A Place Near You, You would love as backdrop to pics

Most the the people who live near me have these wonderful gardens that would look so good.

Namely this one lady who has this hole maze of koi pounds/rivers and wooden bridges with bonzi trees and the hole bit.

But she scares me So I don't plan on asking.

 

I live out in a forest, so my whole surroundings would make for pretty backgrounds. I would love to take pics of my doll in Elk Landing. It's a historic house around here and I think one of the oldest houses in MD (or just in my town). My grandparents used to own it or something, so I've been in there before, but the place was a mess and falling apart. But the town ownes it now I think and they are refinishing it for tours. I dunno if they'd let me do a photo shoot in there though.

 

There's this really old, really big house down the road from me that I'm totally smitten with, and it's got a big yard with gardens and birdbaths and trees everywhere, and I would LOVE to take pictures of my boys there. Especially with the house in the far background, I think it would look so cool.
The house, though, is owned by these stupid contractors and I'm pretty sure they wouldn't let anyone take photos there, especially some teenage girl with dolls. XDD

 

Well, I do have some great photo opportunities at my house, being that I live out on a farm, but there is this 'troll garden' thing in the town I live just out of that used to be filled with gnomes and such, but it's a beautiful place with sd-sized bridges over a stream, plus when the monarchs come back they all gather there in huge massive amounts. And then there are like a billion marshes and such all over, which is perfect 'cause Grendel is a swamp kelpie, but to get to the closest one I would have to climb down a steep (and I say steep as in an almost straight drop off) hill to get to it. And then there are woody areas a-plenty, but I've been to lazy to go to them so far.

 

I'd love to take pictures in my neighbor's garden. Its so pretty and he even has a pond and everything! But he cares for his garden about as much as I care for my doll so he doesn't like just anyone to go in there >.<

I'd also love to have a photoshoot at this authentic japanese restaurant. They have beautiful screen doors and ink paintings. Swords and fans mounted on the bar, I think it would make for a great backdrop

 

There is a national park nearby called Litchfield and it's beautiful - it's got many, many waterfalls and rivers and such and I would love to take dolls there for photo stories!

 

I want to go to the closed down mental hospital nearby.... It has been shut down for twenty years but the insides remain the same, there are mattressed rooms there, paintings and nailmarks and blood on the walls, these long white corridors and everything really really creepy... I just don't dare go there

 

Photos on Boston Common's Frog Pond could turn out interesting, especially if there had been a light snow recently, and the surface of the ice was just a little scarred from people skating on it. (On the other hand, I'd be kind of jealous if my SD had an easier time standing up on the ice than I do! ) I'm assuming, though, that there'd be a time when the rink wasn't very busy, so I could set up for photos without fear of people careening into me, my camera, or my doll...

 

First place we're going, assuming it's still open by the time he gets here, is the Japanese Garden at the Conservatory in St. Paul. Next will be the Institute of Arts (they have a wonderful Asian collection: jades, Chinese robes, scroll paintings and 4 full rooms, including a Chinese literati studio and a Japanese teahouse), the Landscape Arboretum, the chapel at my alma mater and some of the special-collections libraries at the University. Says the woman who hasn't even bought a digital camera yet...

 

I've always wanted to take my dolls to nearby Lake Washington, or over to the beach at Shilshole and take pics in the water. I don't like bringing my dolls out in the sun or in public, though, the people really mess up my concentration and I don't want to expose my dolls to unnecessary UV.
Luckily my yard is shady and private, with lots of decent places for photos.

Ooh another place I'd love to use is the Japanese garden at the Arboretum. My doll might get eaten by giant Koi, though!! XD

Raven

 

There's a nice woodsy area in the corner of my yard that seems like it would be a good place for doll pictures. A bush there would look like a tree from close up. I also have a foresty park area near my house where I'd love to take pictures of my doll, but at the same time I'd be worried about getting her dirty.

 

There is a miniature villiage in the UK where i think the scale would work wonderfully for SDs and MSDs. It even has a model village inside it!

http://www.theoldnewinn.co.uk/village.htm

I'd love to arrange a doll meet there someday

 

That would be AWESOME!!!

 

My friend has an ancient house in her front yard that's been abandoned for 50 or so years.. It's soooo old, and caving in.. it's totally haunted looking! I'd love to take the boys inside and take pictures there

 

Bluewater has this awesome lake around the back of the carpark that hardly anyone knows about. I'd love to take Tripoli there when she comes! It's got little wooden bridges and bushes and swans and everything. And it's secluded, of course xD
Oh, and the gardens at my college too. It's a land based college so it's got some great scenery. They put a huge slate fountain thing in a year or two ago and there are all kinds of plants and great views.

 

in staten island where I live we have a gorgeous botanical gardens and a section that's dedicated to chinese architecture and horticulture, I'm pretty sure it's open to the public but on specific times and dates and last time I went there was TONS of people there >_< impossible to get pictures with people mulling everywhere..

also I believe it's called saint patrick's cathedral in manhattan.. and there's also saint john the divine.. utterly gorgeous churches. I'm not religious but I think churches make for beautiful photograph backdrops but uh.. I'm not sure I want to try to take pictures of my dolls in there.. it would be rude? or something ._.

 

I would love to take all my dolls to Red Rocks (Colorado) for the day and take tons of photos. I guess I really could do this.

 

I'd love to take my doll to the sidewalk near here in early autumn, because in evenings with sunlight it looks so pretty (ya know, colorful leaves and all). Or to a square of grass and trees over the road. Maybe to the park too, but it has way too bad lighting. And way too much people.
Oh, wait! There's a small field opposite my house. Few summers back I went there with my friend and we ended up on a little, very little patch of grass and flowers. Plus there's a little runnel (unfortunately full of junk) and when it was clean, it was so pretty. All the water and fishes and all.
So I guess there's some great places to take pictures here.

 

I would like to take my doll to a 'castle'(which is actually just a big house) to take pictures but I don't know how they'd react to it XD "No no, don't mind me, I'm just going to put my doll in this oldstyle 'water closet' and take a picture. He's gotta go okay?!" Either that or the park near my house. Cause it's big. And has a playground ha ha

 

I'm lucky I live by a beach but I'd really love to take Circe out to brock house. Or maybe this place called the enchanted garden there are a bunch of little houses and other neat stuff there.

 

My back garden is pretty big and there are three ponds with lots of beautiful flowers, bushes and trees along with decking you can sit on. So it'd be really beautiful to take some photographs of Eilonwy outside. Unfortunately the British weather is less forgiving

 

I want to so bad to do a cute little photo shoot at the Space and Rocket Center here in Huntsville! "The Boys go to Space Camp" I don't think they would allow such a thing though.

I was planning to do one at the US Army Aviation and Missile Command, but the military police didn't particularly care for me posing my boy on their apache helicopters and things Those party poopers.

 

I love this old remains of a church in the town where i go to college, but there are always these creepy stoners sitting on the benches, i don't even go there anymore just to sit on the grass because they scare the beejezus out of me >< but it's just sooo pretty!

I guess i'm lucky though, there are loads of historical sites near where i live which are free entry, and they don't care what you do as long as you don't break anything! we've even shot shorts films for drama at them before!

 

It isn't even that I can't get permission, it is just that the place I want to take photos at is TOO CROWDED.

I really want to go to The Bean in Millennium Park and take a bazillion photos and play with all the crazy reflective angles. The problem is that it is a massive tourist attraction and the people viewing the structure are mainly families and kids. They make me nervous, not to mention that you can't even get a photo of yourself there without at least half a dozen other people either standing near you or in the reflection in the back.

I've been thinking of trying to get up early one morning and waiting outside the park gates before it opens to see if I could snag maybe fifteen minutes in relative seclusion...

 

The Millenium Eye in London! It would be so cool, but I just cant afford it lol.

Or this little railway tunnel near my house, but its always full of the hoodie people so I wouldnt want to take Adrian there!

 

There is a rock garden at my school, its so peaceful, beautiful and quiet in the early morning whe nobody's there. But i'd be too afraid to bring my boy to school D= There's also a woodlot just a few blocks away from the school.

There is also this japanese garden nearby the biggest shopping mall in my city, i'd like to bring him there too becuase its pretty nice there.

Uhmm, there's a pretty neat park across the road from my grandma's apartment in Kowloon/HK, i might bring my boy there when i go back this year.

And there's a few sakura trees growing a few metres away from my townhouse and a small garden-type thingy in front of the swimming pool in front of my house.

and, and, and, and, and, and, and...

 

There's a walled-in garden on my bike route home that I desperately want to go in. From what I can see through the gate, it's gorgeous and overgrown, all ivy and wildflowers and long grass. . . .

Unfortunately, I live in the heart of Suburbia, where you can't just go into an abandoned garden. I'd get arrested or something.

 

Just up the hill from my house is a disused graveyard, which would make for a great creepy shoot. And a bit further up the hill is a very old village with a ruined church. I just have to persuade my hubby to take the photos. My little point & shoot is just not up to the job. Oh, and carry my kids up a very, and I mean very, steep hill, which as they are not light weights by anyones standards..........

 

I took my Magrat up to Clent hills because I wanted a picture of her down a rabbit hole ...and on the 4 Stones ...it was way cool !...well she is a Pon


...husband wouldnt walk with me though LOL


and my Garden ...I always take my dolls in the garden ...my favorite spot is either with the Pansys or by the pond

 

Not near me, no, but there is an old convent & church that I took photos of at the end of last year (Abbortsford convent, an hour away?). Some of the buildings were spooky and other had really nice stained glass windows, the garden is full of flowers.. and right next door is a farm.

I just cant remember who/where I ask permission from.

 

This is near, but far away in time...

In 1890-something a lot of things were built up on a island in the middle of stockholm for an exhibition. One of those things were a 1/3-scale model of Stockholm, very detailed, you could even peek inside windows and doors.
A whole city in 1/3-size......

Actually it is only partly demolished, but it is on a little island that was made to look like Stockholm in shape too, and since it has been more than 100 years everything is buried and the only thing you can see that remains is part of the harbour. Plus the bridge is gone, so you can't get out there.

But it had been SO perfect ;___; why didn't they keep it? >.<

 

my roof overlooks Queensborough bridge and it used to be open to apartment residents. I wish they open it again.

 

I love to take pictures of my dolls (non-BJD, I am still to buy one) on the sea-shore, sometimes just sitting onthe sand, sometimes in the water... No permissions needed, just have to find less crowded place

 

I live in cornwall so i'm pretty lucky to have ancient buildings and ruins dotted around. i can't really explain them. so here's a few i'll bring my dolls to.
http://www.cornwalltour.co.uk/trevethy_quoit.html
http://www.cornwalltour.co.uk/men_an_tol.htm
http://www.cornwalltour.co.uk/chysauster_iron_age_village.html
there's plenty more, i'm also taking them to beaches, castles and a few other places.

 

i am now still finding nice place to pic near my house >0<
i love gardens with pretty flowers and grass~~
but these place is not much in HK lol

 

I live in the far north of The Netherlands, and I'd love to take my dolls out of town and photograph them to the background of yards and yards of nothingness XD It's really spacey in here, with lots of potato and cabbage fields. There are also two big lakes and woods about two miles away.
In my town itself there are many old buildings and houses and a large rosarium (rose park) where well-known Dutch sculptors display their art. It's a littel dull now but in summer it looks great

Who said The Netherlands are boring?

 

There's in the village I live (actually quite near where I live) a super old hospital.
They haven't been using it in ages and has now become a quite dangerous ruin.
I actually never looked at it before as a 'perfect backdrop' but only as a "building who deserves lots of respect". XD
But recently when I walked there I actually thought it'd be the most prefect place for shoots!

 

Auuugh, so many.

The back hallways of the mall where I work are like, very "horror movie-ish" and could be great for a "dungeon" part of a photostory I someday want to do...

An old, halfways abolished abandoned schoolhouse I often utilized for cosplay photos would be great, but... falling debris?! NO

The creek near my house.. but... I do not thing BJDs take well to water. Him getting close to the pond in my front yard had me iffy enough.

 

There was a grass fire by my house recently, so every thing on that hill is completely dirt.. it would make a great desolate wasteland. xD I really want to make a photostory about it but it's muddy, so my doll would get dirty. ><; It would be so cool. D:

 

We've got a beautiful set of gardens on my college campus so I want to take pictures there as well as in the Little Chapel by the dorms. Another place I want to go is the front of the old Courthouse on the square thats a 5 min. walk away.

 

in halifax, (the city closest to me) they have a huge public garden. i've only been there once and that was yeeeeeeeeears ago. i would love to go back to do a photoshoot or just take pictures of the gorgeous flowers.

here's a website on the gardens.

 

I live near two parks and my neighbor across the street has an awesome garden I'd love to take Jinx to.

 

right across the street from me, (it actually used to be my view, when I lived in another apartment in the same complex,) there is this old rusty looking metal shed, where they make headstones for cemeteries. Inside, there are hooks and rotting tools, and dirt and scraps of metal and stone. It's amazing, and it really fits with the sort of photos I wish I could take... but I can't seem to find the person who owns it, and I don't want to trespass. ;___; I like rusty, grungy sorts of things.

 

Much as I live in a nice neighborhood, I wouldnt use it for pictures. (they are still actively busy building houses here) Unless someone would like a picture of a doll in front of the giant rock filled hole next door! (they are putting in a foundation)
I would like to get some nice pics while we still have a gorgeous New England Autumn going on. I'd also like to get some pictures at the beach but that will have to wait until next Spring.

 

I'd love to take my darling to the opera house in my city.
Although it's out of scale that building just looks AMAZING, all those details are just stunning, pictures taken there would probably look awesome.

 

Where I live theres this old building called the pumphouse, it used to provide water for my whole town and such. But one day there was a fire and it was abandon, it still stands together, but the roof is giving away, theres holes in the floor, and in areas where there used to be an upstairs, I used to climb those stairs and go up there years ago, it has collapsed. It's a neat, spookey kind of place.



I can't wait to take my boy there, honestly. but I did not take this photo.

 

I live relatively close to a railyard (the Baltimore and Ohio RR...or CSX, or whatever it's called now), and there are some bits of the old building that are no longer in use as far as I know. On one side of the buiding is a set of doors set into a wall that are chained shut. Behind them is a fairly big, empty space with stairs and grass/weeds growing up through the concrete anda bit of ceiling has fallen so that the sunlight shines in and there's this great play of light and shadow in there, and it just looks...really spooky and soooo perfect for a photoshoot. If only I could get in there for even half an hour, I'd be extremely happy. I may try to get a photo, because I'm not decribing it very well.

Also, there's an old cemetary I'd love to get into. It is, however, over 100 years old, at least, quite dangerous because of vandalism and lack of upkeep (there are fallen gravestones, sunken patches of ground, broken stones, etc.) and not open to the public. It's a real shame because there are some really nice stones in it that I'd love to photograph one of my boys with, like a very pretty celtic cross (the aforementioned boy is Irish) and a couple of other stones he'd find interesting (he's an elf, and effectiely immortal and doesn't deal with the death of his kind very often, so he finds things related to mortal death and grieving rituals fascinating, including things like headstones and the sybolism contained in many older stones). He's also a gothy sort, and the kind of guy who likes cemetaries just because he finds them peacful, and there is at least one stone bench in there I'dlike to have a photo of him on.

 

I really, really wish there were old abandoned buildings near me that I could go in and take pictures. I have an insane love of abandoned buildings, I think decay and rot is quite beautiful. But as there aren't many old factory type buildings in the midwest I'm stuck. I'd use a place like that for both my cosplays and my dolls!

 

I live near the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington DC. It's such a lovely place to take pictures with all the stained glass, statues and empty, majestic halls. I have two priests and a nun among my crew and would love to take pictures of them in this setting. However, the Shrine is a tourist spot as well as a place of worship and I'm deathly afraid of having people stare at me while I haul my kids around, or even getting kicked out

 

Just a few tips-
Trespassing- in most countries it's illegal- get permission to use places!
Holy Ground- In most countries any synagogue, chapel, cathedral, mosque or what have you that is still in use as a house of worship is sacred to the people who worship there, and hardly IMHO the place to take pictures. If you must, please ask permission. (further thoughts on controversial locations can go into threads on that subject, but not here)
SafetyNo matter how awesome that abandoned building is, there's probably a good reason no people are walking around in it. Please make sure you consider your own personal safety if you intend to venture into any decrepit ruin or iffy part of town.

That said, I'ma get off my soapbox and squee a bit about the cool places I've found to take pictures at.
Locally where I live we have a lot of city and county parks and nature preserves. Even if you live in a city, parks are a great place to get woodsy or natural pics.

Maybe your own backyard isn't prime, but a tiny section of it might be! In the right lighting, the stone wall against one side of my garden could be the indoor wall for a castle scene, or in darker lighting it could be the inside of a dungeon.
Look at places near you and think, how would this look if I only saw maybe three feet of it?

Oh, and , as has been mentioned, if you're very very polite and ask permission, some stores will let you use their place as a backdrop. I did a shoot with live models, not dolls, in an antique store, surrounded by old furniture and things, and I mean to go back later and do the same shoot with dolls.

 

I'm moving next week, and the new house is just like... a little castle.
It is really small, but it has that old-fashioned look.
Almost everything is made of wood and there is a fire place.
I really want to make pictures there, so I can't wait till we moved in!

It isn't near me... But Disneyland would be awesome.
Maybe when I go there I'll bring one of my dolls with me.

 

Oh, yeah, I have hundreds of places I'd go if I had the guts to go on my own...

1. French Twist at Chermside; it's a quaint little store that sells heavenly French pastries. Their sweet potato and hazelnut cream cake is worth its weight in gold... anyways, the interior design is so cute, like a vintage bakery. I'd love to put my girl in French plaits and snap a few pics there.

2. My uni, beside the lake. When the Jacarandas are in bloom, the lake is just like a fantasy movie set. The great court is also a must... even tourists take photos there.

3. The Freemasons office in the city, plus a bunch of churches around that place, if they allow it. Viva la historical buildings!!

4. Gold Coast. My parents went into all the effort to uproot and move 5000 miles over the Pacific to a place 1 hour within the beach; might as well take advatage of it.

5. Nearly forgot -- The Regent movie theatre on Queen St. looks like something out of Phantom of the Opera. I go there every time I'm in the city just to gawp at the fantastic wall sculpts and the painted ceiling... once I get my dolls some decent period costumes I might just take them there.

 

Even though I live in a (fairly) suburban neighborhood, my house is right in the middle of a vast expanse of woods. When I get my first BJD, my backyard will be the first place I take pictures.
There are also a lot of bike trails and dirt paths that wander through farms and such, so I will most likely scout out every location nearby. XD

 

I live in Humboldt County, which is the far North of Northern California, and if anyone knows about Northern California, then they know how lucky people are to live here!

There's redwoods, for one thing, but they're too big; but the drop duff, which is fuzz from their bark, and it's super soft and stuff grows out of it very well, like colorful mushrooms and small wild flowers.

Also, we have "goose-pin" trees--which are huge, hollowed out redwoods and/or sequoias...because the bark is flame retardant, it often goes on living many many years after the inside has been eaten out. I'd love to get a photo in one of those. Many of them are in trails and you're allowed to enter them. They're like a whole 'nother world--jetting peaks and black ash-covered walls, and the things that grow in there, too! Sometimes newts live inside them, so you never know what you'll find!

We also have a ton of beaches, but our waves are much too big to get any kind of shot at them. There's a beach and hour and a half from me...I'd LOVE to get photos there, when I finally get my boy! There's these giant rocks that protect you from the waves, but their bottoms get covered in foam, and there's all sorts of agates and pebbles there and eee! *vibrates with excitement*

So, yea. If you guys ever find yourself in Northern California, remember to take pictures, because there's really no other place like it