I enjoy taking photographs that include a vanishing point in the composition. In particular, I capture many pictures of staircases and corridors. One of my goals was to capture an image of one of the most famous staircases in Chicago--the Oriel Staircase inside the historic Rookery Building on LaSalle Street in Chicago.

Capturing a photograph of this staircase presents some challenges. First, tripods are not allowed inside the building. So, the camera must be handheld in relatively low light conditions. I ended up using a shutter speed of 1/30th of a second with a relatively wide aperture of f/5.6 at ISO 3200. That isn't much light! Next, one is not permitted to leave the lobby area while visiting the building. Unfortunately, the staircase starts on the second floor and continues up to the eleventh story. You cannot see much of the staircase from the lobby--certainly not enough to bother taking a picture of it.

The only way to gain access to the staircase--other than becoming an employee within the building--is to take part in one of the tours of the building. The Frank Lloyd Wright Preservation Trust provides tours at noon on weekdays. Tours are limited to 12 people. I registered for a Wednesday tour as the tour includes a stop in the Burnham Library on Wednesdays.

During the tour, the guide spent about 5 minutes at the bottom of the staircase. While he was continuing with his presentation, I sat on the staircase and fired as many exposures as I could within that time. With the challenging exposure, I wanted to make sure that I came away with at least one sharp, properly exposed image!

Fortunately, I was happy with one of photographs from that visit. Recently, the picture did quite well on the 500px website--making it to Page 2 with a ranking of #26 in the world. That's my highest ranked photo on that website since "Claws" reached #7.

Oriel staircaseLooking up at the oriel staircase at the Rookery Building at 209 S LaSalle Street in Chicago, Illinois on December 18, 2013