October 26, 2013 .posted by Vickie Llorente

My "Try Something New" blog posts are a series of photos "out of my element". I love most to take candid portraits, but I believe trying new things and stretching myself is a great way to improve my photography skills all around.

My third Photo Walk with Michael Maloney of Camera West. I met with the group out at Fort Point in San Francisco and learned how to photograph the brick, halls, stairs and more.

This is my favorite (below). I had no idea how to balance out the light in the halls with the shadows in the foreground. Michael showed us how to double fire our flash during a long exposure. In the BW conversion I did darken some of the shadows more simply because I love the drama of the contrast.

View into the fort from the top. It's hard to explain just how massive the Golden Gate Bridge looks from this angle. I was in awe.

View of the Golden Gate Bridge from the Fort Point roof.

My boy joined me on the photo walk. He did not want his picture taken so I snuck this one in.

Guard tower? Light house? Both? Looks to me like a lonely place to be stationed. I hope the views made up for it for those soldiers.

There were so many interesting windows in the fort. Some of them even looked like they had been blasted through at some point. Some of them had orange paint on them from the regular bridge painting. I could have taken photos of just the windows all day but this was all I had time for. Always great to have a reason to go back!

One of the sleeping quarters in the fort. I hope that fireplace got hot enough because it looks like a very cold place to sleep!

A portion of the staircase. Difficult to walk up and down but wonderful to photograph! I know some of the others took more angles - I look forward to seeing their shots.

My boy again I still think any photo looks way more interesting with a person in it - especially one of my people.

I don't even know what this is! LOL! Buckets of different fluids with wires going in and out of them. Any guesses?

The view of the city from the fort. It was almost noon so not very good lighting at all. Reason #2 to come back!