One morning at the Wright Park

It was barely four months using my Olympus E-510 DSLR when I took this shot. I could not even remember the type of exposure I used here, but the EXIF data said “Normal” which means “auto” or “program” mode. I must honestly admit that for a long time, I was in “P” mode. It should be okay then since I was still getting more familiar with photography. [Smile!]. But now, I am mostly on the “M” mode and I still use “P” shooting during my photojournalism stints when I have no more time to compose and meter, etc. In other words, point and shoot!

When I was in college in Saint Louis University, I was amazed by one of the tourism posters of Baguio City which hung on one of the walls of the old Baguio Museum way back 1987-89, when it was not yet ravaged by the killer 1990 earthquake. It was a photo of a white horse grazing on a piece of grassland at the farther right end of this photo. It was a sunrise and the rays of the sun were just perfect seeping through the pine branches. I wanted to duplicate that photo, but then, the grassland was no more there. It was replaced by that white building on the right. Also, at least a positive development, small pine trees now lined up the supposedly open space then. The horses are no longer white, but pink, yellow, green, and what have you! It looks amusing but it is not!

Anyway, I did not want to spoil the effort to wake up before sunrise so I went up the Mansion House instead and took some photos and play with my shadows among the trees lining up the man-made lagoon. Then I went down through the stone stairs with more than a hundred steps, which until now, I have not really counted. Needless to say, it was tiring and I had to rest for a while when I saw this scene. Instinctively, I took several shots until I was able to get the rays of the sun. My “copying”, while not a poster material, ended very well, I think (at least with the effort I made). I was able to capture a minute in the life of the horsemen and their “rainbow horses” at the Wright Park–and I still have the soft rays of the morning filtering through the pine trees.