San Francisco De Asis Church

Taken in July, this photo is the back of San Francisco De Asis Church in Rancho de Taos, New Mexico. This structure is supposedly one of the most photographed, sculpted, and painted structures in New Mexico. People like Georgia O'Keefe and Ansel Adams have all taken their turn portraying this church. After I took this photo, I was looking through some portfolios of Ansel Adams and saw he had a similar view of the church as this one -- from behind, no windows, doors, or crosses shown -- just the graceful lines of adobe and stucco. My modern spin was to do a single image pass through Nik HDR Efex Pro to give everything a little more texture; also desaturated it a bit. If you're interested, here's Ansel Adams' image. I have to admit, it's a little like the Alamo in San Antonio. You hear of these places, and you imagine them to be out in the middle of nowhere, but just as the Alamo is in the heart of a busy city, San Francisco De Asis in the middle of a gravel parking lot with restaurants and tourist gift shops all around.