Dave Daniel Photography

Motorists on I-65 are enjoying an interesting distraction just north of Lafayette as they enter the middle of an immense wind energy farm with wind turbines towering over 250′. The wind farm is home to over 600 wind turbines spread across 100,000 acres. The entire farm provides thousands of megawatts of clean energy to local energy users. Honestly, there really isn’t much of interest to look at on northern Indiana highways, but as I found myself looking around the countryside at the countless wind turbines, I began to wonder if the accident rate has increased on this stretch of highway.

After many trips through the area, I finally managed a short stop to get a handful of images. Pictures don’t do these turbines justice, as they are incredibly large with a total height of 372 feet, and there are so many of them. On the windy day I stopped, the 110 foot long blades made a low vibration as they slowly spun. Even though the blades turn at a seemingly slow speed of 15rpm, the tip speed is high enough to blur them in the photos.

I plan on returning to the area in the near future to take a number of night shots. It’s really hard to describe, but picture hundreds of red lights a couple hundred feet in the air, flashing on and off in unison well off to the horizon. The area truly looks like a sci-fi invasion. Meanwhile, enjoy these daytime shots of a very small fraction of the turbines in the area.

The Indianapolis Canal was a spectacular destination for this unusually warm spring day. With camera in hand, I spent the afternoon watching visitors to the canal take in the views, the museums, and memorials along the canal. I was also wanting to check out the canal length for candidate locations for some upcoming portrait shots.

In case you didn’t know, what we know as the Indianapolis canal downtown was actually part of the Indiana Central Canal. It was intended to connect the Wabash And Erie canal (which is partially intact today) to the Ohio River. The Indianapolis section roughly parallels White River and extends in pieces between Broad Ripple and White River State Park.

Although it’s a wonderful destination, I continue to be upset that the city allowed private construction along the canal, such as a tacky Residence Inn hotel, office buildings and condos. In my never to be humble opinion, the entire canal should be surrounded by park space and public venues. So much for the soapbox.

This was a chamber of commerce day – unusually warm at 84 degrees, slightly breezy, and mostly sunny. I ended up shooting over 200 images ranging from canal views to some families and pets along the canal. It’s clear that I need to make up some info cards so people know where to go to see some of the pics I took of them.

I thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon and will be back with some photo clients to use the canal as a backdrop for some portrait shots. I easily found a couple dozen locations that should provide excellent results.

Enjoy!

I’m constantly on the lookout for interesting locations for future photo shoots, and happened to come across one in East Central Illinois in the small town of Villa Grove. Villa Grove is on Illinois SR-130 about 5 miles north of US-36. The location is near the train yards and appears to be an old commercial oil/gas supply terminal. Also at the site is a large semi-circular warehouse that might have been a roundhouse, along with a number of smaller support buildings. Across the tracks is a terminal building and a complement of small main streetish buildings. The whole town is rich with potential photo targets.

What appealed to me about the site were the amazing textures and, of course, the fact that it’s falling apart. While the initial draw was as a backdrop for a model photo shoot, or as a framing for something like a motorcycle or automobile shot, I found a number of possibilities for the site as the star. I shot off about a dozen images to remember what was available for a later session when I had more time and better light. Some stark winter shots intrigue me. Now to schedule a time to go back for those killer shots.

Desperately needing to get out of the house, and even more desperately needing to exercise the camera (and myself), we trekked off to Indianapolis’ Holiday Park to shoot the famed Ruins. For those that don’t know, Holiday Park is a 94-acre park located on the north side of Indianapolis. The park has something for almost everyone, including botanical gardens, hiking trails, native wildlife, the White River, a nature center and, as mentioned earlier, the Ruins.

Holiday Park Ruins in Winter

The Ruins is a sculpture by Elmer Taflinger, based on the facade of the St. Paul Building, which was located on Broadway in New York City. The facade was originally designed by Karl Bitter, a prominent architect of his time, and featured Indiana limestone carved into the “the Races of Man.” The limestone found its way back to Indiana as part of a contest to preserve the carvings. About 50 years later, the Ruins are even more beautiful, although the surrounding area needs some attention from the City.

The gallery from the shoot is available here . All images were shot with a Nikon D200, using a Nikkor 18-200 lens, all on a tripod. Exposure information for each image is provided in the gallery. I’m planning on returning in the spring to shoot identical views. Enjoy!