Background to the Fore

Here's a trick that I often find useful - find some scene that I like - then using it as a background or backdrop, wait for someone to walk into the scene. You need something photogenic to use for the backdrop... a handsome or unusual building, as in this case, a colorful, graffiti-covered wall, or a path in a park during autumn.

This kind of thing is an example of the whole being more than the sum of the parts. The building, wall, or whatever may be attractive, but by itself, will seem too static. On the other hand, a person walking by an uninteresting, distracting, or ugly background probably won't be an image worth a second look. But combine an engaging background with passerby, and you often get something compelling.

Bedrock Billiards in Bank Building in Baltimore

Pardon the alliteration - I can't help myself.

Now that I'm working on the West Side of downtown Baltimore, I'm discovering new things to photograph. Having worke for some years near the Inner Harbor, on the East Side, this area has been terra incognita to me. But as it turns out, there be no dragons here, nor, for that matter, nearly as many architectural turkeys as on the East Side.

This fin de siècle bank building, its bank long defunct, now houses Bedrock Billiards. I haven't been inside, but I understand it's basically a bar-and-grill/catering place with pool tables, dart boards, and even two shuffleboard courts.

This photo looks manipulated, as if I desaturated everything but the sign. But in fact, this is pretty much the way I saw it on a gray morning last week. The contrast between semi-cheesy, colorful sign and the elegant gray stone carvings is what attracted me as I ambled up West Baltimore Street.

To set this photo in its context, here is a photo I found on Flickr.com that shows the Little Bank that Was.