WARREN CONNECTICUT – Our last day of this almost two-week break in the country. It’s gotten very, very cold here, which at this time of year is not totally unexpected. Lake Waramaug has gone from being free of ice to frozen overnight. Here it is.
Day 1,907 of one photo a day for the rest of my life.
On this day last year (day 1,542): 94th Street.
WARREN CONNECTICUT – Back to shooting really wide (with my Carl Zeiss 16mm), this time with failing light on a grim day.
Day 1,905 of one photo a day for the rest of my life.
On this day three years ago (day 809): Wheeler Wilderness Area.
WARREN CONNECTICUT – Let’s discuss New Year’s resolutions. I’ve made the usual ones dealing with weight and prompt response to phone calls and emails, and attention to my loved ones. Not surprisingly I’ve also resolved to continue one picture a day for the rest of my life – I actually expect better compliance with this one than with some of the others.
Exactly a year ago a resolved to make a concerted effort to expand my audience online. The progress that I’ve made during the year has been immensely satisfying. Thanks to all of you for your continuing support and interest in this project.
Despite the good intentions no great insights today from a photographic perspective.
Day 1,904 of a picture a day for the rest of my life.
On this day three years ago (day 808): Taos Mountain. Need I say that this was cold?
WARREN CONNECTICUT – This was a productive day of shooting around Warren and New Preston. Most of our family members have departed so it’s a bit quieter. Still shooting my Leica Monochrom and antique Carl Zeiss lens.
Day 1,902 of one photo every day for the rest of my life.
December 30 has been a productive date for me so I’ve had trouble choosing a legacy photo. In the end I went with last year (day 1,537): Aleksandra .
WARREN CONNECTICUT – I’m continuing to shoot with my antique Carl Zeiss 50mm lens, which stopped down is excellent for landscape and wide open has a lovely signature for portraits or just about anything else. Paraphrasing myself from a few years back my research indicates that the optical cell (the optical workings of the lens) was produced at the Carl Zeiss works in Jena, Germany in December 1945. So it actually is a Zeiss Jena 5cm f1.5 Sonnar. The lens cell was subsequently fitted to a Leica screw mount body by an unknown third party, probably in Germany, the UK or US, for sale in the UK or US. The distance scale is denominated in feet and Zeiss itself didn’t make any lenses in Leica mounts as Leica was a competitor (Zeiss and Leica were the equivalent of Nikon and Canon today). I can see why it would have been worth the trouble to convert this lens to a Leica mount: it is actually the equivalent of an modern lens in most respects at f4 and beyond – its performance is simply breathtaking and as noted above it has a lovely signature.
Day 1,899 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day last year (day 1,534): Cemetery, New Preston CT.
WARREN CONNECTICUT – Here we are in Holiday recovery mode – making concentration on the visual present tense difficult. So . . . here are some backlit ornamental grasses.
Day 1,898 of one photo every day for the rest of my life.
On this day two years ago (day 1,168): Night blizzard. One of my favorite images from the past five plus years.
WARREN and BANTAM CONNECTICUT – Christmas Eve. The process that I’ve adopted for this project presents a real challenge around holidays. In the course of my one picture every day project I generally shoot the equivalent of a roll of film a day. So over a 365 day year I end up with 10,000 to 11,000 images. I post about a week after each shot, which gives me a chance to edit with a bit of detachment. But as a result of the delay these posts are never breaking news. For typical landscapes, cityscapes and people this isn’t a problem, but it is with holidays. Here I am on New Years Eve (when I’m writing this) posting Christmas Eve. The solution is simply to avoid holiday themes on holidays, which makes me look Scrooge-line, which I’m not.
Anyway here are some non-Holiday images taken with my Leica M Monochrom and an 18mm Super-Elmar lens.
Day 1,896 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day five years ago (day 70): Monarchs. This is rare color for me these days. It was taken near Tualpujahua Mexico. Here we witnessed a remarkable phenomenon: there is huge annual migration of Monarch butterflies from Canada and the Northeastern United States to this mountainous region of Mexico, about a three hour drive from Mexico City. Â The Monarchs arrive in early November, which coincides with the Day of the Dead – the pre-Spanish people resident in the area believed that Monarchs were the souls of their ancestors. Â They cluster in very high density (estimated at about 20 million butterflies per hectare) at very high altitude. Â It’s possible to visit them by driving deeply into the the mountains and riding a horse for about a half hour from a nomadic base camp. Â It’s possible to walk, but not advised because the elevation is very high, 11,200 feet (3,400 meters) and the half day one is there is too short a time to become acclimatized to the altitude. Â The Monarchs cluster quietly on every surface until the temperature goes above 50 degrees F at which point they take to the air in breathtaking density, Â The Monarchs we see in Connecticut take part in this migration.
