Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum

Goal: Capture urban decay type images of a facility that is over 160 years old. The photographs should be part of a coherent set of images showing the condition of parts of the facility.

Challenge(s): Site access is available through one of the regular scheduled photography tours. No other access is provided specifically to accommodate photography of the grounds. There are specific buildings made available on campus during a specific timeframe. Each building is in a different state of decay and is left that way for the purpose of photo tourism.

Because there are multiple buildings that were used or different purposes, the interiors are designed different from each other and the light moves through them very differently. This means the timing of shooting in specific places to get specific images can vary greatly and I would have to walk between buildings multiple times to get the target images. Walking burns time and, more importantly, light.

Time is a factor. The tour is only available on a handful of days each year and for a few hours each day. Research and planning are important to having a successful day of shooting.

Portability of equipment is important. While preparing for the shoot, a decision has to be made as to whether bracketing is required or not since that can dictate equipment choices. For this shoot, I decided to not bracket any shots allowing me to move more freely and quickly around the campus.

Solution: Using professional level camera equipment, I was able to shoot with a single lens and either hand hold or use a monopod for all images. Typically shooting at 14mm allowed me to keep the images sharp from 3 feet away to infinity. Using a minimum shutter speed of 1/125 second allowed me to hand hold the camera when not on a monopod. With those two settings in place, I took advantage of the high-quality sensor in my camera to push the ISO as high as 20,000 to get shadow detail where needed and have control over any noise in the image. Thoe decisions all greatly simplified the work in post processing.

Result: A set of images showing the ongoing decay of a facility over a century-and-a-half old. The dynamic range of the dark interior with bright light in the windows is controlled, depth of field is sharp, various textures are visible, colors are clear, and the compositions communicate the look and feel of the spaces.

These photographs could be used for many purposes including advertising, social media, prints, event posters, cards, and more.