Getting Ready for Spring

With the relentless winter this year, trying to think of spring flowers has been difficult.  In order to get my macro, flower photography eye 'tuned up', I have taken in the lovely Cleveland Rockefeller Greenhouse the last few weeks.

The beautiful flowers and warmer indoor setting has help me to exercise my macro photography gear and hopefully be ready in a few weeks as the spring wild flower season will be starting.

Big Snow, Little Italy

Now for something that is a bit outside of my comfort zone - urban street photography.  

There is a small section of the large metropolitan area I live near called "Little Italy".   As the name implies, this was a very dynamic Italian neighborhood for the last 100+ years.   In more recent years, the area has become an arts district with trending shops, galleries and a wide variety of restaurants and famous bakeries.    The middle class feel of the area remains.  

Several years ago, I was visiting a friend who lives in the area during a heavy winter storm.   I was fascinated at the scene of piled snow and limited driving in the area.    I had thought of trying to revisit during a snow event to photography the scene. 

Finally the combination of available time and wintery conditions all came together.   I just had to battle the elements to walk and photograph the scenes.  

I really enjoyed finding and capturing the street scenes, but as I told some friends, unless I live near this area in the future, I'm not fighting the traffic again to photograph this scene.    The driving was terrible, but luckily I got home without any incidents and have some nice images to remember the scene by.