Rebirth of top photographers

Chapter 190 The restless city is colorful
Before going to shoot, Chen Pingsheng still has to make a lot of preparations.

Such as clothing, planning routes, and various tools needed.

Chen Pingsheng spent two days planning before basically finalizing the decision.

His journey will be divided into three sections. The first section starts from the mouth of the Yellow River and Huanghekou Town, Kenli District, Dongying, Shandong, passing through Jinan and finally arriving in Kaifeng.

The whole journey is about 550 kilometers.

The second section starts from Sanmenxia City, passes through Yuncheng, Luliang, Ordos, and finally reaches Baotou.

The whole journey is about 700 kilometers.

The last section starts from Yinchuan, passing through Lanzhou and Xining, and then along the Xili Expressway to Maduo County, and from there to the source of the Yellow River, the Bayan Har Mountains of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau.

The whole journey is about 1200 kilometers long.

If you include detours and other routes, he needs to drive about 3000 kilometers in the entire journey.

It was certainly a challenge for him, both physically and mentally.

Because of this, Chen Pingsheng is full of energy. He has not done such a challenging shooting for a long time.

With this idea in mind, he arranged all his work matters one by one and posted his upcoming itinerary on WeChat Moments.After that, he told his parents that his mother's request for him was to talk to him once a day.

Chen Pingsheng said that he was not going to some deserted place, but his mother was very insistent and could only go along with her.

After taking care of everything, he dragged two huge suitcases to the airport.

It contains not only his change of clothes, but also his wealth and life, a medium format SLR and a large format digital camera.

It’s time to embark on a journey again.

He looked at the ticket in his hand. The first stop was Dongying Shengli Airport.
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After arriving in Dongying, the first thing he did was contact the car rental agency he had communicated with before. He rented an SUV, which was very spacious and could sleep in the car at night.

But he also brought a tent to avoid any accidents.

After arriving at the dealership, I found that my car was undergoing a safety inspection before driving.

Check to see if there are any water or oil leaks, and whether the tire pressure is appropriate.
At Chen Pingsheng's request, the dealership also changed the engine oil and third filter.

Safety is always his top priority.

After the vehicle inspection was completed, Chen Pingsheng placed his luggage in it after paying the money.

Touching the dark blue smooth door, Chen Pingsheng sighed: "You will be my mobile home next."

After that, he found a restaurant to eat.

Dongying is located in the Yellow River Delta and has a lot of seafood.But Chen Pingsheng searched for the delicacies here, and found that seafood is not the main focus, but fried buns, donkey meat and whole lamb soup are the best.

When it comes to mutton soup, Chen Pingsheng must try it.

Many people hate the mutton smell of mutton, but he is not one of them. Even when eating mutton and drinking mutton soup, he feels that without that smell, the essence has been lost.

This may be related to his life in the Northeast when he was a child. He still remembers the mutton siomai downstairs. The thin skin hides the plump and juicy mutton. It is lightly dipped in soy sauce and vinegar. After one gulp, he feels instantly satisfied. Spontaneously.

This is a delicacy that he will remember for the rest of his life. After arriving in South China, mutton is not so common.

The special thing there is eating mutton soup pot in winter, also called Jianyang mutton soup.Boil the mutton and haggis in a pot, then put a piece of fermented bean curd in your own bowl, add some spicy millet, add coriander and chopped green onion, and finally scoop a ladle of soup into the bowl, add the meat and water to eat.

One bowl after another, after finishing the mutton, add more soup to the remaining seasonings and drink it into your stomach to warm your stomach and comfort you.

Chen Pingsheng eats there every winter solstice, because during the three seasons of spring, summer and autumn, the store may not sell mutton soup but instead sell Sichuan cuisine.

As for the Yanwo Whole Lamb Soup in Dongying, it is similar to the mutton soup in Northeast China. Both are served in sea bowls. Chen Pingsheng ate the mutton soup and ordered fried steamed buns, which gave him a taste of the local customs.

After that, he drove straight to the mouth of the Yellow River in Kenli District.

After arriving at the destination, he could see a wooden sign on the side of the road, with the words "Entrance of the Yellow River into the sea" written on it. Chen Pingsheng drove forward and soon saw a pavilion.

After getting out of the car, he stepped forward and took a look.

"The mouth of the ancient Yellow River." A stone tablet was erected in the pavilion. The red fonts on it have been eroded by the years and appear blurred.

"Let's start from here." Chen Pingsheng nodded, feeling that a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.

He took a photo, sent it to the photo circle, and wrote a copy: "Thank you Feiming for your help, allowing me to embark on a new journey again."

Fans then left messages one after another.

Sun Yimao: "Is Teacher Chen going to start taking pictures again?"

Simu Mumu: "I hope everything goes well for Teacher Chen!"

Fan Shusheng: "This is Dongying at the mouth of the Yellow River. Does Mr. Chen want to take pictures of the Yellow River?"

Young photographer who commits crimes against the wind: "I'm really looking forward to this! My home is near the Yellow River,"

Cangyi: "Teacher Chen, please update the film circle quickly. I haven't seen your work for three days."

Keli Keli: "Teacher Chen finally took a photo of the scenery of China. This must be the first time!"

However, Chen Pingsheng didn't see any of these comments. After he silently silenced his phone, he drove to the first shooting location.
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Here is a vast, seemingly very turbid river surface. The color in the river is even darker and heavier than the surrounding loess.

In the distance, you can see traces of green belts and factories built in the city, while nearby is a house with its foundation in the river.

Chen Pingsheng didn't quite understand why the foundation of the house was built in the river, but he was keenly aware of the inspiration for photography.

So he set up a tripod not far away and propped up the Feiming LG810. This thing was really heavy, and even he, who was successful in fitness, could not handle it easily.The weather today is very gloomy, which suits the needs of this series.

In fact, the most difficult and time-consuming thing for Chen Pingsheng is how to control all the photos in a cloudy environment.

If he wanted to keep all the tones uniform, he had to shoot on a cloudy day. But with such a long journey, how could he ensure that he could get a cloudy environment?
This reminded him of the golden prop he had drawn.

Prayer music box.

Before he left, he specially tried it on when he was in South China, and found that this prop was more powerful than he imagined!
The reason why Chen Pingsheng failed at first was because he was praying for rain.

And when he changed this condition to cloudy weather, something unexpected happened.Unlike praying for rain that can only be within the scope of that small garden, praying for cloudy days can even extend to a radius of hundreds of miles, covering an entire area, and the maintenance time is also extended from a few minutes to a few hours.

Through experiments, Chen Pingsheng realized that it was possible to make the weather completely as he wished, but the restrictions were also different.

If it is raining, thundering, and hailing, the weather restrictions will be very strict, but if it is cloudy and sunny, which only changes some clouds, the weather restrictions will be very relaxed.

This also gave him the confidence to complete the work within a month.

Waiting is endless waiting, even more boring waiting than shooting "The Crow" and street scenes.

Because everything can only depend on luck, elusive luck.

Chen Pingsheng patiently squatted next to the camera tripod, looking at the buildings and the roaring Yellow River not far away.

The building had six floors, with gray wall tiles. From his point of view, each floor had two windows, and the blue glass reflected the sky, making it look particularly peaceful.

There is a square corridor outside the windows on each floor. The outermost part is painted with white cement railings, imitating the European style and decorated with monotonous walls.

Chen Pingsheng has seen many similar buildings. In the countryside of Northeast China, many self-built houses imitate the European style, because this style is very flashy and feels luxurious at first glance.

As we all know, Northeastern people are relatively good-looking. No matter whether they are really good inside, at least they can't show their timidity outside.

Thinking of this, he smiled and suddenly thought of the memory of climbing mountains in the village when he was a child.

However, at this moment, two workers carrying scaffolding came to the corridor from the main entrance.

Their location happened to be at the corner of the first floor. When Chen Pingsheng saw this, he immediately got up and returned behind the camera.

The two workers chatted with each other, smoking cigarettes while setting up scaffolding.It seems like there is something at the bottom of the second floor hallway that needs repairing.

After a while, the worker in red trousers stood underneath, holding on to the scaffolding, and another worker in yellow trousers climbed up, looking up into the distance.

"Yes, that's what it feels like!" Chen Pingsheng pressed the shutter.

"Crack!"

Extremely loud sounds come from the camera, which is one of the disadvantages of large-format digital cameras.

No matter how well you hide it, you can't erase your presence because the penetrating power of the shutter sound is too strong.

Fortunately, the distance between him and the subject is not close, otherwise the subject's attention would definitely be focused on this big guy.

After taking a picture, Chen Pingsheng put away the camera and continued on his way.

On the way out of Dongying, you can see traces of old industry everywhere.

There are white smoke, large red and white chimneys, bridges being built, and some old buildings being demolished.

People here also wear dark clothes and have regular hairstyles. It is rare to see energetic young people on the roadside. They are all middle-aged men who are older but still running for life.

Passing by the construction site, a pungent smell suddenly came over. Chen Pingsheng rolled up the car window and found that a large amount of stone was being transported here.

Driving around, Chen Pingsheng, who wanted to leave directly, suddenly saw a huge monument.

Above it is a shape like cornices, with golden edges and corners wrapped in crimson inscriptions, and below it are three levels of steps.From here, you can see the bridge being built in the distance. The strong industrial atmosphere and roaring sounds rush in, breaking the original solemnity.

The reason why Chen Pingsheng stopped here was because he saw several people staying under the inscription.

Without saying a word, he set up the Feiming LG810. In order to save time, the camera was always fixed on the tripod.

But no matter how fast Chen Pingsheng is, he cannot change as quickly as the real world.

By the time he set up, all the people had left.

This is the photographer's frustration.

If it were Fei Ming, a medium-format camera, he would have captured the picture he wanted.

But in order to keep all the photos in the same tone and color, he couldn't change cameras.

So the long wait began again.

Chen Pingsheng looked at the empty monument, then passed it and looked further into the cloudy sky that looked foggy.

He suddenly felt a little uneasy.

This uneasiness is not danger in the physical sense, but refers to the unpredictable conflicts hidden in all seemingly ordinary daily life.

Chen Pingsheng suddenly thought of Zhang Kechun's words about this work.

“Anything that feels slightly unsettling in the landscape is ready to be photographed.”

Yes, there was an unsettling moment before him, but the last piece of the puzzle was missing for him to film.

(End of this chapter)