Sanctuary
Sven January 19th, 2010
Insulation doesn’t come much more effective than packed earth and a city overhead. Forget the wearying heat of the summer night, and find refuge in eternally cool brickwork.
It had been a while since I was last underground, and a nice night for it. Clear, cloudless skies greeted us, though you couldn’t necessarily tell, looking up through brightly lit city towers. Draining hadn’t been the original plan, but I had no shortage of torches at the ready, including the ever-more impressive-Quark RGB. A short walk, a short drop, and the calm night was replaced by quiet echoes.
Now, my main thought with photography was to see what use I could find for the RGB. As it turns out, it’s a great torch for light painting in general, even ignoring the colours. Smooth and even, and far less prone to cause flare than the less floody torches. That neutral tone is great, too. Up and down tunnels I trapsed, shielding the light from the camera with my body, a rubber band and a Sennheiser earphone flange holding the shutter open in lieu of a cable release.
Don’t I keep saying I need to get that fixed?
Each experiment was illuminating, if you’ll pardon the pun. The colours on their own tend to cause the camera some drama, so I played with mixing, with varying degrees of success. Though, perhaps I should actually plan, or take note of what I’m doing, if I intend to actually learn something here.
I’m particularly glad now that I opted for the neutral white RGB, as it matches the other Quark, to which I’ve now fit a Fenix diffuser, thanks to some quick sandpaper work. This means I can leave the diffused light in a static position for feature lighting, and fill with the other, without colour clashes.
Of course, sometimes colour clashes are the whole point :) I’m still working on how to make use of those colours in some kind of sensible, tasteful way, but in the meantime, it’s all good fun.
PS: Added one more shot that I wasn’t originally going to post…
PPS: Maybe just one more…
- Excursions
- Comments(6)
The scale really is quite deceptive in that first shot.
sure is! unfortunately it is no where near as large as it looks.
Interesting to see that when you were there lava appeared to running through the channel. I too visited recently only to discover what appeared to be some form of radioactive/toxic waste flowing into the river! Strange! What have they been dumping at RSP?? Better call the EPA :P
That junction photo is one of my favourites by you
Thanks, Inventor!
Cool locations and awesome shots!
Looking for some drains like these to shoot some shots for a mates band, as well as some (safely planned) long exposures and light-play shots, I’m always looking for unusual locations. If it’s not too much trouble could you please email me back? I’m interested in discussing and locating some of these underground palaces!
Thanks!
I’ll drop you a line – as you intimated, though, the weather is anything but helpful at the moment.