WARREN CONNECTICUT – Not much activity in the photo world today. We had an emergency with Basil the Norwich Terrier – he was badly injured by a neighbor’s dog, which cast a pall on the day.
Day 2024 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day last year (day 1659: Cherry blossem bokeh. Not a lot going on last year either. Beware May Day.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I’m very busy preparing for a whole series of meetings. My limited time outside today yielded little in the way of images, but there was a moment of amazing light out my window that I managed to capture in two images.
Day 2020 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day three years ago (day 925): Spring in NY. As I went back through the various April 27s in the past five years I observed that I shot them all in color and they are all flowers. This is what I call the “Spring trap” and I evidently fall into it this time of year. I’ve re-imagined the image from three years ago as black and white. Interestingly the converted files always look a little plasticy, not as authentic as the Leica Monochrom files.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I’m xperimenting today. I bought an 85mm Nikkor P f2.0 lens on eBay; it arrived today so I decided to try it out. This is a famous lens. It’s from the mid-1950s. David Duncan Douglas was on assignment in Japan in 1950s; his Zeiss Contax 85mm lens developed a problem so in desperation he bought and shot with the Nikkor 85mm. He and his editors at Life Magazine were amazed at the quality of the images; the lens became a photojournalist workhorse and Nikon’s business took off. This lens is in a Nikon rangefinder mount, which is an approximate copy of the Contax mount. I have an adapter the lets me use Contax mount lenses on my Leica gear (an extremely exotic item) but the rangefinder doesn’t couple so I attached the lens to my Leica T which focuses through the lens. There is also an issue with infinity focus that the Leica T permits me to address.
The images are crisp with terrific micro contrast in the midtones. It’s sharp corner to corner by f4.0 – it’s quite impressionistic at f2.0. Bokeh is lovely. Today’s image is a test shot out my window taken with this impressive 70-year old performer mounted on my Leica T and converted to black and white.
Day 1,974 of one photo every day for the rest of my life.
On this day three years ago (day 878): Flatiron. Shot with a Phase One IQ 180 back on a technical camera.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I had an inside day today with bad weather outside and a lot to do in front of a computer. This leaves three choices for my daily photo: an interior of our apartment, a close up detail, on an “out my window”. I guess a selfie or a picture of our dog would be possible but I’ve banned those subjects from these pages. And of course there is Maria but she get irritable when I sneak up on her with a camera. There was a light snow so I opted to shoot out the window. On the tag cloud on the administrator’s side of this website the word “snow” is getting bigger and bigger.
Day 1,946 of one picture every day for the rest of my life.
On this day five years ago (day 120): Infrared image of the then-Ferrari dealership on Park Avenue.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – This was a day largely spent preparing for meetings happening next week. So I took some images out my window with my Leica T and the marvelous 280 mm Leica Telyt-R lens. We stayed in town this evening to attend an event celebrating the 40th anniversary of the discovery of Lucy at the Explorers Club.
Day 1,856 of one picture every day for the rest of my life.
And here’s Lucy.
On this day three years ago (day 760): Four Seasons Restaurant.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I’ve been living with my new website look for a few days now. I like the way it runs on tablets and smartphones. I’m less enamored with the three column look that it presents on a computer. I’ll go back to the drawing board on this over the weekend.
Today I experimented with my Leica T (which has good live view and adapts well to Leica manual focus lenses). Today I shot out our window with a Leica R 280mm f4.0, a long lens that has remarkable charisma. Here you go.
Day 1,826 of one picture every day for the rest of my life.
Here’s the context of the above image.
On this day one year ago: Schloss Elmau
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I shot out my window today with a long lens, a Leica R 280mm APO, adapted for my Leica M. It’s essentially perfect. I’ve converted the images for today into black and white. I almost never shoot long lenses – this is a rare exception.
Day 1,673 of one picture every day for the rest of my life.
On this day last year (day 1,308): No dogs. I generally avoid pets and babies, but here is an exception.
