Thursday, February 12, 2009

Heavy Industry

I have always loved huge industrial things - skyscrapers, dams, bridges, railroads, and heavy machinery.  I am in awe standing next to these gigantic structures.  So today I decided to photograph something industrial.  Look at the feeling of strength and power in these machined parts.  It is both powerful and beautiful, even thought it is covered in dirt and grease.  Can you tell what it is?  It is part of what makes my bicycle go!  It is the cassette on the rear wheel, which is made up of 10 sprockets of different sizes which the bicycle chain wraps over in order to drive the rear wheel.  That is a part of the chain in the center of the photo.  This is, of course, an extreme close-up.  It was astounding to me to see all the details that became evident looking through the lens.  And I was stunned at how dirty the chain is - I cleaned the bike only three days ago.  On some of the photos you can see these "giant" grains of sand that the grease has picked up.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

a wonderful new way of seeing a bicycle chain -- muscular and musical.

Amy said...

So so so so cool! I thought it was a steel gate at first, so to find out that it was a close-up of your bike chain was an awesome surprise! Who knew it could be so beautiful.