It was downtown kind of morning

Instead of going to the gym as usual and hitting the treadmill, I decided to grab my trusty camera and brave the cold winter morning in downtown Port Arthur. Luckily, the weather warmed up slightly so it wasn't as bad as it has been all week. So I parked the car, bundled up and headed out into the unknown. Well, in this case, it ended up being Cumberland Street at first.

My first stop was the old Cineplex Theatre, which is just an old abandoned building for the most part. I am still amazed that they haven't torn down the signage. My camera of choice was the Fuji X-T1 and the 16-55mm lens. It's a great combo, and even though it's a bit of a bigger lens, I still don't really notice the weight. I usually shoot with my prime lens but I must admit, it's nice to have a bit of zoom. It allowed me to get some perspectives I wouldn't normally have been able to get.

The next stop along the way was the Shoreline Motel. For some reason, I'm always drawn to this building, for photos that is. It's not really my cup of tea as an establishment, but to each their own. I think I'm just a sucker for slightly run down and old buildings. 

Seeing as how I was right across the street from the Marina, I crossed the street and walked around the west end. There were some interesting cloud formations hovering around the Sleeping Giant so I waited a bit for the sun to be right and snapped a couple photos. I really need to start bring my tripod with me more often but I think I got a good enough shot hand held.

I was starting to get a bit colder, especially once the sun went away so I took the overpass back downtown and finished up by exploring some other streets and back alleys, before heading back to my car. The last shot of my walk was my favourite. I noticed that a whole bunch of pigeons were perched on the building so I gently approached, and because I had my zoom, I was able to stand a bit back and get a good shot. 

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County Fair + Cumberland Street

Since it is my birthday today, I figured I would treat myself to a little photowalk. Since I had just met my wife Anne for lunch on Eddy Lee's, I decided to go down the street and walk around County Fair. There used to be a Canadian Tire there but it has long since shut down. Instead, they opened up a Walmart a few years ago. I always remember going to that Canadian Tire when I was younger to go get some tennis balls or other random things that kids need. It was always a trek to ride my bike all the way there. As you can tell from the photos, it is now just an abandoned building, but you can still see some of the signage. 

Well, me being a fan of run down buildings and anything old, I simply walked around the building looking for things that caught my eye. It is actually attached to the mall which I later checked out. The mall itself, is almost empty as well, with just a few random stores here and there. I'm not sure what is going to come of it but it's really strange seeing it so baron. 

Once I finished walking around at County Fair, I trekked down to the end of Cumberland Street. For those of you who aren't familiar, it is another street with a lot of motels and older buildings. Again, I just looked for random scenes, paying attention to colour and composition. 

For the County Fair photos I used the X-TI with the 16mm and for the Cumberland Street photos I used the X-T1 paired with the 35mm. Both lenses are fantastically sharp and quick to focus. I am just taking photos of stationary objects, but still, the colour rendition is superb with this camera and lenses. Each image, I used the jpg version, with the exception of some of the landscape photos where I need to bring out the sky a bit more. All processing was what I always do. I boost the contrast, selective colour here and there to make it pop and overall sharpness.

Thanks for viewing!