Project 52 - Week 42: Brick

I missed last week's theme, but I could not get my act together in terms of my schedule.  I am glad to be back this week.  The theme is brick, and I only wish I had taken a dog with me on my trip to Carlisle, PA this past week.  The red brick historical architecture would have made an excellent backdrop.

In going for a walk at one of our local parks this week, I discovered work being done on a memory garden.  The garden is lovely, and the work crew is using brick pavers, many with engravings meant as memorials to loved ones.  I decided this would be the place to try and capture an image for the week.

Here's a photo just to give you an idea of what the memory garden encompasses.

That's Moe in the photo.  You've met him before.  He had been lobbying to go for a walk since I returned home from my trip.  Moe likes to do two things on a walk:  eat grass and eat grass.  There is nothing "walky" about eating grass.  In fact, eating grass is "standy." But that suits Moe to a tee.

There are two things I forgot about the time of day I chose to take these photos.  First, it's October, and the sun sets differently and at a different time in October than it does in August.  Second, the sun shines pretty brightly on the memory garden location, which makes for too much light and lots of diffused shadows. 

In the shot below, I blurred out the brick.  It's a little bright and Moe's face is blown out in spots, but the sun and shadows made the brick look blue and pink, and I liked his expression.  This is Moe's "when are we going to eat grass?" look.

Moe was actually leashed to a bench in the memory garden the entire time.  It took me a while to get him to look at me.   Moe is 11 years old and pretty set in his ways.  He has seen it all, and knows a human trying to get him to do something he does not want to do is a lost cause.  So he humors us.

I did get him to give me the ears up look just once, so I had to go with the next photo.

Again we are in the land-of-too-bright.  The brick pavers, however, are good to go and give you a feel for the color and pattern scheme being laid down.  Moe and I walked all through the garden and read all of the names (well, I read them to Moe).  The garden is a good place to contemplate life and memories and I plan to make it a regular stop.

For those who care, I used a 24-70mm lens on a Nikon D800 and should have had a polarization filter on the lens. I took it off to clean it, forgot to put it back on, and the rest is history.

To see more brick interpretations, the blog circle is waiting.  Start with Cahlean of About A Dog Photography in central Minnesota, then look for the link at the end of each blog to move forward to the next photographer.  Enjoy!