photos

It’s Wednesday, March 9th. That means (you guessed it) it’s time for another serving of New York photographs.

One day I was walking across the street and a motorcycle with a movie camera came around the corner.

Sometimes you just have to sit on a milk crate in the street.

While marveling at the texture of the street a taxi passed by. (surprise)

Inside MoMA. A security guard texting and nobody notices! Save the Leica.

That’s actually a view from one of the windows in MoMA. Loved that facade.

If you don’t already know what this is you probably don’t care. But on the left is the “companion” piece to Orange Car Crash Fourteen Times which gets my thumbs up.

Possibly my favourite piece at MoMA. Incredibly happy that I rangefindered the framing appropriately.

Nothing original but might as well.

An extremely rare specimen of Homo Photographicus. I was very lucky to spot this one amidst its hunt.

I think that was near Adorama. It was nice to buy some trix for a decent price.

Later I went to visit Strand and was fortunate to have Olivia’s help to find some rare books that I’d been looking for. Unfortunately I couldn’t find Ben.

Making metro art.

That art, courtesy of Central Park.

I was on my way to the Met to get grenades dropped on me from the second level in a room without an exit.

It’s Kodak Ektar 100 by the way.

Artemis.

Dionysus.

Young Hercules.

Neopagan.

Death of Socrates.

I may have been aiming for the most nonsense in one frame.

pod hotel where we stayed. Good place to do NY on the cheap.

Roof of the hotel.. just about the same view as one of the night shots from my last post.

Heading to Brooklyn.

Walking through the streets as the sun set.

Looking back.

Perch Cafe. There’s Kyle in the background. You may have known him from dA or perhaps he made you famous.

Being in the hot metro.

Being impressed by the metro’s abundant advertising.

We didn’t do too much shopping but that was one of my favourite stores in NYC.

Maybe subtle.

She was a real beauty.

Well, that’s almost everything. I have a couple more rolls to go through which feature more cute photography. Then I’ll have a good reason to develop the rest of the film in my fridge that I shot since NY. As always, thank you and please come again.

I’ve been stuck at this turnstile for some time, but it’s finally time to pass through. Back in New York, this was the familiar sight to the end of each night as I left the metro. And for the longest time it’s been the familiar sight every time I load up Lightroom and remember the mess of files that I needed to organize in order to continue with this blog. Some things happened. I lost my job after I got back from my trip, and then I found a new job but throughout that experience I never fully gained back the motivation and energy to focus on my photographs.

And then I started receiving some spam from a venue in Brooklyn that I went to while I was there and I started to miss NY a lot. So for you and I, here’s a further taste.

One thing I loved about this hotel was the open access to the roof which had a beautiful view of the city in each direction. A great place to unwind after the long days of ‘vacationing.’ In a place like New York you’re trying to do everything you can each day.

On Tuesday morning I ate my breakfast from this window while I watched the day in progress.

Plans for today were a) to meet a contact from craigslist to purchase some of these things. I’d been watching out for more of these things for years since Kevin gave me one of the two that he found on eBay back in the day. So while I was in New York I somehow fluked out and came across a craigslist ad for them by mistake. His name was Frank. Filmcase Frank to be exact. And for $10 I had 2 more x-ray proof cases to protect my films on the way back home. So I bought more film. And b) Museum of Natural History. c) Perhaps spend some time in Central Park.

It seemed ridiculous to photograph fake animals but they were too photogenic to ignore, really.

Action shot.

He was a nice man.

MoNH was amazing but I don’t see how it’s possible to see or absorb everything there in one day.

We strolled through the park a bit after the museum. She’s trying to lean out of the frame on the right.

There was a photographer behind me shooting a Hasselblad who captured me capturing this. I tried to search the net for it afterwards but never came up with anything. I bet his blog is way behind too.

Some folks were helping children make giant soap bubbles. I really enjoyed observing their amazement.

Some creative aerobics in the park. One thing I missed photographing was the incredible number of people exercising in Central Park. The roads in there are dominated by joggers but I never felt like there was a good shot to make for some reason.

I was pretty tired that day, so I went back to the hotel and rested for a bit while my travel mate Randy went out for dinner.

I brought my ipod up to the roof.

Eventually I left and I wandered around Manhattan for the rest of the night.I secured some pizza to eat and eventually I found myself in Washington Square near the university.

There were a lot of people there to enjoy the fountain which seemed like a decent idea.

They were talking to each other.

I found a bench to sit at and then I read for a while. Gravity’s Rainbow.

Came across this scene on St. Marks. As a victim of bedbugs what I find most disturbing about this display is that they actually managed to depict an artistic yet convincing bed bug. And yeah, so I guess I don’t want to think about that anymore.

Nice marmot.

Well thanks for coming back to my blog. I bet you never thought that would happen. In the next update, I’ll take you to MOMA. And maybe if I remember what ISO I shot all my film at since the summer I’ll develop and scan more images.

After the patio lounging episode on Sunday we made our way back to Manhattan and brought ourselves to 30 Rockefeller Plaza, Top of the Rock.

Now that you’re looking at this web page I think that you deserve advanced notice. In this entry I will visit the Statue of Liberty on Liberty Island. I arted the shit out of that place. Just so you’re aware… just so when it happens you won’t be able to say you were not warned. There’s some serious art up ahead. It is not the standard product I push, but trust me when I say that you’ll be back for more.

Weather was great. Still hot and humid, but smoggy.

Switched to some 125px.

Sure why not.

70 stories above New York. To the north you can see most of Central Park. To the south is the Empire State Building and further south is downtown and the financial district.

Back on the ground I got more interested in what I had been on top of.

We’d spent a long time up there and become hungry again so we went searching for a good place to eat. Passed up the M&M store…

125px was starting to get a bit slow.

How about that?

After wandering in circles for ever we managed to find a Thai restaurant that was cheap and delicious. Then we wandered back towards the Times Square area to take in the beauty.

When I saw these guys pull up to the light I was thinking I might have a great photo in front of me so I bent my elbows and waited for something interesting on the massive screen across the street. It seemed totally irrelevant, even ugly, and discouragingly I lowered my camera. At the same moment they all noticed me and got excited. Click. There’s no evidence on the negative that the girl was wearing anything at all on her feet. Interesting choice.

That was at Starbucks.

Such is the value of space.

On Monday morning my first stop was at the post office to send some post cards home.

Monday was forecast as being dodgy weather wise. A bit of a storm passed through in the morning but it cleared up quickly and so we decided to head for Liberty/Ellis island in hopes that it would be a little less busy that day.

When I got to Battery Park, that was happening.

I guess that’s something horrific meant to inspire hatred of unknowable foreign enemies and encourage a patriotic support for war. The Statue of Liberty on the far left and Ellis Island mid-frame.

What I wanted to capture was the degree that the boat suddenly leaned the moment we were within proximity of the statue as everyone rushed to that side of the boat. But I couldn’t seem to get a good frame of it at the time.

Yeah.

That’s totally what it looks like when you put the sun behind her torch.

Here is the icon of freedom in America, complete with black helicopter.

A group of boy scouts pass through the Registry room at Ellis Island. Between 1892 and 1954 twelve million immigrants were processed at Ellis Island. Most of them passed through this room.

Off to the side of that room was a room of tiny bunks where children slept. The room seemed creepy and rather claustrophobic. The bunks are smaller and tighter than they look here. I thought of how scary it might have been to spend nights there as a child in a foreign place, but for many it must have been such a comfort compared to the journey that lead them here.

For some reason the crank to operate the windows was fascinating.

That was a long day out in the heat of the sun through the queue to the ferries, the ferries and the islands. We went to do some more shopping on Broadway that evening and then found a place to have some greasy food. I had a bacon cheeseburger and Randy enjoyed a Reuben while we listened in to a conversation between the waiter and this fat kid who was sitting at the bar with his dad. The kid’s like “ey! Amigo! How about that chocolate deep fudge cake and I want a raspberry sauce on the side.” I almost spat out my beer and I’m like Randy did you hear that?

When we paid our bill and walked past to exit, father was asking him how he liked that dessert with the raspberry sauce and encouraging him to finish all that, and in a fabulous New York accent that I hadn’t heard too much of. Priceless experience.

Hello and welcome back to my blog. At some point while I was composing this post, the first of my New York entries, my thoughts began to obsess over the way my photographs are presented here. I came to the conclusion that thumbnails are for the faint of heart (or the disinterested) which I never meant to endorse. I’ve now put 900px images right on the front page and offloaded the workout for any thumbnail clickers on to the tubes of the internet.

Last we heard, our heroes were wrapping up a successful project in Washington, DC. Well, on Friday morning, Randy and I trekked over to Washington’s Union Station and hopped the Amtrak to New York.

Passing through Philadelphia.

I expected that deboarding the train at Penn Station in New York would be a unique experience, but what I didn’t expect was the claustrophobia (which I’m fortunately not very sensitive to) and bustle through tight sooty corridors and ceilings lower than I ever would have thought. I’d never felt like such an ant. Then we came up outside Madison Square Gardens and I knew I really was an insect here. We got our bearing then and dove back down into the Metro to reach the hotel.

Resurfacing at Lexington and 53.

The urge to start making photos won despite having arms full of bags so I just made a one handed shot as I walked.

But the hotel was just around the corner.

They seemed to have a decent presence of lighting and mirrors, so I got that out of my system.

We had a little rest and then made our way for Brooklyn where we had tickets to see some music at the Knitting Factory that night.

Just outside the venue.

Then I satisfied an important lifetime goal by seeing Elysian Fields play. I’d never thought I’d see them play live at all never mind be introduced to New York by one of my favourite bands.

On the train back to Manhattan.

That shot wasn’t a matter of timing. They were just slumped that way for the whole ride.

Morning at the hotel.

As we walked the streets of New York we played a game of adding up theoretical traffic tickets for honking. Can’t say I ever saw anyone being written up. New York is a city of criminals though, I can tell you that much.

We decided to visit the cathedral of St. John the Divine early on. Outside there was some creative sculpting to be found.

Oh, I was also going to mention that this roll of colour is a long expired roll of Afga Optima 100 that I’ve had for a while. I found the colours fussy to edit. Some parts of the roll is worse than others… a bit green, which I tried to compensate for but got bored of since it was preventing me from posting this entry.

I had heard through a friend that on Saturdays the cathedral offered tours through the hidden passages of the structure and up upon the roof and this was the main appeal to us. But as it turned out we missed the tour that day, so we bought tickets for the following week. More on that later, I guess.

Whether you are a political or religious speaker, it’s good to have figures like these to stand behind so as to freak the fuck out of your audience.

“Ground Zero.”

In New York, there’s Dunkin’ Donuts everywhere. I thought it was hilarious just for how random it was. I mean, Dunkin’ Donuts? Who knew? I guess I’d never seen that in any other city and I didn’t expect it. I started to think of it as Tim’s and it made more sense.

We spent that evening doing some shopping and eventually I switched that roll out for some trix.

Came across this scene while scoping out the area around the hotel that night.

Although DC was hotter, the situation in the NY Metro was different altogether. Hot. stale sooty air. All you can do is stand in the oven and wait for the for the next rolling refrigerator.

One morning in Brooklyn.

Having brunch with some friendly folks that we met at the Knitting Factory and their friends.

They took us to a place called Lodge which had some antler shaped chandeliers. They served water to the table inside old wine bottles. It helped me to feel like a classy, trendy person.

There was a lineup waiting for tables there, so we decided to be polite and do our lounging at some cafe which meant walking across the street.

This guy had walked past in the other direction only a few minutes before and he was quite popular with our table so when we saw him coming back we were ready for it.

Then this guy walked past with a kid on a dolly drinking a Coke! I thought that was hilarious, and far more entertaining than the long haired balding dude, but my enthusiasm was not shared.

Stopping here doesn’t seem like a bad idea. At this rate I’ll probably have two more New York entries.