Noel Kerns
When the full moon rises, photographer Noel Kerns
heads out with his camera to photograph some of the spookiest places in
Texas and other nearby states. Since 2007, he’s spent many full-moon
nights shooting abandoned houses, churches, and other buildings
in ghost towns around the country.
Kerns practices a style of night photography called “light painting,”
which he learned from a group of fellow photographers during a trip to
San Francisco. The moon provides the base light for these shots. Kerns
creates the rest of the light himself by placing strobes and other
artificial lights in the scene while his camera’s shutter is open. “If
you're shooting inside an abandoned building, it's absolutely pitch
black. So if you want something to appear in the picture, you have to
put light in it. You're really using the light to sort of fill in the
canvas and make the picture what you want it to look like.”
When it comes to abandoned buildings, light painting creates an aura
that seems especially apt for the subject matter. “It implies that
there’s something going on in the building, but you don't know what.
That creates a haunting or creepy vibe. It's kind of like a horror
movie: You want to watch but you're scared at the same time,” Kerns
said.
Noel Kerns
Noel Kerns
Noel Kerns
Noel Kerns
Kerns said ghost towns are easy to find. Some he stumbles upon one
while driving. Others he discovers online. They were abandoned, he said,
for different reasons. One town’s residents left because contaminants
from nearby mines were poisoning them. Other places started to decline
when new rail and road routes directed traffic elsewhere. While the
locations are often well-documented, Kerns said visiting them is not
usually legal. “It's almost all trespassing,” Kerns said. “Seldom do I
have permission. It's easier to ask forgiveness if you need it. In
general, most people don't care, and most people don't find out.”
The work presents other perils. The floors of old buildings are at
risk of giving out. And in the dark, Kerns can’t see whether there are
other visitors in the buildings. And then, Kerns said, there are other,
less tangible, unknowns. “I'm not one to believe in ghosts or things
like that, but I will admit there have been a handful of buildings where
there's been a weird vibe. You feel there's somebody watching you from
the darkness the whole time,” Kerns said.
Kerns’ ghost town photographs are included in his book, Nightwatch: Painting With Light. You can follow his work on Flickr.
Noel Kerns
Noel Kerns
Noel Kerns
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