Control

This image is a bit of a departure for me, because there is nothing organic or earthy in frame at all. It’s a steel structure with a pole and valve sticking up, and I’ve given it the title “Control” because it’s most likely some sort of control valve to adjust the flow of liquid or steam. (Believe me, there’s no hidden meaning with the title. I promise. I’m just not very good at thinking up titles.) I saw this a few weeks ago when I delivered some mail to the campus post office, and as I exited the building I noticed a series of these control valves sticking up on the roof of the boiler station which takes care of delivering hot water to the University. Or at least that’s what I think it does. To be honest I’m not really sure, but whatever it is, it looks cool so I returned after several days and snapped this picture in the early morning. The entire palette here is blue, which contrasts severely from the usual colors I like to put in my photos, though as of late there has been a more monochromatic bent towards the images on here so maybe this is my way of subconsciously exploring a new photographic frontier. I dunno. I don’t know if it’s successful or not, but I tried to use leading lines to draw the viewer’s eye to the main subject of the photo: the circular wheel, which itself is a stark contrast to the rest of the image which consists entirely of straight lines and right angles. I’m not entirely happy with how the wheel is framed though, since the lower portion is bisected by the diagonal support arm, but there were not many angles from which I could realistically take the picture given the constraints of my 50mm lens, so we’ll just have to make do with what we’ve got here.