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Phil Douglis | all galleries >> Galleries >> Gallery One: Travel Abstractions -- Unlimited Thought > Bird and belfry, Bodie State Historic Park, California, 2006
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21-OCT-2006

Bird and belfry, Bodie State Historic Park, California, 2006

It was just after sunset when I began photographing this raven perched on top of the bell tower of the long abandoned Methodist church in the Bodie ghost town. Using the spot meter, I exposed on the sky to make the church, bird and adjacent telephone pole into a silhouette. I used a fast shutter speed of 1/400th of a second to abstract the scene, fast enough to catch the bird in flight, just as it was pushing its wings down to gain altitude. I show less of both bird and church, leaving the details to the imagination of the viewer. The silhouette expresses yesterday more than today, an appropriate metaphor for a town that has died.

Panasonic Lumix DMC-FZ50
1/400s f/8.0 at 76.3mm iso100 full exif

other sizes: small medium large original auto
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Phil Douglis29-Jun-2007 19:02
The bird is definitely flying away, Daniel. As for the story this image tells, I encourage each viewer to use his or her imagination and come up with their own. As for me, this is a ghost town -- the bird is spirit, abandoning the church. That is a worthy story for this image. If you put this picture in the context of the place, you should have no problem imagining such a story. If you read the first sentence of my caption, you will have adequate context for it. These words work in harmony with this abstract image to tell the story of a haunted place.
Guest 28-Jun-2007 23:26
While Christine finds that the bird is flying towards the bell tower, I find that the bird is flying away from the bell tower towards the telephone pole. I love how everything is in a silhouette, it really does a great job of hiding the uneccessary details. While I really like this image due to its simple beauty, I'm having a hard time seeing the story it is trying to tell.
Phil Douglis27-Oct-2006 06:45
Without the bird, Christine, it is just another abstraction. With it, we have a story as well.
Christine P. Newman27-Oct-2006 00:09
That bird flying towards the bell tower adds quite a new dimension to the picture.
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