This spooky spider image that I took late Friday afternoon while hiking along part the Potomac Heritage Trail is probably more suitable for later in the month, but I just couldn’t wait until Halloween to share it.
Normally when I use fill flash I try to be subtle, attempting to add a little pop without making it obvious that I used flash. In this case, you can’t help but notice my use of the popup flash. Normally I would take a shot of a spider like this with my macro lens, but I was travelling light with just my superzoom Canon SX50. The 50x zoom of this camera has helped to bring distant subjects closer, but I had never tried to use the camera’s macro mode. I quickly learned that you have to be really close to your subject, literally only a few inches away. I was pretty happy when I was able to get the second shot below, but wanted to add to the drama of the shot.
I dropped the exposure compensation in the camera down to a minus three stops and got my favorite shot. The darkened sky and the way that the flash illuminates the spider give the image a kind of creepy look that feels appropriate for a spider that was just about at eye level.
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved.
Mike Powell 
Abandoned
Posted in commentary, Nature, Photography, Urban, tagged abandoned, Canon 55-250mm zoom lens, Canon Rebel XT, Potomac Heritage Trail, Potomac River on February 21, 2013| 8 Comments »
Last weekend as I was hiking along the Potomac River in Virgina, following the narrow, rocky Potomac Heritage Trail, I came several large metal objects that appear to have been abandoned. They are shaped like some kind of water or fuel tanks and have lots of bolts and/or rivets. To me, they look very industrial. There also was a large wheel-like object. Although I was only a few miles from Washington D.C., the area where I saw these items was very isolated.
Does anyone have any idea about what these objects were used for and why they might have been abandoned?
© Michael Q. Powell. All rights reserved
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