I went for a walk the other evening in Union, IL (where my parents live). The light was warm and golden. There's some old, worn out, abandoned (?) factories on the other side of the tracks. I spent a little time exploring the area. Here are a few of the results...

Every photowalk deserves a macro shot or two don't you think?

Gotta love a random boat outside a factory next to train tracks.

I like this one. Something about the "Private Property" sign in the foreground and the "F Off" graffitti on the door strikes an odd chord.

Macro shot number 2!

These were all shot on my Canon 40D with the Sigma 18-200 f/3.5-6.3 DC OS lens. I throw that baby on when I want to travel light and really can't decide what lense I want. It really is good glass - though it occasionally catches a bad rap. If you stop it down to f/5.6 or beyond, it's really hard to go wrong.

The camera was set to shade white balance. Now there's a good trick for you: If you want to add some character to your outdoor shots, warm up a cool blue-ish looking atmosphere, or just really emphasize golden light, use your camera's shade or cloudy white balance setting. Heck, I shoot shade or cloudy even when I'm out in direct sunlight. It provides fantastic warmth!

I took these images in RAW + JPEG, but to be honest, I never even bothered with the RAW files. The jpegs turned out great. The camera was set to Landscape (with some of my custom edits) for the Picture Style. In Lightroom 2, I pretty much just added two points to the black clipping, slightly adjusted exposure and highlights, and sharpened them up. I really didn't need to do a whole lotta work.

Hey, shooting jpeg can be fun!