WARREN CONNECTICUT – We had a very light snow here. Very light indeed. About a quarter on an inch. 6 mm. The last big storm was the freak blizzard in October. I captured it in process with my Son Nex-7 and a Leica 90 mm Elmarit lens. Compare and contrast with last year – a Connecticut winter shot from 2011 will be last year’s picture tomorrow.
Very light snow
23rd Street
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I finally go out with my camera (Nex-7 with 24mm Summilux lens) after a full day of meetings. Captured this on Lexington Avenue. Oddly, last year’s picture on this day was taken at night a block away. With film! A brief, not very successful, fling with film.
Lexington Avenue
On this day last year: Park Avenue at night. Note the scratch running most of the length of the photo – something that I commented on extensively last year.
Park Avenue Night
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I equipped my Sony Nex-7 with my Leica 35mm pre asph. Summicron (v.IV), which I’ve previously identified on these pages as the “Bokeh King” (“bokeh” refers to the quality of the out of focus image). I took it to the office on the subway (“riding with the king”) and then walked a bit in really good morning light. The camera is very, very responsive in terms of shutter lag – I was able to catch a person standing on the platform as a train sped by.
Subway
Lipstick
On this day one year ago: A picture of our firm’s logo. Taken with the Bokeh King – the out of focus portions of this image really are lovely. Another from the “King and I” series.
pLIMPton
WARREN CONNECTICUT – Still working the kinks out of the Nex-7. I spent the morning shooting familiar things in Connecticut, including a small barn on our property that I use as an informal resolution test. Here I’m shooting it with the 24mm Sony Zeiss lens, which produces a superb result (at least in terms of image quality).
Small barn
On this day last year: Warren at night.
Bad winter
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Now we’re beginning to understand the Nex-7 a little better, and beginning to rock and roll. Here we are on Lexington Avenue in the 50s with a fairly typical take for me on Citicorp Center. Taken with the Nex-7 and the Sony Zeiss 24mm lens.
Citicorp
On this day last year: Time Warner
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Well here we are on Groundhog Day. I had an early evening meeting in midtown just off of Fifth Avenue so I took the opportunity to walk over to Radio City Music Hall to capture this with my Sony Nex-7 camera and a Sony Zeiss 24mm lens.
Radio City
On this day one year ago: /study date.
Francesca at work
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – Met my daughter for breakfast on the West Side. Caught this view of The Majestic as I walked back through the park to my office. Captured with my Sony Nex-7 and my Leica 24mm Summilux lens. The cool thing about having 24 mess of resolution is that when you do extreme perspective corrections in Lightroom or Photoshop there is still enough resolute to print the image large (it took an extreme perspective correction to fix the converging vertical lines on this one – something that I had planned when I captured the image).
The Majestic
On this day one year ago: This is not a good portrait of a friend. Really. But some of the goofballs who follow this blog rated it four stars. Go figure.
Susan Kamil
WARREN CONNECTICUT – I had a chance to try out my new Sony Nex-7 camera. This is a very compact body offering 24 megs of resolution with a sensor that’s about 2/3 the size of a 35mm frame. The crop factor is 1.5x – in other words a 24mm lens becomes the equivalent of a 36mm. It’s possible to use my Leica lenses on the camera (with an adapter). Here’s an image with the Nex-7 and my 90mm Leica Elmarit lens.
More Warren in good light
On this day one year ago: a friend on Macaroni Beach.
Judy Hamilton
I edited this post on February 8, 2012.
NEWARK NEW JERSEY – I landed here on my return flight from Naples. This gave me a chance to drop by the airport customs office and complete the Global Entry process, which should speed going through customs and immigration on my return from foreign travel. There was very nice light for the ride on the monorail that connects the terminals at Newark. Taken with my iPhone, not the world’s best tool to shoot landscape with very high contrast lighting.
Newark
On this day one year ago: Macaroni Beach.
Picnic on Macaroni Beach
NAPLES FLORIDA – Another walk on the beach at sunset with my Panasonic. There’s a stretch of beach here where thousands of gulls gather to watch the sunset, along with the local residents, who bring out chairs to sit on as they literally watch the sunset. As the last rays of the sun fade they (the people) break out into applause. Really. The experience of being surrounded by a very large number of birds was pure Hitchcock. Here’s an image:
Hitchcockesque
And another sunset.
Sunset
On this day one year ago: Mustique rainbow.
Doug and Judy
NAPLES FLORIDA – Day two of the conference. There is a little more daylight in the schedule today so I’m carrying my Alpa TC and a 35mm Schneider lens. Toward the evening I found myself on the beach with the Alpa. Did I say that it’s hard to find an interesting photograph on the beach. Well yes and no. True. But – - – In the few minutes of the “golden hour”, which is usually not an hour – more like 20 minutes, it really doesn’t matter what you point your camera at. When the light arrives, stop what you’re doing and shoot whatever is at hand. Even a beach. I have to relearn this periodically. In landscape light is more important than landscape. Anyway here is the golden hour light etching the beach in Naples.
Magic light trumps banal subject
Earlier in the day I spotted a familiar looking steeple and indeed it was the local United Church of Christ (in round terms the Congregational Churches outside of New England), a sure sign that Naples has been colonized by New Englanders.
Evidence of New Englanders
On this day last year: rainbow in Mustique.
Grenadines rainbow
NAPLES FLORIDA – Back here again, on a mission that’s unrelated to last week’s board meetings: attending the annual MFDF directors’ conference. Today is the first day of the conference and is thus busy, so I’ve limited myself photo-wise to my iPhone and what I can photograph within an easy walk. I caught this from a boardwalk through a local park with my iPhone. The image is my new lock screen image on my iPhone and I’ve adapted it to serve as one of this blog’s rotating headers. The over cooked quality is what comes out of the iPhone. I could dial it down in Lightroom or Photoshop, but who said this process needs to be serious. The image looks very good on a small screen. It demonstrates (again) that great light trumps every thing else (including limited equipment) when shooting landscape.
Another iPhone image from the top of the bar where I had dinner.
Sunny Florida
On this day last year: an immense image – three Hasselblad frames stitched – of the Mustique sky. I’m using a cropped version of this as one of my rotating headers. It turns out that fabuolous skies are my theme for January 24 in whatever year.
Grenadines sky
WARREN CONNECTICUT – It snowed yesterday and last night, for the first time in a long while. I put on my snow shoes and spent a couple of hours out in the fields around our house in poor, overcast light. This with my Alpa TC and 35mm Schneider lens.
Hay bale
On this day last year: Flying SVG, a not-quite-scheduled “airline” operating between Barbados and Mustique.
SVG
WARREN CONNECTICUT – Last month I set my Alpa Max up to demonstrate its “tilt” capacity (the ability to tilt the focus plane to increase the appearance of depth of field) and got an somewhat poorly visualized image of our sundial. It’s snowing today (at last) so I set up trying to do a better of seeing and imagining the image:
Sundial redux
On this day one year ago: a long skinny Third Avenue from my office.
Third Avenue
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Out with my Leica and 90mm lens I caught this in the failing light.
East 86th Street in good light
On this day last year: 9-11 memorial.
9/11 memorial
BROOKLYN NEW YORK – At last a good day of photography. I met a friend for lunch a Peter Luger, still the best steakhouse in New York (and maybe in the universe). It’s just over the Williamsburg Bridge in Brooklyn, so after lunch I explored the bridge and Williamsburg in lovely winter light. Williamsburg is an interesting melange of Lubavitchers, hipsters and young urban types – it has a very good subway connection to midtown. The day was good enough to warrant treatment as a mini-gallery in this post. All images are with my Leica M9 and a 24mm Summilux lens. Lets start with an image of a lone runner in the shadow of the bridge overpass:
Soloist
I’ve done this a lot. For a long time. The distant, solo figure is a recurring theme in my work. Here’s one from 1970 (taken with a
Rollei 2.8 F in Luxembourg):
Solist
Since 1970 the cells in my body have replacement themselves many times; I’ve had a world of experience but I still identify with the lonely, isolated figure. Another thought is captured in the comparison of these two images: my work is often symmetrical with correct prospect (which takes a certain amount of control when shooting with a wide angle lens) or is wildly askew. Anything in between just feels like a mistake to me.
One of the advantages of living in the Northeastern US is the brilliant winter light. It was very much in evidence today giving the graffiti a visual kick.
Fine winter light
Kind of mixed use real estate here, with car repair shops and the like tucked in among buildings undergoing major renovations.
Car repair shop
Here’s the bridge. It wasn’t easy to get this angle. The East River has no accessible waterfront here. I had to trespass through a bridge and tunnel authority parking lot and climb a fence. There are some excellent early 19th century warehouses along here that look like they are in early stages of being renovated.
Williamsburg Bridge
Finally, the scene under the El for the M train back to Manhattan could have been from 1954.
Under the El
On this day one year ago: parking space.
World Trade Center Boston
NAPLES FLORIDA – I flew down here from New York this morning for two days of client board meetings. I managed a long walk on the beach today. Beaches aren’t great for photography (at least when I’m pushing the shutter button) I suspect because they are all similar, if not the same. Here’s a sea bird admiring its shadow, taken with my Panasonic.
Naples Florida
A few hours later, a sunset from my hotel room.
Sunset Naples Florida
On this day one year ago: snow.
Warren Connecticut
MORRIS CONNECTICUT – I drove over to Morris this morning to catch the Morris Congregational Church in good morning light. I got a late start – we had house guests so I needed to attend to breakfast. By time I got to Morris it was too late – the light was flat and dull – but I saw these school buses on the way back and they seemed unusually vivid. Taken with my Alpa Max and 72mm Schneider.
School Buses, Morris CT
On this day last year: a snow covered barn in Milton CT.
Barn Milton Connecticut
KENT CONNECTICUT – I’m getting back on my game in Connecticut. I took my Alpa Max out with a tripod on a field trip to Kent Connecticut where I stopped at a remarkable chocolate shop called Belgique. Do click through the link – the site is over the top. So Belgique is closed today – evidently on vacation to rest after the holiday rush. Taken with the Max, a 72mm Schneider lens and my Phase One IQ 180 back.
Belgique
On this day one year ago: Lexus of Manhattan.
Lexus of Manhattan
NEW YORK NEW YORK – My photography has been feeling a bit listless post Tuesday’s lunch. I decided to shake myself up bit with a radical equipment change. I walked around the upper eastside with a small Panasonic that I had converted to infrared last year. I like IR images in the winter; when there is foliage on the trees infrared renders the leaves as white and they look phony. Here we go with an image in IR false color:
IR on Lexington
Another, converted to grayscale:
Outside of Fairway
On this day last year: a shot of the El Dorado across the frozen Central Park Reservoir.
El Dorado
NEW YORK NEW YORK – A day of preparing for meetings. I took a break to go out and refresh my printer supplies. This from our local Staples with my Leica and a 35mm Summilux lens.
Buying paper
On this day last year: sunset from my office.
South from 919 Third Avenue
NEW YORK, NEW YORK – I went to a lunch sponsored by the ICP that included a panel discussion by a number of photojournalism luminaries. Discouraging. They all said that its easy to produce good or even very good pictures. It’s the brilliant ones that are hard to come by. Everyone has long term projects and takes assignments in hell-holes at the ends of the earth. What’s the point of my daily photo blog from cosy New York and Connecticut (and various one-percenter hang outs)? What’s the narrative? What (if anything) makes my pictures interesting?
Tough issues. Maybe the narrative is my life; but wouldn’t that require me to get closer (photographically) to the people around me – family and friends? That’s difficult because they didn’t volunteer for this (another issue discussed by the panel) – I’ve had one situation where the subject of a photo asked me to take it down; for now I’ve resolved the issue by designating the post as “private” (if you look back carefully you’ll see one day gap in the public record) – I’ll figure out what to do with it at some later date. The lunch was in Tribeca; I had my Alpa with me (not much good at the lunch) and the light in the streets was flat and poor later in the afternoon. I finally settled on this.
A vacant lot
On this day one year ago: breakfast at Kitchenette.
Kitchenette
WARREN CONNECTICUT – So . . . . still relying on my little bitty Ricoh GRD 4. There was some splendid light this afternoon. This image (and some others) prove that good light trumps poor equipment choice. Three frames stitched.
Good light
On this day one year ago: winter in Warren. Another tree line, no more than 200 yards from where this year’s image was taken, but with a radically different angle and lens choice, and radically different light.
Warren Connecticut
KENT CONNECTICUT – We took a walk today along a segment of the Appalachian Trail that runs through here. I thought that I had left my Alpa in Connecticut; it turns out that it was in New York, so I only had the camera that travels in my pocket, my Ricoh GRD 4. Not the best tool for landscape. Here’s a branch off of Ten Mile River taken with the GRD 4, three frames stitched.
Ten Mile River
On this day one year ago: a really crappy day.
1185 Park Avenue in snow storm
TAOS NEW MEXICO – It’s become clear to me that occasional ski lessons aren’t going get me to a reasonable level so I decided to focus elsewhere. One of the nice things about Taos is that there are other things to see and do within a reasonable driving distance. Today I visited Earthship homes outside of Taos. According to Wikipedia:
Earthship homes are primarily constructed to work as autonomous buildings and are generally made of earth-filled tires, using thermal mass construction to naturally regulate indoor temperature. They also usually have their own special natural ventilation system. Earthships are generally Off-the-grid homes, minimizing their reliance on public utilities and fossil fuels.
Here are some images, again taken with my Panasonic:
Earthship 1
Earthship 2
Earthship 3
On this day on year ago: my office.
Office at Debevoise & Plimpton
TAOS SKI VALLEY AND TAOS NEW MEXICO – Maria, Alexander, Laura and I snowmobiled in the morning, guided by a local legend and egregious name dropper called “Big Al”. Really fun racing up and down the mountains in two-cycle engine exhaust miasma. Here’s the village in good light and Maria.
Taos ski village
Maria does a snowmobile
Later in the day Laura and I drove down to Taos and visited the Taos Pueblo, one of the most photographed and painted sites on the face of the earth. From an editorial standpoint I’ve had failure of self control here.
Horse
Sagebrush
Taos pueblo
Cemetery Taos Pueblo
On this day last year: a clear day in Connecticut.
Tanner farm, Warren Connecticut
NEWARK AIRPORT – This is one of those dreaded (photo-wise) travel days. Remember? I generally struggle to find an interesting image in airports, cabs and the like. Well actually the iPhone helps a lot – it’s always at hand and post processing apps provide entertaining (in reality silly) modifications of images. Who said that the photo-a-day gig has always to be serious.
We flew Southwest Air to Albuquerque. The “we” is me, Maria, Alexander and his wife, Laura, and Francesca. A three hour drive put us in Taos Ski Valley, one of the highest and frankly most difficult mountains in the US. Anyway here are two images taken in the aircraft as it prepared for takeoff. iPhone images. The first percolated and the second grunged up slightly.
Southwest Air
Southwest Air
On this day one year ago: Windswept field. In last year’s image from this date I used tilt to decrease the apparent depth of field:
Windswept field Warren Connecticut
WARREN CONNECTICUT – I love it when in mostly cloudy weather clear patches illuminate bits of the Connecticut countryside. Here’s an example. It lasted for a few seconds. I was lucky to capture it with my Leica and a 90mm Elmarit lens. One of my best landscapes of the year.
Baby Cloud
On this day last year: Blizzard redux.
Blizzard
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