Washington State Capitol Building

coscorrosa

The last time I was in Olympia (the state capitol) it was to attend a Sonics rally. The Sonics have since moved to Oklahoma, where, as the Thunder, they are currently 2-19, on pace for the worst record in the history of the NBA. The ownership group has lost around 4 billion dollars since the move was finalized due to the economic recession.

If death by schadenfreude was possible, I wouldn't have been around to take these photos yesterday evening.

There's also been some recent national controversy at the state capitol that some of you may be aware of, but I was there to take pictures.

I also experimented a little (a lot?) with some black and white shots.

#1:



#2:



#3:



#4 (the polarizer really brought out the pinks and purples in the sky)



#5:



#6:



#7:



#8:



#9:



#10:



#11 (the only shot from the interior of the building, which is just as awesome as the outside):

speedsk8r

oooooh i want dat nice.

rwx

well done!
Ron,

Very nice pics! I've been there a few times -- you captured it well! But I've never been there at night, so I especially enjoyed those pics.

I really like the B&W.

I'm curious, since I'm thinking about getting a star filter. What kind of filter did you use on #9?

clemensphoto's

Very stunning photos. The B&W's are my favs

squirl033

rwx wrote:

Ron,

Very nice pics! I've been there a few times -- you captured it well! But I've never been there at night, so I especially enjoyed those pics.

I really like the B&W.

I'm curious, since I'm thinking about getting a star filter. What kind of filter did you use on #9?

probably just a small aperture. shooting at small apertures will produce this effect, which has more "spokes" than a star filter can provide.

coscorrosa

rwx wrote:

Ron,

Very nice pics! I've been there a few times -- you captured it well! But I've never been there at night, so I especially enjoyed those pics.

I really like the B&W.

I'm curious, since I'm thinking about getting a star filter. What kind of filter did you use on #9?

Thanks!

I didn't use any filter, those diffraction stars occur "naturally" as the result of the lens i was using (Canon 16-35), which has an odd number of aperture blades (7 to be exact). When there's an odd number of blades, the star effect is doubled (so 7 aperture blades results in a 14 point star). If your lens has an even number of blades, say 6, then they cancel each other out and you get a 6 point star.

The smaller the aperture (f/16, f/22, etc.) the more pronounced the effect, especially when the subject is the sun. Although this shot was taken at like f/13 and there was still a noticeable star effect, probably because the (artificial) light sources were small, unlike the sun.

bryanj87

Do you ever take a bad picture?

These are great!!! #1 and #4 are really good!

annnna8888

Another great series. I love #1!

Ana

coscorrosa

Thanks for the comments!

I don't take many architecture shots, and even less in black and white, so now that I got it out of my system, I can go back to shooting normal over-saturated landscapes

NorthernFocus

I don't do architecture shots nor typically do I comment on them. But, dude... You did good