St. Mary's Cathedral

Canon A570is

My 2nd image for the May Project.

The shadow across the side of St. Mary's Cathedral caught my eye.

For June, how about an environmental portrait?

--Warren

Alpine Dam and the Falls into Alpine Lake

Hiking with the Mamiya is a real joy. Light and easy to use. I have been using a light weight tripod when I am in low light settings like the falls.

Dan

Cataract Falls

It is unusual for these Falls to be so active at this time of the year, but we have had a wet spring. Mamiya with 43mm 4.5.

Dan

May Shadows

If Warren was just under the wire then this post is at the wire. Eileen's old school desk with her art supplies.

For June why don't we go in the same vein and do reflections?

Tree Shadows

D200  f 4.0     1/160   18mm

Could not be late three months, especially when I am home and not working.  Here is the Project for the month.  Try and find the camera.

**Dolph

Plant Shadows

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 14-45mm

Okay, I got one in under the wire :).

--Warren

p.s. Any ideas for our June Project?

Mountain Goat

I was hiking with friends last weekend (headed into the mountains to escape the pouring rains..) and we saw mountain goats! None of us had ever seen one before and it was really spectacular....

And actually, we saw two! (They're two different goats in the photos.) The first one walked by us twice, just calmly walked right by us. The second was a bit more jumpy but still curious about us.

Their horns were a little intimidating but I was quite surprised how calm I felt around them.

Gorgeous animals anyhow.. :) I took these pics with an iPhone and I think they turned out pretty decent for a phone!

Smoky Meadow, Yosemite Valley

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 14-45mm

For some reason on this late afternoon in the Valley, there was a layer of smoke sitting above the meadow. This family didn't let that stop them from enjoying the views.

--Warren

War of the Worlds

S8000
I was driving on this highway near Hampton Mass when I saw this large water tank.  To give some perspective, some of those homes are have second levels and appear to be very large.

Reminded me of War of the Worlds.  I wanted to see the ray gun fire, but never did in the 5 minutes I stook on the side of the hill.

G1 vs. Rangefinder Size Comparison

Photos shot with Canon SD300

As requested by Dan, here are some pictures comparing the Lumix G1 to my rangefinder cameras.

Voigtlander Bessa R w/Bessa Side Grip and 35mm f2.5 Skopar vs. Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 w/Lumix 20mm f1.7:




Leica M3 in a Zhou Leather Half-case w/50mm f2.8 Elmar M vs. Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 w/Lumix 20mm f1.7:

Walking Path, Harding Park

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 20mm f1.7

Late afternoon at Harding Park golf course, next to Lake Merced.

--Warren

Pigs in Paradise

Here's a shot of some pigs roaming around the Kilohana Coffee Plantation in Kauai, HI. I don't know how long before they were destined for the luau. Kalua pig anyone???

National Felt Company

S8000

One evening I was driving through some of the old manufacturing plants in Holyoke Mass.  I found one of the plants for National Felt Company.  What made this so interesting where these very green metal covers over where the windows should have been.  If you look closely you can also see that the building was constructed in three phases.  The first floor has one set of bricks, a second phase for the next three floors, and then the last phase was one additional floor.

If you can't tell building are very interesting to me.

**Dolph

Yerba Buena Island

I have been working on a consulting project on Yerba Buena Island. Those of you familiar with the BA may not have seen these views. I know in 57 years I have never really explored the island with the Bay Bridge running through it before.

Dan

Random Canine Cuteness

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 14-45mm

His owner asked him to do his bear imitation.

--Warren

Merced River, Yosemite Valley

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 20mm f1.7

This was taken next to the Merced River, mid-morning in Yosemite Valley. I found a shady spot near here to do my Tai Chi practice.

Aside from picture from the usual places, it's always fun trying to find a different viewpoint.

--Warren

Old Brick Water Monitoring Building

Nikon S8000

A little town call South Hadley has a water diversion dam and this little building was to monitor the flow of the water into another town on the other side of the Connecticut River. What was interesting was the direction and different sizes of the brick. This building was built in the late 1700’s and was part of the original dam. It seems to be doing better than the newer building.

Early Walk on the Beach

Art Deco Heaven

In the foreground is the 1936 statue of Atlas by Lee Lawrie and Rene Chambellan. The Art Deco statue greets visitors to 630 Rockefeller Center (the International Building) as well as passers-by. Through the spherical astrolabe on Atlas' shoulders, you can see 30 Rockefeller Center.

"30 Rock", since 1988, is called the GE Building. Before that, it was the RCA Building. The renaming took place after GE bought RCA (and thus, NBC) 27 years ago.

Prior to 1988, "the GE Building" was the beautiful 1931 Art Deco skyscraper at 570 Lexington Avenue. Oddly enough, the building was designed for RCA, and the original plans refer to it as "RCA Building." As it was being finished, GE and RCA were involved in some anti-trust actions, and in the settlement, GE got the building.

I was privileged to work in the "old" GE Building at 570 Lexington for 8 years. There was a company dining room on the 50th floor where anyone, from Jack Welch to the newest mail boy, could eat for a few bucks. The view to the West from the mens' room on the 50th was spectacular, until the Leona "Queen of Mean" Helmsley built her execrable Helmsley Palace Hotel.

Suburbia

Suburbia - Nikon S8000 at 4000 Ft over Weston Florida on approach to Fort Lauderdale.  I wanted to carry a little camera with me so I could take some pictures of some of the older towns in western New England.  This little camera has a great zoom and with pretty good resolution.  It doesn't give you all the controls that I get with my other cameras, but it's not very heavy.  I recently spent a lot of time traveling through airports, and carrying either my D70 or 200 with extra lenses was getting a little troublesome.  Here is the first of several pictures that I took on my trips.

Reflections on Lake Merced

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 20mm f1.7

A "no bars" version of this view of Lake Merced.

--Warren

Lake Merced Behind Bars

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 20mm f1.7

This was taken on a late afternoon walk at Lake Merced. Does this qualify as a May Project shot? :)

--Warren

Camera Size Comparison

(Camera used: Canon SD300)

This photo shows where the Panasonic Lumix DMC-G1 fits in the spectrum of cameras sizes.

Counterclockwise from top right:

- Nikon F4s, one of my favorite 35mm film cameras. It's big, heavy and imposing.

- Nikon D100 w/Tamron 24-135mm (36-203mm equiv.), This is a mid-sized DLR.

- Canon A570is, a jacket pocket-sized digital P&S.

- Lumix DMC-G1, Micro 4/3 format, w/14-45mm kit lens (28-90mm equiv.)

Here is a side-by-side shot of the D100 and G1.

--Warren

Lovers on a Bridge, Yosemite

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 14-45mm

These are not strangers, our friends, Cristina & David, were able to join us for a few days in Yosemite. However, they didn't know that I took this picture of them.

--Warren

Tree Layers, Yosemite Valley

Panasonic DMC-G1, Nikkor 85mm f2.0

Half Dome After Sunset

Panasonic DMC-G1, Lumix 20mm f1.7

Photo Archeaology - Anatomy of an Image

Rue Foyatier, this oft-photographed stairs, climbs up the Butte Montmartre in Paris, ending near Sacre Couer basillica, the highest point in the city. On a stopover following a business trip in December 1977, I had walked here from a Metro stop a few blocks to the south, and found myself at the bottom of the staircase. I liked the disappering-into-infinity pattern of the steps, railings, and trees, but by itself, the scene looked to static.

So I did what I now realize is a frequent trick of mine - I anchored myself and waited for someone to walk into the scene. The strip of exposures above is the sequence of photos as I took them (click on the image to see a larger view).

Back home on East 83rd Street, I developed the film and checked the contact sheet with my trusty 8x Agfa Loupe, the 20th-century equivalent of the "magnify" button on the back of our digital cameras.

The first three images didn't do anything for me at all. The fourth was a "maybe"... the woman caught ducking behind the fence seemed to lend a tiny bit of mystery. But the fifth photo gave me an aha! feeling.

The position of the woman within this frame, as well as her relative size, works well compositionally. Also, her slightly bent-over and schleppy look at this moment suggeted a tired struggle up the long staircase that matched the somber, lonely look of that soggy, gloomy December day.

Here's the "new" version of that fifth photo, newly scanned from the negative after more than 32 years, slightly cropped, straightened, and lightly adjusted for blacks in Photoshop.

I think it's a great marriage of new and old technology: Epson V500 scanner combined with 1970's Tri-X film and D-76 developer, a 1940 Leica iiiC body, and a 1952 50mm f/2 Collapsible Summicron lens.