FROM THE ACELA between NEW YORK and WASHINGTON DC – It’s generally not a good idea (from an image quality standpoint) to photograph through the windows of a moving train. Today was a generally bleak and overcast day on the Northeast rail corridor so when lovely light broke through for a few moments I did the best that I could through the train window. Here are a couple of images through the glass.
Day 1,882 of one picture every day for the rest of my life.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – A busy day with my cameras. We drove back to New York (from Warren) to get Maria to a doctor – she’s had a hacking cough for two weeks now. When I arrived I found that FedEx had delivered two packages, one with my 2x tele-extender for my Leica R 280mm lens (which I can use on my Leica M camera), one of the great long lenses of all time. I also received a 75mm Leica Summicron Asph., which it turns out is a marvelous lens. The first two frames below are Baby V (our granddaughter) taken with my Monochrom and the new 75mm. In the next image I’m experimenting with the quality of the out-of-focus portions of the image (so-called “bokeh”), which is creamy and lovely, a real accomplishment for such a highly corrected lens. Finally a couple of out my windows with the 280mm and 2x tele-extender set up on a tripod. Looks fine but this combination is really fussy in use.
Apologies for the gear talk. What’s more important here is that Baby is making the transition, at just short of two months old, to having a personality. You begin to get a bit of that in the series of pictures below, taken over about a five minutes period.
Baby VMother and childBueno Bokeh560mm lens!560mm lens!
On this day last year: Lipstick building. Taken with my Leica Monochrom and 5cm. Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar from 1945 – this lens rocks.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – We walked across the Manhattan Bridge from Chinatown to Dumbo today, in search of an image of the bridge on the Brooklyn side with my ICP rephotography class. There was a brief downpour while we were at the center of the bridge – we sought shelter and waited it out. All images with my Leica M and 28mm PC lens.
GraffitiManhattan BridgeDumboMore Dumbo
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I went today with a tripod and my large Alpa, the Alpa Max, to explore Riverside Park and the George Washington Bridge. My start was delayed by personal errand – by the time I got into things the golden light was gone and the light was rathe uninteresting. I’ve posted some examples anyway.
George Washington BridgeRiverside ParkRiverside ParkRiverside ParkRiverside Park
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – This was a travel day, starting in the morning at LaGuardia and ending the day in Quito, Ecuador, via Miami. This out of the window of a taxi on the way to LaGuardia. The Bridge is the Triborough Bridge – at least that’s its historical name and what most New Yorkers call it. It was officially renamed the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge in 2008. Here’s a short excerpt from the Wikipedia entry on the bridge:
“Construction had begun on Black Friday in 1929, and the Triborough project’s outlook began to look bleak. Othmar Ammann’s assistance was enlisted to help simplify the structure. Ammann had collapsed the original two-deck roadway into one, requiring lighter towers, and thus, lighter piers. These cost-saving revisions saved $10 million on the towers alone. Using New Deal money, the project was resurrected in the early 1930s by Robert Moses and the bridge was opened to traffic on July 11, 1936.”
Here’s a link to the Metropolitan Transit Authority’s page on the bridge: RFK Bridge
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – My birthday. This image is of the 59th Street Bridge and a pylon for the Roosevelt Island tramway at sunset. As of this post I’m adding information about camera and technique, not because it matters (the images speak for themselves) but to provide a bit more traction to search engines, which look for words, not pictures. S0 . . . Leica M9 with a 28mm aspheric Summicron lens.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Today I went to Brooklyn to explore the Brooklyn Bridge from the east. The Brooklyn Bridge is an icon. My objective in my icons work is to sneak up on the subject from an unusual angle, approaching it as if it had never been seen before. This isn’t always successful, but here’s today’s attempt. This was at mid-day – it would be far more interesting in early morning light. To be explored further.
Yesterday and today I had a rare moment of self-doubt. Why am I doing this? In the end I’m a landscape photographer – some of my work looks architectural because I live (for most of the week) in an urban landscape. My formal portraits are fine but I don’t seek that work out. My street work is pedestrian. I was really struggling last night a Lincoln Center – finally settling on the fountain centered on the Metropolitan Opera.
You’ve heard of Rembrandt and Vermeer and probably Frans Hals. They painted people (primarily in historical settings) in 17th Century Holland – the “golden era of Dutch painting”. It’s less likely that you’ve heard of Aelbert Cuyp or Jacob van Ruisdael. They painted landscape in the same era. The Wikipedia entry on the golden era says “landscapists were the ‘common Infantry foottmen in the Army of Art'” citing Samuel van Hoogstraten for the quote. Citiscapes ranked even lower.
Anyway, here’s today’s view of the Brooklyn Bridge.
