I went to Trinity Cathedral during my lunch hour today. It is one of the two massive churches located on Sixth Avenue across the street from The Duquesne Club in downtown Pittsburgh. Although I remember when Trinity Cathedral was mostly black with soot from our city’s industrial days, its stone exterior has since been cleaned and it probably looks as good as it did when the church was completed in 1872. The church is of the Episcopal denomination and part of the Anglican Diocese of Pittsburgh. Like many downtown churches, it offers a warm environment during the day for the city’s homeless. For the 30 minutes or so that I was inside, there must have been at least 20 people sitting in the pews. Some were snoring and others were mingling in a loud cluster at the back of the church.

Anyhow, back to the photography. I try to limit myself to 30 minutes inside the church because it usually takes me 15 minutes each way to get there and back from my office. Today I was working on some HDR or high dynamic range photos using several exposures to capture a greater depth of brightness and darkness. This requires a tripod and then I take the photos to my computer to merge them and come up with one photo that I feel mimics what you actually see in person. I like replicating real life as much as possible. Some photographers are very talented at exploiting this technique for exaggerated effects.

I didn’t photograph any people in the church. Some photographers I know take offense at photographing the homeless, but I feel differently. They are people like everyone else. I think they have a story, just like any other pedestrian on the street. Their stories are sad and I’m not capitalizing on them, I’m simply creating a visual that speaks their needs and frustrations for others who might not have thought about what life is like for them. My reason for not photographing the homeless today was technical. People do not make good subjects for HDR photography because they move.