans would think it fun to turn them off at the most inopportune times. Glad to hear the Florida state symbol has finally been removed from your road
BRILLIANT!
Such a cool shot dude! Great find.
wow! Good job!
Great capture !
Strange rendezvous !
A good photo is also godsend.
Wow, now why don't I ever get opportunities like this! Dumb luck just isn't on my side, It's great you noticed and went back, so often we don't take the time. This is just "da bomb" love it!
Chad, I love everything about this photo, even the randomness of you finding it. It's really a wonderful shot on many levels! Kudos,
-Kim
What an awesome photo! I'm so glad you went back to get this shot!
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