The above photo is of the Kapstone Paper and Packaging paper mill. When I first arrived in Charleston I didn’t know of its existence. That, however, was short lived. When I reported to work on my first day, some 14 1/2 months ago, I had to brave the assault to my nostrils of this malodorous, smoke-belching monstrosity. If you’ve never been near a paper mill, well, I cannot describe the smell. It is, to the least, pungent, tangy, sharp, and nasty all at the same time. There is no escape from it.
A few of my fellow employees say that they don’t even notice the smell anymore; however, I’m not one of those. I notice every time. Sometimes sooner than others, depending on which way the wind is blowing. As the crow flies (in a direct line), I live about 10 or 12 miles from the mill. If the wind is blowing into Summerville, SC from North Charleston, SC, I can smell it clearly. Fortunately, that doesn’t happen so often, but as I work within easy walking distance to it, I smell it most days.
So, as you can probably guess by now, I’m not a fan and seek to portray it in a bleak light. My own little political statement, if you will. The other morning I stopped and wanted to take a few pictures of it. I should have done it the day before because on that gray day the mill was producing lots of output and looked truly ominous, but on this day, the sun was shining and it looked less ominous, but smelled not better!
I messed with the photo a bit in Lightroom. I wanted to give it a sinister look, but I don’t quite think that I pulled it off. What might I do to make it look even worse? LOL! Just to show a comparison, have a look at how the newspaper portrayed it in this article. Quite a bit of difference, eh? Here it looks so nice, innocent, and look, it’s barely putting out any smoke!
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7 Responses to “Creating mood”
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Sorry about the smell, there are huge sections of my area that would love to have it back along with the jobs and economy that came with it. The Olympic Peninsula once had a lot of mills and now my area is down to 1 in Port Townsend and 1 in Port Angeles. Lots of reasons they are gone, both pro and con the main thing is it killed several communities and almost killed the main ones here when they died. That was 20 yrs ago and they area still hasn’t recovered, so the current recession is just a continuation of what we have had for over 20 yrs. If things there are the same as here that isn’t smoke but cleaned vapor from the paper process and not a pollutant, but it sure can smell bad when the weather is just right. Course it doesn’t bother me but I’ve had my nose broken enough times not much smells to me
The mill, on the shores of Lake Erie, closed a few years ago. I grew up watching the billowing smoke and seeing the aftermath of what the pollutants, dumped in to the bay area, did to the lake’s ecology. I am surprised anything survived it. The smell, if you went near the area, was just as you described.
We’ve since cleaned up our lake and, I believe, the controls placed upon the mill to do an environmental clean up, were its final death nil.
You’ve portrayed your mill exactly as I’d picture ours here–now a ghost on the waterline’s horizon, sans the billowing smoke.
Nicely done.
The photo really portrays such a mill as it “feels” (at least for me). A lot of those are around in Sweden (paper industry is HUGE here) – but at least people have become aware of the environmental impacts that those mills have if not operated properly. I guess, it’s a real question of balance.
But whatever you do, those mills will never turn out to be a nice sight (or smell, for that mattter).
I think you’ve done well capturing the mood. The thing working against it is that the sky doesn’t look sinister.
If allowed to move beyond black and white I’d probably go for an infrared thermal camera look. For some reason these always look sinister or dangerous to me.
The paper mill in West Point is exactly as you described. I don’t believe I’ve ever smelled anything so extremely horrible. I like paper, though. I use quite a bit of it every day. I am an admitted paper junkie. The mill is the main reason for that small town’s existance. So, with some good comes some bad. Life.
And, yes they do put out an offensive odor, which I think you described quite well (pungent, tangy, sharp, and nasty). Not sure how to give it a sinister look, maybe darkening it some.
I don’t think industrial areas need much help in looking sinister, they seem to do fine without any help. The mill you linked to does look cleaner I suppose, but not enough to prevent it from being an eyesore. I would say you portrayed the bleakness quite well with the processing here.