What Is Urbex?
Urbex also known as urban exploration, or UE is visiting, exploring, and photographing abandoned places. It’s traveling, but it’s not regular sightseeing. Guided tours are not attractive for an urban explorer. Palaces, mansions, factories are worth seeing, only when they no longer fulfill their role, and all its previous functions cease to exist. Some people find this hobby strange or creepy. We don’t agree with them. Decayed buildings are beautiful, but it is a specific kind of beauty. Crumbling walls, broken windows, rusty devices, lighted only by the sunshine are creating a unique mood of abandoned places. Here nature fights back against civilization and wins. Walls covered with ivy or a tree growing in the middle of a room look very nice.
The most exciting thing in urbexing is discovering the unknown. You don’t know what awaits you. For example, during our trip to an abandoned soap factory in the Modlin area, we found a long tunnel. We’ve walked along it and in the end, we saw a two-stored cold store. We made research and we got to know that it was the part of the Modlin fortress. That was surprising!
How To Find Abandoned Places?
Contrary to appearances, finding abandoned places in not a difficult thing. Most abandoned places can be found on the internet. None of the locations we visited were a secret. We found them by ourselves, searching Google Maps, urbex portals, other blogs, or facebook posts. You can join urbex communities, where you can meet people with the same interests. They can share their knowledge with you, but they’ll do it very carefully. It’s only for protection. Some places are getting more and more destroyed because too many people have visited them. They didn’t know how to behave there, steal some gear, break the windows or do something worst. We are totally against vandalism on urbex. If you are going to devastate these beautiful places, please, don’t ask anyone about the location.
Next, you have to check if the entrance is available. There are many abandoned buildings located in the middle of the forest where everyone can get unhindered. Some ruins are in the city center and people can go there for a walk. But a lot of abandoned places are not abandoned at all! They have their owners, and they don’t want any unwelcome guests. There is probably security and entrance there by your own is illegal. In those cases, we ask the owners for permission. Some of them are not willing to talk, but some are willing to negotiate. We had to assure them that we were going to visit this place and take only pictures.They let us in and even showed us around.
We believe that you have good intentions, and you are going to take good memories (and photos 🙂 ) from abandoned places. We know, that you want to know how to find urbex locations. We prepared a map with abandoned places, and we are marking here only coordinates that are widely available on the internet. We’re sorry we can’t publish everything, but if you love urbex, you understand us. But please remember the rule: “take only pictures, leave only footprints”.
How To Prepare To Urbex? - Urban Exploration Gear
Collecting urbex gear is not a piece of cake. Based on our experience, we prepared the list of necessary stuff. Check it out!
- Proper clothes – Captain Obvious says – “Don’t take formal clothes for urbex”. There is a lot of dust, sand, or sometimes mud in abandoned places. Better take clothes old, but comfortable. You will face narrow passages, holes in walls, branches. The outfit should protect your body from injuries and scratches. Don’t take shorts, even if it’s hot summer. Gloves are useful as well. They’ll protect your hands against dust or even chemicals.
- A flashlight – Probably the most popular and the most important part of urbex stuff. It’s a small thing which has saved our lives many times.We went through long, dark corridors, where holes in the floor couldn’t be seen. We saw them only thanks to the flashlight. So we advise you honestly – don’t forget to take it to your urbex trip. Which one is the best? You can take a regular one or a headlamp. The choice of type depends on you.
- A mask – It is necessary if you are going to visit an abandoned warehouse, hospital or chemical factory. There may be toxic fumes or dust in the air. You need something to protect your respiratory tract.
- First aid kit -Broken glass, rusty fences, crumbling walls are common in abandoned places, so you may get injured. Having something with you to disinfect wounds or stop bleeding is essential.
We hope that our advice will make your trip safer. Remember, urbex may be dangerous, and you enter at your own risk to each place. Not scared? Ok,so you can start urbexing and taking photos. We hope that our advice will make your trip safer. Remember, urbex may be dangerous, and you enter at your own risk to each place. Not scared? Ok, so you can start urbexing and taking photos.
Abandoned Places Photography
Urbex photography combines many styles and concepts. On the one hand, you are focusing on architecture and details. On the other hand, it’s more similar to paparazzi work.
Taking pictures in abandoned places, you will face a lot of difficulties. Some of them are related to the architecture of the place. For example, in a long underground tunnel without any source of light, taking pictures may be hard or even impossible. In this case, a tripod may be helpful, but sometimes you have to use a flash.
In a small, cramped room, a fisheye lens is very useful. A wide-angle combined with an appropriate exposure time will help present narrow rooms in an interesting style. You can show the viewer how the construction is built.
You don’t need expensive equipment to start taking pictures while exploration. You need only a camera with variable exposure time, aperture and sensitivity of the sensor. Sometimes a tripod is useful as well.
Take care of your equipment. Water, sand, and dust are the challenges you’ll face. Dust in the air, flooded cellars and basements can be dangerous for your electronic stuff.
Creepy Photos From Abandoned Places
Once upon a time, someone asked us “are the pictures from abandoned places creepy?”. Well, it depends. We find our pictures beautiful, but we are aware that some of them are creepy. We have visited a lot of gloomy places. We came across dead animals, bones or more strange, creepy stuff. In this article, you saw a lot of picturesque photos from abandoned places. If you would like to see something creepy, check the pictures below.
