A random building on 15th street across from Zeckendorff Towers. NYC is so varied you can find interesting patterns, colors, architectural details, and contrasts on almost every street. The on a building that seems to love red and white. Yes, I take a lot of these sorts of photos, but what is photography but turning the ordinary into interesting and varied art objects.
Red & White – NYC 15th St Full Post »»»»
Got a Lomo LCA-120 camera a couple of months ago and have been really having a fun time with it. In case someone doesn’t know, it’s a point-and-shoot 120 camera with an autoexposure aperture and shutter speed, 4-position scale focus, and an ultra wide angle 38mm lens (equal to a 21mm on 35mm film). Not super sharp on the edges, but a lot better than a Holga. Super-expensive for what it is at around $400, but the only alternatives are a Hasselblad SWC at $3k or a 3D-printed camera, and the closest you can get is probably a 47mm Angulon.
LCA-120 and 35mm Film Full Post »»»»
Had the Noblex 135U out in Westfield, NJ in February for urban shooting, definitely my favorite type of photography right now. I really like this camera, but like all panoramas, you really have to be careful with your levels, so I have both an in-camera and a hot-shoe, 2-way level on the camera. I find that the best shots come from holding the camer at waist level where you can really get the level right or on a tripod. You also have to be very careful with fingers and side subjects given the 140 degree FOV. No tilting.
Wide Angle Urban Full Post »»»»
Back in Westfield, NJ, Walking around behind the businesses. The sterile store fronts in this “bubble town” are lovely with their windows and bucolic shoppers (I do live here), but the backs of the stores are where the interesting stuff is. This all with the 120 film LCA-120 ultra wide angle P&S.
More LCA-120 Urban Full Post »»»»
Got a new, to me of course, Nikon S2 Rangefinder camera from Igor’s Camera Exchange (highly recommended, by the way), got it CLA’s by Pro Camera in Charlottesville, VA (also great guys and great work). Loaded it up with Delta 100, which I love in HC-100 Dil B and went to a local, very tired nature preserve. Most of the local town nature places here in Northern NJ are overrun by deer, so they are devoid of much understory. Not good. But this can make for nice patterns. This one, in Fanwood, NJ, also has a boardwalk that has nice
Nikon S2 in the woods Full Post »»»»
Walking in NYC, you never know what you will find. Was at brunch with my family ad had a few minutes outside with the iPhone and saw this scene (in color of course), but thought that it would make a good scene. No distractions, no wires. Nothing but pattern. I had to straighten it up a bit in Lightroom mobile, but after that and a bump in contrast, I thought it turned out very nicely.
Just a few snaps of street scenes in Sacramento. Not candids, but actual photos of the street with the fall leaves. I was really taken by the contrast of the concrete, metal conduit, and freshly fallen leaves. Olympus E-M1 mk 2 with the ever-mounted 12-40/2.8 Zuiko lens
Sacramento leaves Full Post »»»»
In Sacramento, we were at the CIM Marathon and this was a railing that stuck out to me as interesting. I think it’s very interesting the things you find as a photographer. I guess if you’ve taken photos for 48 years as I have, I’ve gotten tired of the normal sunsets, flowers, or pets. I tend to look for interesting subjects in mundane places. Given that I work from my home, I don’t get out as much as when I worked in NYC, so wondering around places within a few miles of my home can be boring. It can also
Was walking around the town of Westfield, NJ with a couple of black and white film cameras and came upon this scene of a bunch of cans destined for recycling. The Westfield Fire Department has a giant wire-framed container with soda cans destined for charity recycling. I forgot to look whether there were any beer cans, but most are soda cans. I didn’t have a color camera, but I did have my iPhone 14Pro. Took a few photos, both close up without the giant container and some with the rust-red/orange container. The ones with the container net were much better,
Psychedelic Cans Full Post »»»»
Walked around the town of Westfield on a nice cloudy day in mid-January hunting for photos of architectural items. It was a Saturday, so things were not super crazy and busy. Walked down Prospect St and this was painted on the side of a building off Prospect Street in an alley. There are two windows separated by about 10 ft, with a big purple wall all over the whole building. I took these two with my iPhone 14Pro, but I need to come back and do a swing-lens film shot on a similarly grey day. The colors are wonderful. Pink
Purple and Pink Full Post »»»»
Went to the old Bethlehem steel plant in PA with the Essex County club on Jan 2, 2023 and was introduced to this very cool place. It’s an old steel mill, the one that essentially supplied the steel that built much of the WW2 ships and cities throughout the Northeastern US. Once had tens of thousands of people working on a huge campus. It’s decline started in the early 70’s when the lost the bid for the steel for the World Trade Center. Much of the site has been torn down, but what remains are four gigantic blast furnaces. The
The Steel Stacks – trip 1 Full Post »»»»
It’s 12/31/22, New Year’s Eve, and I get up and I remark that the fog is real thick today, something VERY unusual here in North-Central New Jersey. It requires a cold front pushing ocean moisture up on top of us and some cool air leaking in to condense the copious amounts of water vapor in the air into fog. My wife says “You should go take photos of this”. I thought Yes, I should, because it will be gone in a flash. Well it wasn’t gone. It lasted many hours and I wish I had gone an hour or two
