Meeting Place for APUG group for MidAt

[TheFlyingCamera]

Just thinking of more things to see/places to go in Baltimore, we can also take in Cylburn Arboretum - it is a 176 acre park centered around an 1880s victorian mansion. The arboretum is run in a public/private partnership to showcase and preserve american horticultual traditions. There are acres of greenhouses, and displays of many kinds of gardens, featuring new and antique varietals. Cylburn is at least a half-day excursion in itself.

[JamesG]

I would be interested in coming to the party. I'll keep active in this thread.

James

[TheFlyingCamera]

James- welcome to the Mid-Atlantic APUG cluster!

If you can make it to DC next weekend, on Saturday we're doing a tour of the new photography show at the National Gallery, then hitting a neighborhood eatery for lunch and a portfolio show-and-tell.

[JamesG]

Let me have the details and I'll see what I can do.

[TheFlyingCamera]

There's another thread with the details, but the short version is that we're meeting inside the rotunda of the West Wing of the National Gallery of Art at 10:30. Bring some of your prints to show if you like, over lunch.

[TheFlyingCamera]

Well, folks, the May 6th date is fast approaching. I'm going to hit B'more this weekend to do a dry run, map an itinerary and schedule, and I'll post it here next week. As an incentive to get folks to show, if anyone is interested in trying the new Ilford Warmtone and Cooltone developers, I will bring 3 bottles of each. First come, first served on the paper developer, 1 bottle of each per person max.

[TheFlyingCamera]

The dry run was a great success. There's enough material to work with between Druid Hill Park and Cylburn Arboretum, which is not far from the park, that we could kill an entire day just there. Jim Shanesy, Diwan Bhathal and I spent the morning shooting at Druid Hill Park. There's a victorian Conservatory in the park, which has some fantastic plants, including a massive Agave plant in the desert conservatory. They have an Orchid room, great for folks into macro or color, and a formal garden outside. Good news for the large format and macro crowd- the Conservatory permits tripods inside. It is also rarely busy, so you don't have to worry too much about the crowds getting in your way or tripping over your tripod.

Within a very short walk from the Conservatory there are several pavilions, monuments to William Wallace and Christopher Columbus, and the lake. The lake has a folly at one end (now closed for safety reasons) made to look like a moorish castle tower, and a stone pumphouse in the middle of the lake with cast iron railings. I'll post some scans when I get some prints made.

Cylburn Arboretum is worth an entire day in itself. The Arboretum is 178 acres of protected parkland in Baltimore City. There is the mansion itself, which is quite photogenic. The mansion grounds have numerous spots worthy of attention - a formal garden, marble lion statues, and acres of greenhouses. There are various trails through the woods marked for the species of trees and other plantlife that can be found. We were fortunate to have some fantastic fog rolling through the grounds that day, and the property lent itself very well to photographing in the fog. I'll have alternate sites mapped out for folks who want to stick to more urban/architectural subjects.

[c6h6o3]

The dry run was a great success.

If I can come away as I did with at least a half dozen keeper images from such a "dry run", just think how well I'll do during the real thing!