fourpointedstar

Yesterday, on my walk through Elgin with a friend, I photographed this same scene; but I already had a monochrome for yesterday, so Sarah and I went back tonight to capture the scene again for today’s monochrome.

…view older images with the thumbnails below…

For the second full week of Black & White February, I decided to follow up on an idea that I’d had for a few months – to shoot light trails in Elgin.   I enjoy capturing long exposures, but the added challenge of capturing light trails in downtown Elgin instead of Chicago (where there’s more traffic) seemed challenging.  

While we were out in the bitter cold for the January Lunar Eclipse, I realized that Elgin’s parking garages would make a great vantage point for some light trail images.   I’d taken images from the top of the Spring Street garage, in fact, I’ve led photo walks in downtown Elgin and used the Spring Street garage as a vantage point.  

However, I decided to add one more aspect to the week’s photos: I would attempt to shoot 7 images and capture 7 photos that I was proud of…I didn’t quite make it.   Capturing light trails of traffic when there’s very little traffic turned out to be a bit more challenging than I expected.   But I took 14 images, from 6 vantage points, and captured 7 images that I’m proud of.

Elgin’s historic buildings set it apart.  Elgin was prosperous and large enough to support a booming downtown in the late 1800’s until the mid-1900’s.  The buildings that once housed dozens of downtown shops and the historic churches are just as impressive today as they were 100 years ago. As I’ve walked around downtown, these buildings have gathered my attention; and I wanted to document the names, brickwork, and cornerstones on a few of them … which then turned into this black & white poster.