Today’s Post by Joe Farace
“Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail” – Ralph Waldo Emerson
History Lesson
From1859 to1860, during a period of gold rush and the settlement of Colorado, six way stations were established along the Cherry Creek to accommodate travelers. These house’s names were based on their distances to downtown Denver. In these places—think Minnie’s Haberdashery in The Hateful Eight— travelers could get meals, spend the night, and rest their animals. Of all of the original mile houses, only 17 Mile House and Four Mile House remain today.
17 Mile House, near Parker, Colorado, is part of a 70-acre open space that includes an 1860’s “mile house,” along with a barn and silo and is located along the historic Smoky Hill/Cherokee Trail route to Denver. It was originally a log cabin and some portions of the original structure can still be seen.
How I Made this Shot: This image was made using a Panasonic Lumix G6 that had been converted for infrared capture by LifePixel using their Enhanced IR (665nm) filter. For more information about nanometers of infrared light, please read my post Welcome to the Word of Invisible Light, when you have the time. The lens used was a Lumix G Vario 12-32mm f/3.5-5.6 kit lens at 12mm or 24mm equivalent. The exposure was 1/640 sec at f/11 and ISO 400. The RAW file was converted to monochrome using Silver Efex with Platinum toning added by PhotoKit 2.
17 Mile House is located at 8181 S. Parker Rd. on the southern edge of Arapahoe County where three adjoining open space properties serve as a regional wildlife corridor and biking/walking trail. In 2001, nine different entities joined together in an attempt to preserve this historic site and work there has been ongoing for the past several years. It’s worth a visit, especially when the house is open and available to tour. Although be aware that the docents frown on photography inside the house, for some reason.
I’ve found that Life Pixel does a great job with IR conversions and they’ve done most of the conversions for my Canon DSLRs and all of my Panasonic Lumix G-series cameras. This is not a paid or sponsored endorsement, just my experience.
New copies of my book, The Complete Guide to Digital Infrared Photography are currently available used from Amazon for $20.85 (plus shipping) as I write this. Creative Digital Monochrome Effects has a chapter on IR photography and new copies are available from Amazon for $11.46 with used copies starting at a little more than six bucks, which is a heckuva deal.