NEW YORK NEW YORK – Here we are back at the Seagrams Building – one of my favorite places to shoot in NY, with my Leica Monochrom and 50mm Summicron lens from 1972.
Day 2505 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day five years ago (day 679): Foggy morning.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Walking around today in pretty good light I ran into a fashion shoot. Shot with my Leica Monochrom and a 50mm Summicron lens from 1972.
Day 2504 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day six years ago (day 313): BBC Crossing.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – An only ok day: the light was flat and uninspiring and it’s frankly a bit hot to be walking around with a camera. Both images taken with my Leica Monochrom and an 50mm Leica Summicron lens from 1974. As you may have noticed I like the look of vintage Leica lenses.
Day 2503 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day six years ago (day 312): Kenya.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – I’m shooting with different equipment for the next week. I’ve become very concerned about Leica service, particularly through their New Jersey service center. In April I sent Leica: my 50mm Summicron Asph. lens for cleaning, lubrication and adjustment (after three years of hard, daily service – this why I’m shooting with different 50mm lenses now); my 135mm for “six bit coding” (a routine Leica service); and my new second Monochrom body to have the frame lever replaced because it had fallen off. Here we are in mid-August and these items still haven’t been returned. Only pro-forma communications. They don’t return email. You can’t leave a voicemail message because their voice mailbox is full. This is frustrating enough that I’m considering alternatives to Leica.
Starting today for a week I’ll be shooting a Sony a7rii, the current leader among mirrorless “SLRs”. The terrific thing about it is that adapters exist for almost every type of lens ever made, so it opens a broad range of legacy glass. It has a good 42 meg sensor that delivers resolution comparable to the Leica Monochrom. I own this camera for the occasions when I absolutely need to shoot color, when I really need autofocus, for odd legacy lenses (like my rangefinder Carl Zeiss lenses from the ’30s and ’40s) and when I need a backup. I’ll converting images to black and white.
Here is my first day’s effort with the Sony, starting in the kitchen as I defamiliarize myself with the Sony’s overly complex controls.
Day 2492 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day two years ago (day 1763): Classic.
NEW YORK NEW YORK – Getting my bearings back home. Not a very productive day.
Day 2490 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day six years ago (day 299): Sao Paolo. The color original and the black and white conversion.
MODENA ITALY – We’ve come here to have dinner tonight at Massimo Bottura’s restaurant, Osteria Francesca, which has been crowned as this year’s best restaurant in the world. We had a lovely time with Massimo and his wife Lara, and indeed dinner was one of the best meals that we’ve ever had.
Day 2477 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day last year (day 2112): Manhattan.
AIX-EN-PROVENCE – We arrived here this morning, checked into a lovely hotel and spent the day exploring museums and the like. Maria bought a vintage 1950s dress.
Day 2471 of one photograph every day for the rest of my life.
On this day three years ago (day `375): Lake Waramaug
