THE ART OF ABANDONMENT
WILD WATERS - AT SILVER SPRINGS STATE PARK , OCALA FL Photographer / Writer : Walter Arnold TheDigitalMirage . com
Walter Arnold is a self-taught fine art photographer born in Tallahassee , Florida in 1981 . Walter grew up in a creative and artistic family and spent most of his childhood in Elmira , New York . After living for years in Florida he settled in Hendersonville , North Carolina and now calls the mountains home . After picking up his first digital SLR camera in 2006 , Walter used the beauty of Western North Carolina to help train his creative eye and hone his photographic skills . In 2009 , he stumbled on an abandoned airplane graveyard in St . Augustine , Florida . Shooting the abandoned planes , he discovered his passion for abandonment photography . Since then he has focused on developing his own personal style of photography that he calls “ The Art of Abandonment ”.
Walter ’ s vision draws him to capture unusual and artistic scenes in places that others often pass by . He employs an artistic technique called High Dynamic Range photography with many of his images . By capturing multiple exposures ranging from dark to bright , his technique reveals a greater range of light and detail in
a scene than could be captured with a single image . This , coupled with Walter ’ s creative interpretation of a scene , allows him to create non-traditional and sometimes surreal images , that bring to life the forgotten locations that he explores . Walter ’ s photography has received national and international recognition . Most notably , Hollywood movie director Ron Howard selected one of his images to inspire a short film “ When You Find Me ”. Howard chose the photograph out of almost 100,000 other entries as part of Canon ’ s Project Imagin8ion . Walter ’ s award-winning work has been featured on MSNBC , CBS This Morning , HGTV , Yahoo News , PBS , Business Insider , Conde Nast , Lonely Planet , and many more . Walter has also worked with camera manufacturer Sigma , creating images used in numerous AD campaigns published in over 30 magazines .
THE STORY :
The humidity felt thick – like slogging through a hot fog — as I walked alongside other tourists , under the “ Florida ’ s Silver Springs ” sign for the first time in 30 years .
I was six the last time I visited the famed artesian springs , and quite frankly not much has changed since then . But then again that ’ s part of the appeal of visiting one of Florida ’ s oldest tourist attractions . People have been visiting the springs in Ocala , Florida since before the Civil War .
My reason for traveling here and enduring North Florida ’ s oppressive land-locked heat and humidity wasn ’ t purely for nostalgia ’ s sake though ; I had my sights set on photographing Wild Waters , a recently closed and abandoned water park on the grounds of the now state-owned property .
Getting legal access to photograph abandoned and off-limits places can be a challenge . Throw in the fact that the State of Florida now owns Silver Springs park , and getting permission becomes even more difficult . Several days prior , I had met with one of the head park rangers about photographing the old Wild Waters portion of Silver Springs . After a bit of explaining why I wanted in and assuring them that it was NOT my intent to paint a negative or bleak picture of Silver Springs , I got the OK . I also got a stack of paperwork to sign ,
PORTFOLIO MAGAZINE 11