Sunday Stills

I'm joining the Sunday Stills Photography Challenge. This Sunday we are to "look beyond the typical barn shot, if possible get inside, get different angles, things in barns etc…"

Being in Kentucky I felt almost obligated to feature horses or tobacco. As there are horse barns all over the country and many of the horse barns in Kentucky started out as tobacco barns, it was an easy decision.

I'm going to start out with two favorite photographs from my archives, just to set the scene. These were taken last summer and are of a friend's barn just up the road. Not only can you see the traditional styling of the barn, but also tobacco hanging to cure.

I can smell the tobacco in this picture. Hard to describe - the smell and the fact that I can smell it by "sight". Through the barn, some of her cows in the background. Note also the basketball hoop. I don't believe I've seen a barn in Kentucky without that requisite garnish.

These pictures are inside our barn - once a tobacco barn, converted to horses and now for sheep. The stalks of tobacco in the first two pictures are speared onto a tobacco stick and those sticks are then hung (by hand) all the way to the top of these barns, resting between two "stringers" - the long square boards running throughout the barn. This time of year, all the tobacco barns are this empty as the tobacco has been stripped, baled and sold.

This is the top end of the back of our barn. Our barn dates back to at least 1922, when it was moved to this farm from a neighboring farm. All of the wood has been replaced at least once I'm sure, but I'm not sure that this last remaining bit isn't still original. The lace work of the boards reminds me of a church window.

A question - can someone tell me how to retake this picture and remove the glare?