The Artful Engineer

On my last visit to Alabama, we went on a drive to see some covered bridges. We ended up finding three of the eleven such bridges that remain standing in the state. I have always associated covered bridges with states further north, but you can learn about the ones in Alabama here; there is both a video and a nice summary table. One interesting anecdote mentioned a horse thief—who also happened to be the county sheriff (!)—that was hanged from one of the bridges. Seems like a good basis for a movie.

The Horton Mill Covered Bridge, above, was the first bridge we found. It’s easy to see why so many of these bridges have burned down over the years: the open timber trusswork, as beautiful as it is to look at, would allow tremendous air circulation in a fire once it started. The sky was much brighter than the interior of the bridge, so I had to underexpose a lot to keep the sky from blowing out and then brighten the interior by around three stops. I also desqueezed the anamorphic image, which gives this wide perspective, something that is enhanced by being taken from about knee-high.

This next image shows the outside of this same structure. I focus-stacked this image from twelve separate exposures, which makes the most of the repeating pattern and the textures, although I wish I had made a shallow depth of field version, too. The amount of vertical variation in what one would expect to be straight lines—such as the bolt locations—is a little disconcerting in a bridge, but I expect it is mostly attributable to them being placed by hand when it was originally built.

Although it’s not a bridge, I had to jump out and photograph this barn getting hit by light from the setting sun. I think it is otherwise an unremarkable barn, but it goes to show what nice light can do. The little playhouse next to the barn is a cute extra detail, though.

As with the previous bridge, Easley Covered Bridge, below, still carries vehicular traffic. I went for a very wide view to show as much structural detail as possible. It would be fun to return to these bridges with a fisheye lens.

It was starting to get dark when we arrived at our last location for the day: Swann-Joy Bridge. This is a long bridge over the Locust Fork of the Black Warrior River (What a great name!). Long exposures worked very well here, showing off the pretty colors in the river. The metal cladding on the bridge itself reflected the still-(relatively)-bright sky helping it pop. These final two images are a little more similar than I usually like to include, but are a good example of how a small change in position—here about 15 feet at most—can dramatically change a composition. I prefer the first, which is more about the bridge, to the second, which is more about the water. I think the first one is a stronger composition overall, too, with the well-positioned trees and some nice roots in the lower left. I do wish I had shifted slightly to the right, however, so that the bridge support was not partially blocked by the tree trunk.

I hope that you enjoyed these images from rural Alabama. It’s a fun state to explore, and I look forward to being back there for more in August. (I say that now, but the weather will be truly horrid.) I have a few more weeks of posts covering Alabama and Colorado to come before I finally turn the blog’s attention to London and Rome.