Home Is Where
For some of us, home is a place. Sometimes it may be a specific building, or maybe an entire city. For some of us, however, home could be represented by being held in someones arms. It is a concept as open to interpretation as love and while it has its firm definition as the physical place where you live there is plenty of room for creative interpretation. In my case, home is not so much a place as it is a feeling. So while on the surface you could say the image above is of my new home lit in the warm late afternoon sun but I can’t help but feel something, or I should say, someone is missing that would make me feel truly at home. I have been slowly settling in with new furniture and flourishes but I still can’t wait for her to come and fill this void.
Sentimentality aside, lucky for me my new apartment has a nice afternoon light that casts a peaceful glow in the bedroom and office. Plenty of windows is something I was specifically looking for and I was happy to come across this space. What you see here really was the color of the room at the time. The white balance is set at a fairly neutral space and there was little to no post work. Just the beautiful afternoon and a steady hand at work here.
I will tell you a trick I always rely on when shooting at slow shutter speeds without a tripod (such as this 1/15 f/1.4 exposure). Take a couple of deep breaths, relax, prop your elbows against your chest to form a semi sturdy platform with your hands for the camera, and balance yourself as best as you can using a wall or crouching works best for obvious reasons. Then take one last deep breath, breathe out slowly and focus on the stillness of not only yourself but everything around you, as if the world itself is moving in slow motion. In that stillness before breathing back in, trip the shutter. I don’t always have the steadiest hands in the world but this often works for me. At any rate, enjoy the new image and I will see you next time.
My girlfriend is in the Navy in Florida and home is whenever I’m with her. I love this image by the way.
This is really great, John. It does have that feeling of home, somewhere safe and intimate.
Love it! thanks.
Beautiful. Love the bokeh in the window.
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I love you (not in a homosexual way) for that sentence: “(…) but I still can’t wait for her to come and fill this void”. I am in a truly unique relationship now & I’m starting to feel that way, the more I see her. It’s a feeling that you can’t describe, it’s too good to put it in words. :-)
Cheers & wonderful photo once again!
Hey, John! Truly love your photography, and this is definitely my favorite picture of yours. I read your terms of use and came here to ask you for permission to post this wallpaper on reddit.com/r/wallpapers under my account with a direct link back to your website, in order to share it with more people who might not have been fortunate enough to stumble upon your website. Also, after reverse-image searching this photo in particular, I managed to find that someone had uploaded it here: http://wallbase.cc/wallpaper/2233875. Just thought I’d bring your attention to this. Keep it up and thanks for your time!