“Urban Grunge” was my first dive into the art of landscape photography. It was an experiment in finding points of interest among the mundane and generally unappealing landscapes of the cities and towns near my campus. My concept for this series was to photograph light in the darkness, going out past midnight, searching for areas that were still illuminated for my camera to capture. There’s something fascinating about the small pockets of civilization where we keep the lights on after the world goes to sleep. The chill in the air, the isolation, the uncharacteristic quiet—I find it all equally cozy and unnerving in these places.

Taking these photos was an exercise in thoughtful observation. I had a few visions for shots I wanted to create, but much of the process simply required me to open my eyes to what the world wanted to present to me that night. I spent hours driving around and looking carefully at spaces I’d passed by for years without ever really noticing. My favorite shots in this series are the ones I had no prior plan for. And if I ever revisited this project, I have no doubt there would be countless similar locations to capture that I’ve discovered since.

The editing process is where these photos truly come to life. I wanted these images to look dirty and distressed, as if each photo was a lost print that spent decades decaying in storage. I added layers of scratches, dust, smudges, lens flares, and grain, strategically masking them to create a controlled chaos in the texture of the composition. The images were color graded to highlight the dingy and artificial tones found only in landscapes made by man. I emphasized browns and yellows, and created strong blue glows around neon lights and street lamps. In the end, this collection embodies the nature of the place I used to live in, and finds a small sense of beauty in the industrial, the utilitarian, and the dilapidated.

- Colby Wygal