Monday, September 23, 2013

Little Rock Through My Lens


When the Central States Chapter of the Society of American Travel Writers met in Little Rock in June, several of us competed  in a photo shoot-out.  We began at about 5 in the afternoon and went until after dark.  We started out early the next morning and shot until late afternoon.  We then had to pick ten photos for competition.  The categories were: Bridges, People, Architecture, Action and Sense of Place.


I'm having difficulty moving these around on the page, so they'll show up rather haphazardly but these are my ten entries.  The top picture was taken in a beautiful sculpture garden along the Arkansas River.  The sunset shots were all taken of and from Little Rock's Big Dam Bridge.  Yes, that's its name.  It's a marvelous pedestrian bridge over a dam on the Arkansas.  Little kids (and I) enjoy talking about the bridge because it sounds naughty!


How quickly the light changes!  This shot, of another bridge was taken the same day.






This shot was taken shortly before the last bridge shot.  You can see the clouds gathering.




More of that Big Dam Bridge!





The farmers' market provided colorful subjects -- and they tasted good, too.





I loved this shot of this beautiful mother and daughter at the market.  It was the winner in the "People" category.




I caught this gorilla at the zoo -- animals were entered under "Adventure" -- and I think this could have been an action shot if I hadn't been on the other side of a wall.  I believe if you click on the picture, you can make it bigger.  If you do, you'll see the whites of his eyes.





There were a lot of obvious shots in Little Rock, particularly in architecture -- the Old State House, the Clinton Center, the state capitol -- so we all tried to get different pictures.  This is a detail of the little Victorian home which was used as the exterior of the Sugerbaker sisters' house in "Designing Women."




Another sunset on the Big Dam Bridge.  You can see how the ramp on the left leads up to the major portion of the bridge.  This is the longest pedestrian and bicycle bridge in the world -- and that's damn big!