Rural Tama County, Iowa - Ruins

I have a fascination with old abandoned farmhouses. The residents have long since moved out and most likely dead. It takes years for the first bits of shingles to give way--exposing the wood underneath to the elements. It is said that if you can keep a coat of paint on the sides and a dry roof over the top these structures (like barns) will last indefinitely, but let that first bit of moisture in and the days are numbered.

I used Picture Window Pro 5.0 to convert these images from color to B&W. During the process, I backed off the amount of monochroming, and found a nice balance--one that makes the images look hand-tinted. I used a yellow filter during the conversion to enhance the sky. PWP handles this correctly--it applies the color filtration to the entire image, monochromes it and then allows you to blend in a percentage of the orginal color photo. Here is the original color version.