Mary and I were in Sonoma with some friends to taste wine and we made some time to photograph the mission in Sonoma and some other fun stuff. It was a terribly overcast and cold day. These were not ideal shooting conditions, but we can’t chose the weather conditions. We have to adjust to them. Here is what I saw and did.
The Mission San Francisco Solano is located near the town square in downtown Sonoma. After photographing the inside, Mary and I proceeded to the courtyard. The courtyard was very plain; the light was flat and gray; and the sky dark and overcast. We both knew that whatever we shot, we would convert to black and white.
As Mary shot some of the windows and doors, I looked up to see this.
I knew there was a good photograph somewhere in here. But I did not just go for the obvious answer – I explored several options. I had already heuristically come up with the answer, but I wanted to make sure I did not jump to conclusions and maintained the discipline to try more than one composition. So here they are.
LOOK – was standing in the middle of the courtyard and looking around in a 360 degree manner to find something to shoot. SEE – was finding the cross and the interesting corner below it. IMAGINE – was exploring all of the possibilities and imagining the scene in black and white. CREATE – was taking all of the choices in the field and creating the final best print.
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