Couple More Calendars

Here are a couple more calendar possibilities for you to ponder. The folks at our Cleveland plant wanted a calendar that showed the Cleveland skyline, and I dug way back in the archives and found these unused (well, not entirely unused, but not previously published...) shots from a couple of years ago. I think they're going to go with the night shot above, but nothing is set in stone yet. Feel free to leave your opinion down in the comments. One of these shots will be used in addition to one of the Statue of Liberty shots I showed you early, not in place of those. I don't know if I'll have copies of both calendars or not, but maybe...

One More Thing

Go RAYS!!!

A Flash Of Red

I found the picture above in amongst all of the stuff I shot during my last trip to Ohio in June. I remember chasing this red-winged blackbird up and down the side of a canal near downtown Cleveland, but I didn't think I'd gotten any decent pictures. I must have missed this one when I was reviewing my shots for the day. As you can see, he's got his lunch, or at least a juicy appetizer, held firmly in his beak as he flies back to the nest.

Popular Vote Or Electoral College

Here's your chance to participate in the great democracy that is Ernie (Not Bert). Sort of. I've got the opportunity to get my pictures on a spiffy new calendar this year, and we've narrowed it down to a photo of the statue of Liberty Enlightening The World. But which shot should it be? I've picked out four of the best from my trip to NYC last month, and here they are. Which one do you like the best? My first choice was the one above, and it's the one I've done the most work on. I had to play with the sky a little to get it to the shade of blue that I like, but I wouldn't admit to that in court.

Shot two is another good one, you can see her left hand holding the tablet that's engraved with the date July 4, 1776. (Some people think that's where Emma Lazarus' poem is, but it's not.)

Picture number three is probably the odds-on favorite here in the little contest. That's probably because it squeezes in all of the important elements of the statue. You get the face, the crown, the tablet and the torch. I've also done some touch-up work on the sky in this one. I don't think it came out as blue as I wanted, but it's sufficient.

Number four is a detail of the face, with a little tiny bit of fake blue sky to the right. I like this one, but those streaks across her face (from water leaching some rust out of the joint to the left of her eye) detract from it too much. I like it, but I don't think it's the best.

While I was playing with the sky in the picture up top, I threw this one together in a hurry just to see what it looked like. There's a little tiny sliver of sky still edging the sculpture, and it shows when you look close, so this one won't fly, but I just wanted to see how it would look.

There you have it. Four choices. Which one is your favorite? And would you be interested in buying one of the calendars this picture will appear on? The calendars are about 2' x 3', with the picture printed at about 9" high and 27" wide. It's got the whole year on the face of it, and is printed on glossy paper that allows you to use it as a dry erase board. They'll sell for about $20. I figured I'd ask and see if there's any interest. I'll have to piggy-back my order onto the company's order, so I need to know about how many to get. If you're interested, leave a comment or drop me a line.

PS-Your votes don't really count. It's like the electoral college around here. You can vote all you want, but they tell you who wins. :)

Why I'm Not A Wedding Photographer

Plenty of people have asked me to shoot weddings and other events for them, and I've always politely declined. Part of the reason is that I think I don't take good people pictures. I don't have any real experience with using the flash and getting good flesh tones and all that jazz. The other reason is my lack of concentration on the task at hand. As I mentioned a second ago, I shot pictures at a wedding this evening, and right about the part where they read their hand-written vows, I spot this osprey flying along the water's edge looking for dinner. So what did I get a picture of? The vows? No. The osprey? Yes. Of course. Why ask a silly question?

Congrats Kayla & Ash!

My cousin got married tonight. I shot a thousand or so pictures of the festivities, trying to capture all of the stuff that the professional photographers might miss. That was hard to do as they seemed to be pretty on-the-ball. But as far as I could tell, they didn't get any silhouettes! I tried to watch what they were doing to learn a little something (while staying out of their shots), but all I really got was a bad case of lens envy. Hopefully the shots I got will add something to the memories of the event.

One Week's Notice

Just a quick update on the stolen car business that some of you may remember from a couple of weeks ago. I got served today with a summons to appear before a State's Attorney next week. I guess they want to get an official statement from me or something. We'll have to wait and see how that goes. In the meantime, I'm keeping my eye on my car just about every waking moment...

Not Exactly Wall Street

What the devil is this all about?

Out On Bond

Uh-oh, looks like the accused is out on bond! I'm going to go move my car to right outside my window so I can keep an eye on it. I wonder if they'll let me bring it in the shop? That would put my mind at ease a little more. The adjusters are supposed to come look at it today to see if there is any damage to the front end or the underside from the towing. I think it needs an alignment, and maybe some new front tires. Tires don't respond so well to being drug across the asphalt when they can't roll.

Whodunit?

I can't seem to link to it, so here's a screen grab from the website of the Manatee County Sheriff's Office. Remember, all people are innocent until proven guilty, even if you did find your car in her back yard while she was at the tag agency with your license plate trying to trade it in on a new one.

And We're Back

Just like that, my car is back. Well, there's more to it than that. Someone thought it was theirs, so they took it (had it taken, actually, by a towing company, who is also now in trouble). I pointed out that it was not theirs, and got it back. They caught the lady at the tag agency trying to exchange my license plate for a new one in her name. I'll never understand people. But she is now in jail. For how long, who knows? I do have to drive it in someplace tomorrow to get the front end checked out for damage due to the rough tow job, but at least I know how I'm going to get home tonight.

Gone In A Flash

Someone has stolen my car. I parked it here this morning, and now it is gone. I kid you not. Who would want a nine year old dirty car? Updates to follow. I can barely think right this second.

Last Night

Thought you might be interested in seeing the sunset from last night. I know it's a day late and all, but it's still nice. This was down in Venice, about an hour south of my house.

Wrong Photo

When I walked through the New York Public Library recently, they were installing a collection of sports photos along a hallway. Lots of people were busy hanging pictures and lots of other people were looking over their shoulders to make sure everything was hung correctly. It just struck me as funny that the one above was marked as the "Wrong Photo". I don't know why I thought that was so funny, but there you go.

Another Pomodoro

Did I mention that I found another sculpture by Pomodoro? I don't think I did. This sphere is located out front, and just to the left, of the United Nations complex in NYC. I didn't know it was there, I just stumbled across it as I was walking by, but I knew what it was when I saw it. I spotted my first Pomodoro in Charlotte, NC. This one is not quite as high, but it's a full sphere instead of just a cylinder. You can't get close to it, so I couldn't tell if it moved or not.


Look close and you can see me in there, with an unrecognizable chunk of the New York City skyline rising in the background. I tried to get a shot with the UN building behind me, but that would have been the section of the sphere where the interior was exposed, so it wasn't reflective.

Loud Cars

No, not cars that make a lot of noise, but cars that are somewhat ostentatious. As I was walking around downtown Manhattan on 9-11, I found these two cars that people had brought down there in honor of the date. They weren't being used in any official function that I could tell, and they weren't found anywhere really close to each other. I think the one below was affiliated with some police organization, but I'm not really sure. Both of them just served to demonstrate how deeply affected many people were by the tragic events of September 11th, 2001.

Fabulous Coney Island!

Who wouldn't want to visit Coney Island when they're in New York City? Well, someone who's been to a decent beach really shouldn't. I was terribly depressed by just about everything I saw. I wanted to go out there, and go we did, but what can you expect from a beach with a subway stop? Turns out that it's the end of the line in more ways than one. There were actually permanent signs erected stating not to enter the water. Just great.

Pretty much all of the fairground type attractions were closed. I guess the parachute ride above is one of the symbols of the area, but it looked like it had been closed for years. The rides below had only recently closed, but closed they were.


The only real high point of visiting the beach in Brooklyn was the upside-down girls in bikinis. Can't complain about that.

The Bronx Bombers

One of my goals while in NYC was to visit all five boroughs. Coming up with stuff to see in some of them was a bit of a challenge. I didn't know anything about the Bronx, so I wound up heading for Yankee Stadium. I arrived right in the middle of a game, so I tried to get back out of there in a hurry before the game let out. The picture above is the old stadium, the one that's been there since the twenties. Right across the street is the new stadium, scheduled to open next year. At least I can say I was there. Later that day, by complete accident, I wound up at Shea Stadium, home of the Mets. More on that later.

Two For The Price Of One

As you may or may not know, there are currently two space shuttles on the launch pads waiting to blast off to space. I figured this was too good a photo opportunity to pass up, so I headed over to Cape Kennedy this past Sunday with telephoto lens in tow. Unfortunately, security is tight, and they wouldn't let us out to the usual shuttle vantage point to the East of the launch pads. You'll have to make do with three different viewpoints from something like one to seven miles away. And only one of those spots lets you actually see a shuttle without a gantry in the way. The top photo is from the causeway between Cape Kennedy and Cape Canaveral. Someday soon I hope to get a pass to shoot a launch from this spot, as it's the closest the public can get during a launch. It's $60 or so for admission, but at only 7 miles distant, it's half the distance from where I usually shoot. The detail down at the bottom is shot from this same spot, and I think that's Atlantis you can see quite clearly. It's Endeavor on the other pad, for those of you keeping score at home.

This view is from the observation platform near where the crawler takes the orbiters to the pad. It's four stories up, so this is probably the best picture of the three, and the light was just right when I shot this. However, both machines are hidden by their launch platforms.

This is the view from behind the Apollo/Saturn 5 center. Still quite a ways away, and the shuttles are still hidden from view.

And as I mentioned above, this is Atlantis on the pad and ready to go from about seven miles away. Don't mind that seagull in the picture, he'll be gone pretty quick when they fire up those solid rocket boosters.

The (Temporary) Waterfalls Of New York City

One of the things I saw in NYC that surprised me were these temporary waterfalls. They were an art project designed by Olafur Eliasson, and were only in place for a few months this summer. They are all visible from a few spots on the East River, I first shot them from the South Street Seaport. The one above in under the Brooklyn tower of The Brooklyn Bridge. You could hear it when you walked over it, but there were no views of it looking straight down, I'm afraid.

The falls above were the ones the farthest away, out on Governor's Island. I thought about going out there, but I never did.

The shot above is from the Brooklyn Bridge itself, looking underneath the Manhattan Bridge on the Manhattan Island side. Pretty cool view, if you ask me.

And last but not least was this falls just South of the Brooklyn Bridge on the Brooklyn side. I took all four of these pictures on my big NYC picture day. I spent 17 hours out and about, shooting 3200 pictures during that time. As you can see, the shots aren't exactly going to get me any contracts with calendar manufacturers, but I enjoyed shooting the shots.

Under The Bridge

No, this post isn't about the Red Hot Chili Peppers, it's about the view from underneath the Manhattan Bridge in New York. That's the bridge you see above, shot from the Brooklyn side of the East River. Nice little park down there, perfect for shooting pictures like this. I'm sure you've seen similar shots in movies, I know I have. I shot this after walking across the Brooklyn bridge, and right before I walked over the bridge in the picture. It was a long day...

Dick Clark?

The very last picture I took during my trip to New York was this mosaic in the Times Square subway station. I thought at the time it was supposed to be Dick Clark, but now I'm not so sure. There were quite a few of these merry New Year's revelers along the wall in the Times Square Station, and it being Dick Clark would make some sense, since he's been hosting the New Year's festivities there for as long as I've been alive. But looking at it now, I think that's just a horn of some sort in his hand, and not the microphone I imagined at first. The sign on the ground is one of dozens that some group had spread along the wall, trying to bring people over to their view of the Bible. I, of course, was more interested in Dick Clark.

Update: The Web is, of course, an amazing place. Go visit this excellent site all about the New York City subway system, where I learned that my non-Dick-Clark mosaic is part of an installation called The Revelers by Jane Dickson.

Looking South

Here are three pictures I took from the observation deck of the Empire State Building on September 11th. Each one is a little bit closer to Ground Zero, which is where they are shining the spotlights from. It's tough to get shots like this in the dark without them being blurry, but I think these are fairly good. Just to orient you a little, in the shot above, you can see the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges at the left of the picture, reaching over the East River. To the right is the Hudson River. The bridge in the shot below is the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, linking Brooklyn to Staten Island. And that means that most of the lights in the background are actually on Staten Island. Somewhere out there is the Statue of Liberty, but I don't think it's visible too clearly in any of these pictures. Wait, it's a tall green object in the right of center in the picture up top. I think I've gotten much better as a photographer since the last time I tried to take pictures from this spot.


In this last shot, you can see where the lights shine right up out of the hole that used to be the World Trade Center towers. More about that hole later.

Road Block

I don't know why, I just thought this picture of four sandhill cranes walking down the driveway to my parent's house was hilarious. I suppose you had to be there. The ones with their beaks open were making their loud cry, telling me to quit following them around and taking their picture. Sorry, guys, I couldn't resist.

Wake Up To This

I keep forgetting to post this. Last time I was working over in Daytona Beach, these giant stick insects were mating on the window sill out side the office I was in. That big one, which I think is the female, is about four inches long, not including the antennae or legs. The little male is only about two inches long. The only time I ever see these creatures is mating season, and even then I don't see two many of them. They seem to like to crawl up walls while mating for some reason unbeknowst to me. Biggest one I've ever seen was almost six inches, but that was back before I was an avid photographer, so I never got a picture. But maybe someday...

I love the internet! This is a muskmare (the big girl) and the little guy is her stallion. Scientific name is anisomorpha buprestoides, commonly called two-striped walkingsticks. How's that for info?

A Lighthouse In New Jersey

Imagine my surprise when I spotted this cute little lighthouse while on the Staten Island Ferry. Imagine my surprise when I tried walking towards it and after a mile or so I was no closer. Turns out that it's in New Jersey, and not actually on Staten Island. And if you look close at the shot below, you'll see it's got an airport nearby. I shot this on 9/11, so it concerned me at first, but the second or third time it happened, I figured out what was going on. Turns out it's Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR) behind there.

PS-This was not the first lighthouse I saw on my trip. More about that other one later.

Was It Something I Said?

Hmmmm... I leave New York, and the financial markets tumble. You'd think they could have paid me to stay in town a few more days... Anyhow, that's the New York Stock Exchange above, before the big tumble. After the Dow Jones Industrial Average looses 500 points today, I suspect that flag looks quite a bit smaller now.

Good Bye New York

Add JFK to the list of airports that are kind enough to offer free wireless. I'm sitting here waiting for the flight back to Sarasota, and I wanted to say that I had a great time here in the Big Apple. They aren't kidding when they say it's big, but I never figured out the apple part. I'm happy to say that I made it to almost all of the spots on my list, including all five boroughs (Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, Staten Island and The Bronx), the tops of both the Empire State Building and Rockefeller Center (Top Of The Rock), Coney Island (blech!), the Statue of Liberty (it's actually called Liberty Enlightening the World, by the way) and I even walked the entire length of Central Park. But more on all that later, after I've slept for about a week. Shame I have to be back at work tomorrow.

Imagine

After several tries, we finally located the Imagine mosaic in the Strawberry Fields section of Central Park. I'm not sure how we missed it the first few times, but we finally got to the right path. It's across Central Park West and just slightly south of the Dakota building, where Lennon lived at the time of his death, and where Yoko Ono lives to this day. There was a guy there playing Lennon songs on a guitar, and plenty of people quietly showing their respects to their favorite Beatle. I don't know if you get the flower petals every day, or just on the weekends.


I was a little shocked to be a thousand miles from home and see a bumper sticker for a Tampa radio station on a guitar laid near the Imagine memorial. But there is was. Maybe I should send them this picture. WMNF, are you listening?

You Never Know What You'll Find

One of the more surprising things I've seen here in NYC is this statue. Nothing too exciting when you spot it, until you read the story behind it. This sculpture was 2.5 kilometers from the atomic blast at Hiroshima in 1945. It was brought to New York ten years later and now sits in front of a Buddhist temple on Riverside Drive. Impressive, huh?