Selep Imaging Blog: May 2020

Tuesday, May 26, 2020

Eiffel Tower Reflections

I vividly remember the day I took my Eiffel Tower Reflection photo as one of the best days of the summer in 2019.

Eiffel Tower Reflected in Puddle by Jeanne Selep

Eiffel Tower Reflection

First, just being in Paris made it a great day, but on top of that I achieved a goal I had set - getting a photo of the Eiffel Tower reflected in a puddle. Puddle photos caught my attention multiple times over the years, but I knew Paris was having a hot and dry summer. If the weather presented an opportunity, I knew I would have to move fast.

Eiffel Tower Reflection

My son and I left the Musée Marmottan (Marmottan Museum) and discovered a downpour going on. We changed plans on the spot, bought an umbrella at the museum, and decided to go to the Eiffel Tower for perhaps the 3rd time that trip. There were no metro shortcuts, so we literally started to run to the Eiffel Tower so I could "get my shot".

Me and my umbrella

When a fit 20-something male decides to move fast, it can be quite a fast pace. We basically ran what google maps claims is only 2.4 km (Personally, I think google might be wrong - it seemed like much farther).

Then we looked for puddles and waited for the rain to stop.

Eiffel Tower in different puddle with raindrops

The wait was made much nicer by eating crepes from the now very uncrowded concession stand near a carousel.
(At least I ate crepes. Nathan ate the kind of lunch a 20-something eats after a delayed lunch and running for a half an hour. So, maybe two sandwiches, a couple of snacks, then crepes...)

Food Stand near Eiffel Tower

Gray and rainy doesn't necessarily bring me down, in fact it can be sometimes quite nice. Even if your shoes are soaking wet. (The vendors and crowds near the Eiffel Tower must melt in the rain - they seemed to disappear, especially the vendors.)

Decorative flavoring containers at the food stand

We people watched as we waited - the wedding couple below and their photographer were fun to watch as they tried to ignore the rain as well.

Wedding Couple at the Eiffel Tower

I might not have achieved my ideal "puddle" shot, but I love the memories it brings back. The size of the "puddle" was mammoth, which somehow seems appropriate for the Eiffel Tower - dwarfing the cars and motorcycles and people with umbrellas.
(Ideal shot: Eiffel tower lit up at night reflected in the puddle - a goal for next time?)

Eiffel Tower Reflection 2

We had to wait for traffic to stop and the puddle to "settle" between photos, and I never caught a good shot of the cars splashing through the puddle still reflecting the tower, but there still is an energy in the in the photo above, and I love the way the cobblestones show through.

Eiffel Tower Reflection

That evening we met my daughter after her classes, went grocery shopping, and cooked a family meal in her dorm's kitchen, achieving one of her summer goals as well. Overall, a great day in a beautiful city.

Fun note: Puddle shots are trickier than I thought - you have to find the puddle, the best angle for reflection (that is safe and not in the middle of a road), figure out where to focus, (which basically means what you want to have in focus), and how you want to compose it given the limitations of your lens and the geometry of the distances involved. If you get too low to the ground, the reflected object becomes squashed. So perhaps I should have considered practicing before I went, but there aren't a lot of Eiffel Towers back home where I live.

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I think about the French people during this Coronavirus pandemic. I think about the few I met, and the ones that assist and rely on the tourists, which I so enjoyed being. I think about the beautiful museums, restaurants, and stores, and their staff, and I hope they are healthy, and will come out of this summer doing fine.

I hope the same for you as well. May you find great moments in what surely will be the weirdest summer of many people's lives.

Click on the images to see them enlarged.

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