David Howell Travel Photography and Map Blog

Pure function. Local resources-stone, wood.

A person could spend a lifetime photographing or drawing doors, arches, shutters, and windows in old stone villages. Perhaps some have. But why?

Each stone mason had a functional solution for creating a strong opening in a wall. Some were ornamental arrangements, others were limited by availability of stone or time or creativity….

This photograph depicts both sides of leisure.

While almost all of the passengers slept, this woman and many other crew members, were busy cleaning, cooking, and preparing for another day of leisure – for other people. For me, this image is a metaphor.

On one side of the glass, the deck is clean and ’ship-shape’, ready for very early morning strolling. On the other side of the glass, behind the scenes in a way, a woman (lower right) works hard to clean the glass….

I had been taking photographs for an hour or so as the morning brightened. I had walked all over the ship and explored the vantage points on all the decks….

Patterns, shapes, shadows, white, and the sky.

And the sun.

Everything in this photograph is white, except for the glimpse of sky and the sun filtered through the skylight….

I am starting to enjoy the buildings that house art displays almost as much as the art itself….

Luxembourg Garden in Paris is an entire world unto itself.

In the autumn it is filled with people basking in the last warm days before winter. There are readers collected in groups in the sun or isolated in distant corners in the shade. People meet to talk or just sit quietly and watch what others are doing. There are ice cream and crêpe vendors….

The beaches of Rio de Janeiro are not all crowded.

This small beach had only a few people in the middle of the day. This boat was left temporarily by a local fisherman….

“Let’s spend the morning on Nydeggbrüke.”

We were only in Bern, Switzerland for a couple days. Fortunately my wife was patient while I tried to get this photo. The Nydeggbrüke is a bridge over the River Aare.

It was a partly cloudy day. My goal was to have high contrast shadows on the cobblestones of the street below (Mattenenge). So it had to be a time when the clouds had passed. They were moving swiftly, so the openings were brief….

Beautiful information!

OK maybe I enjoy maps more than most, but there is something very compelling about aerial photographs.

In this case the aerial photograph is not only beautiful, but it is also scale accurate and terrain corrected. That means that the distortions that occur in all aerial photographs have been taken out by computer corrections…This aerial photograph is of the vicinity near Trinidad, California, USA. This area on the northern coast of California is covered with beautiful redwood (Sequoia sempervirens) forests. The beaches are dramatic, scenic, and usually empty….

If you are tired of crowds, stress, and noise consider a trip to a desert near you!

In the late evening, in summer, after the sun has set, there is a long dusk. The sky is open. The vistas are immense. The sounds are limited to wind moving through hardy brush, dry grass, and, in this case, Joshua Trees (Yucca brevifolia Engelm.). There are no lights, no cars, no buses, no television, and no sirens.

It is still very warm at dusk, although it cools off later. The quiet masks the activity that increases after the sun sets….

How many stories? And where are they going?

How many stories have woven through old train stations like this one in Marseille, France? How many short journeys to work or school? How many romantic rendezvous, family holidays, trips to the beach, mountains, or abroad? How many of these stories have unexpectedly overlapped?

As they wait for their trains the passengers feel excitement, anxiety, stress, devotion, boredom, escape….

I gave myself an assignment to cover the local county fair.

A fair is a very visual event. The workers at the carnival trying to entice customers onto rides or into games; the livestock auction; the vendors; the performers; the people; and the horse races, are all interesting.

I had never stood at trackside at a horse race before….