Flashes of Panic

Sometimes I carry a piece of equipment around to multiple places without ever finding a good use for it. Tonight I was struck by inspiration, though, and while walking back to the train station from dinner I pulled out my Gorillapod and used it to take some long-exposure shots of Stuttgart at night. I probably couldn’t have taken any of these shots without a tripod of some kind.

My M.O., in general, was to find a place to prop the Gorillapod, frame the shot (a bear of a problem, as you can see; frequently I was resting the tripod on the ground, and I wasn’t willing to lie full-length on the sidewalk to adjust the shot properly), and set the camera for no flash and a ten-second delay. Why the delay? Because pressing the shutter button made the camera shift on the tripod, and since most of the exposures were a full second, I couldn’t have that. So I’d press the button, then take my hands off and let the shot take itself.

I got shots of the Collegiate Church tower, the fountain here, the Neues Schloss (where last night’s dinner was), the Landesmuseum Württenburg, a column I haven’t identified yet, a relief on the facade of St. Eberhard’s Cathederal Church, and some more. For the full set, look on Flickr.

Not all of them are quite as pretty as this, I admit; this is the one I like most, in fact. (You really want to see the full-size version.) I’m still looking for a good shot of the stadium.

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