NEW YORK NEW YORK – This morning I took a break from professional cares and walked to the office through Central Park in curtain filtered sunlight. Sometimes too filtered and flat; at other times lovely. Today I shot with the Leica Monochrome: the fact that it’s limited to black and white protected me from my worst tendencies and instincts in shooting this time of the year. My lens for the day was the ’60s era Leica 35mm Summicron v.IV, aka the “bokeh king”. The first is three frames stitched.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Carrying the big guy today, my Leica S medium format camera and a new 24mm super wide lens (this completes my trade out of my former Phase One medium format kit). A very, very capable camera, but it doesn’t sing to me the way the Leica rangefinder cameras do. I’m continuing to work on this. In reality it may be that I see in black and white and shouldn’t be trying to shoot color with this camera.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Here we are, on the street in Manhattan in bright early Spring light, with my new Leica M and a 21mm Super Elmar M lens. This is familiar territory working through the plusses and minuses of a new Camera.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – A new camera. I’m shooting today with a new Leica, the Leica M, which is the successor to the M9. It’s one of the few in the country at this point. (I sold my M9 a few months back in anticipation of this.) The changes from the M9 are incremental but important. The shutter release is smoother and quieter – very similar to the Leica M3 which set the standard for smooth and discrete. It has better high ISO performance and is weather sealed. It’s a joy to shoot with.
I found my self in Foley Square this afternoon to attend the investiture of a former partner, Lorna Schofield, as a Federal district court judge in the Southern District of New York. A moving ceremony, but I couldn’t photograph it because cameras are not permitted in the courthouse. Outside, in the rain, I found this behind the New York Supreme Court building at 60 Center Street: a statue (evidently of justice) carrying a shield emblazoned with the seal of the State of New York. It’s an odd figure. Her face and posture signal defeat and depression. This is probably why she’s been placed on a little-used walkway behind the courthouse.
Justice
On this day last year: Mottled light in early Spring. This is an image from Central Park which was in full bloom on March 27 of last year. This suggests that Spring is more than a little bit late this year – it was cold today and there’s not a sign of a bloom anywhere.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I saw a potential image at Lexington and 51st Street that reminded me of second picture from Boston that I posted on March 13. I snapped it with my Leica Monochrom and 18mm Super elmar lens. It’s less successful than the Boston image at least in part because the light is less interesting. As I’ve said many times before on these pages: “It’s the light, dummy.” I was also able to get closer in Boston. That always works, doesn’t it.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – this post is dated March 14 but as is typically the case I’m actually writing this about a week later (it takes me that long to edit, upload and write a post). My web hosting service, Bluehost, had had some major service issues this week and last week (including a couple of periods of total shutdowns). They now appear to have things under control. I apologize for any bad experience that you may have had in terms of page loading times and so on.
I went out today with my Leica S and a 35mm lens. This is four frames stitched, with a lot of overlap. This is the Municipal Asphalt Plant, an architectural icon that now serves as an indoor swimming pool. As you can see it is being renovated.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – It’s St. Valentine’s Day. I walked across Central Park to shop for valentines gifts, carrying my Leica Monochrome and a 24mm Leica Summilux lens. I put a .9 neutral density filter on the lens permitting it to shoot in daylight wide open at f1.4, giving very narrow depth of field, but requiring exacting technique. Three examples.
