NEW YORK, NEW YORK – I promise that I’m going to quit this. I mean the wide angle thing. Quit it real soon now. Maybe it’s becoming a crutch. Or worse. My name’s Woody and I’m a wide angle junkie. But later. Maybe. For now I had my Leica and my super wide lens in hand as I walked by the Guggenheim earlier today. If you’ve been following these pages closely you’ll know that the Guggenheim is the one icon that I’ve been struggling with. Well today with Mr. wide I caught it – the first image of the museum that I’m really happy with. Here it is (this is another one of those shot straight up images that could be oriented any of four ways, but I prefer this orientation):
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Feel free to go to one of those other daily photo blogs that you follow if you find that my voice is getting a little whiney. Yes, another week of all day meetings, at least through Wednesday, including a trip to Boston. You may ask “Why doesn’t Woody just quit the damn day job?” Actually I like my day job – it’s just that sometimes it gets in the way of photography – why I like it is beyond the scope of a two paragraph discussion. Today I spent some time shooting going to and from my meetings. Sometimes this is not very productive, but today it was, so I’m posting two images. They are both with my Leica and the 12mm Voigtlander lens – I’m getting more interesting results shooting wide right now. Let me know if you think it’s a gimmick.
Anyway here’s a night shot looking straight up at the facade of the New York Central building (now known as the Helmsley Building) at the foot of the North segment of Park Avenue. Wikipedia entry on the Helmsley Building. The Wikipedia entry is oddly ambiguous on who the architects were. It’s actually Warren & Wetmore, who were also responsible for Grand Central Terminal. Here’s a link to the AIA website.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Another full day of meetings. The light first thing in the morning was sensational. For this image I had a 16mm Voigtlander lens on my Leica. Shooting very wide presents a lot of challenges – the wide frame assures that there are extremes in terms of dynamic range, and that either the sun or the photographer’s shadow in the frame.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Breakfast with my son, Alexander Campbell, at the Brasserie, the other restaurant in the Seagrams Building (besides the iconic Four Seasons). Back with my ultra wide 12mm Voigtlander lens.
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Another lunatic day. We gave a dinner party for 10, “auto catered” by me. On top of this November is typically a busy time in my day job (actually round-the-clock) so at a couple of points I’ve been hanging by my fingernails in terms of a daily photograph, and timely posting has suffered. As things ease off a bit I’m catching up on posts. Here is a guest at dinner:
Dinner at home
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Another eventful day. Midday found me in midtown with my Leica M9 and a very wide lens, a 15mm Voitlander. This is similar to an image that I posted last week – Park Avenue – I’ve got quite a few of these that I haven’t posted.
On November 2 last year we went to a book party for our friend Patrizia Chen at The Corner Bookstore: Patrizia tangos
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Back home from Chicago I attended a seminar on blogging for photographers. There were a number of important infrastructure suggestions that I’ll be implementing over the next few weeks. The hard issue that emerged from the discussions, though, is that the conventional wisdom on building website traffic is to focus. So if you want to be a successful wedding photographer you post sample work. You focus on backstories and relationships with clients. You find ways to link to you site from other wedding resources, and in fact you become a wedding resource.
If I were pressed to say what my focus is I guess that I’d say it’s the fine art market. Me and a lot of other good photographers who focus on landscape would like to sell fine prints to people. But I do think that how people consume images is changing dramatically – in the end the on-line product may be the only product. So the blog, rather than being a marketing tool, is an end in itself. I’ve got some serious further work to do on this issue.
Returning from the seminar I caught this crossing Park Avenue. Leica M9 and 15mm Voigtlander lens.
