A town that once was

Ardmore, SD, 2009. Pretty much a ghost town now, Ardmore once hosted an event with President Calvin Coolidge.

The clouds became heavy and the late afternoon light disappeared, only to reappear for a few minutes as the sun dipped between the cloud layer and the horizon. The cottonwoods and this old water tower glowed brightly. I had been walking around taking hand helds of abandoned homes and other buildings, and was walking back to the car when the light reappeared.

I had to try something with those trees against the dark sky. I took this braced over a fence post to use a slow shutter speed in windy conditions, which allowed the grass some motion blur. The effect worked about as I planned, but when processing the image the range of tones made me think of trying a b & w conversion. I am a little out of my element with this kind of experiment, so let me know what you think.

D200, 17-55 @ 44, ISO 125, f11, 1/125