In the opening chapter of Greg Urbano’s photographic journey, “Fubbles” stands as a remarkable testament to the artist’s early instinct for transforming the mundane into the sublime. Created in 2014 during an afternoon at Fort de Soto Park, this image captures far more than a simple bubble in flight—it reveals an emerging photographer’s understanding of light, form, and the delicate boundary between documentation and fine art.
The composition presents a soap bubble mid-flight, its translucent membrane caught in a state of graceful distortion. What immediately strikes the viewer is the dreamlike quality of the motion blur, which Urbano candidly notes was enhanced in post-processing. This creative decision speaks to an important aspect of his early development: the willingness to move beyond strict documentary realism toward a more interpretive visual language. The blur transforms the bubble from a fleeting childhood toy into something altogether more ethereal—a meditation on impermanence itself.
Shot with a Nikon D5100 at 35mm, the technical execution demonstrates a sophisticated understanding of exposure for such translucent subjects. The aperture of f/6.3 provides sufficient depth while maintaining the isolation of the bubble against the softly rendered background. Most significantly, the shutter speed of 1/1250s at ISO 100 captures crystalline detail in the bubble’s surface, preserving the swirling patterns and subtle gradations that give the sphere its otherworldly quality. These technical choices reveal an artist already thinking beyond the moment of capture to the final image.
The monochromatic palette proves essential to the photograph’s success. By stripping away color, Urbano directs our attention to form, texture, and tonal relationships. The bubble’s translucent skin becomes a study in graduated grays, while the blurred background creates a tonal symphony that could easily hang beside the work of mid-century modernist photographers. This treatment elevates a whimsical subject matter into the realm of fine art abstraction.
Within the context of “Chapter 1 — Beginnings,” this photograph occupies a fascinating position. It demonstrates that even in his earliest work, Urbano possessed the vision to see artistic potential in unexpected places. The playful title “Fubbles” maintains a connection to the image’s origins—fun with bubbles—while the execution reveals serious artistic ambitions. This duality between playfulness and sophistication would become a hallmark of his developing style.
The photograph also speaks to broader themes of transformation and transience. A soap bubble exists for mere seconds before bursting, yet through photography, Urbano arrests that moment, preserving what cannot be preserved. The enhanced motion blur serves not as deception but as emphasis, amplifying the sense of temporal fluidity that defines the bubble’s brief existence. In this way, the image becomes metaphorical—a meditation on photography itself as the art of stopping time.
For viewers encountering Urbano’s work through his Top 100 Journey project, “Fubbles” offers essential insight into his artistic foundations. Here is a photographer unafraid to experiment, willing to blend capture with creation, and possessed of an eye that finds beauty in the transient and overlooked. The bubble, forever frozen in its graceful dissolution, invites us to reconsider our own relationship with impermanence and the extraordinary potential hidden within ordinary moments.
Greg Urbano 