My goal for this photo was to capture both the sign and the pointing conductor in one shot up close. I found that my fisheye lens on my tiny Fuji X-T1 mirrorless camera to be the perfect set up for this photo. I don't usually like to tilt an image, but in this case, I was super close to the sign and the conductor and this tilted crop was required to fit it all in.
If you follow his pointing finger, you might not think that he's pointing at the sign. This is an optical illusion caused by the fisheye lens. There appears to be an arc between the conductor's finger and the sign, but in reality, it's a straight line.
If you're a coffee fan, you must try this ice cold nitro infusion. It was so smooth requiring no creamer and had the texture of a Guinness!
Here's a shot from my Instagram feed:
After coffee, I Uber'd myself into downtown. Luckily, some fast moving clouds coupled with a variable ND filter helped make this 10 second exposure:
Ghost signs provide insight to a building's historical past:
Opened in 1914, the Beaux-Arts styled Union Station is stunning! Here's a ceiling portion of the grand hall 95 feet above me with the chandelier weighing 3500 pounds.
A sweet font and window detail:
Since it was Sunday, this was closed so I had amazing BBQ instead. I love old retro signs!
Finally, a TWA rocketship. I want one.
As you can see, Kansas City offers lots of fun architectural details to appreciate. I look forward to my next visit!
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This past summer, I had the unique and exciting opportunity to ride in the cab of this engine where I took most of the following photos. Please forgive me in advance as I am not aware of the many technical terms associated with trains.
Here, engine 734 enters the Cumberland station pulling several passenger cars to begin it's journey. This 2-8-0 engine was built in 1916 by the Baldwin Locomotive Works. Currently, this engine is undergoing it's 15 year major inspection/tear down so the WMSR will be using another engine from the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Museum. I felt this image just had to be black and white!
The fireman (the guy who keeps the coal burning so that we have steam and thus have power to move) maintains the various moving parts of the locomotive while it's parked in the station before our trip. I saw quite a volume of steam drifting around - I knew there was the possibility of a good photo to be made.
Before getting underway, Richard shovels coal into the fire.
Crawling out of the station, we can see the engineer is seated on the right side of the cab, the firman is nearest to me feeding the fire, and the guy who stands in the tender feeding the coal forward is observing. I'm in the left seat of the cab hanging on.
With eye protection, gloves, and hearing protection in place, we're racing down the track! Although you can't feel it here, it's a very turbulent ride in the cab of the engine!
I really liked looking up at the coal smoke pouring out of the engine.
Although a cool wet day, each time the fire doors opened a wave of heat blasted us.
I don't normally do funky antique film conversions, but it seemed to work in this case.
At the end of the line, the engine turned around on the turntable in Frostburg, and moved to the other end of our train.
Cruising back to the Cumberland station.
The crew of the train really got into their roles by authentically dressing in period wear.
Sweet authentic vintage luggage.
At the end of our journey, I complemented the conductor telling him he looked like a real conductor. He appeared confused by my comment and replied that he was a real conductor. Of course!
Upon entering the building, you will be taken by this stunning atrium space:
Principal firms involved on this project include Opsis Architecture of Portland, Bernardo-Wills Architects of Spokane, MW Consulting Engineers of Spokane, and Hoffman Construction of Portland.
Pictured here is "360 Degrees," the Mongolian wok.
There is an abundance of seating in the common areas.
Outdoor gathering spacings include a fire pit
and terraces with views of the athletic fields.
Organic produce is grown in the state-of-the-art rooftop hydroponic greenhouse/learning lab located on the eastern rooftop:
Group meeting spaces to pray, reflect and share.
The facility also houses University Ministry programs, Center for Community Action and Service Learning (CCASL), Center for Global Engagement/Study Abroad/International, Unity Multicultural Education Center (UMEC), Group work spaces and meeting rooms, Laptop stations, computer labs and learning technologies, Comfortable, private study/work lounges.
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This lens was really made for cockpit shots and other such tight spaces. The Fuji X-T1 has a decent dynamic range allowing me to capture the details of the brighter outside and darker inside.
While sitting at the gate in LaGuardia, I noticed a very interesting sky full of puffy white clouds. I reached my arm out the window while parked at gate D-3 to get this:
These two seem to be wondering what I'm doing with a fisheye lens:
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The pilot came prepared with both an American flag and card for his love.
Jay, the boom operator, flies the boom by way of hydraulically powered ruddervators into the F-16's receptacle. Once connected, the KC-135 tanker pilots turn on an air refueling pump to fill the receiver with his scheduled offload of jet fuel.
I'm up to exposure #17. When one must pay about a $1 per shot, much more thought is given to composition and whether the image is really even worth making. I'm practicing much more intentional photography. The camera I'm using, my 21 year old Nikon N90, is unable to shoot in manual mode or aperture priority with most of my lenses. Modern Nikon lenses don't have an aperture ring so I'm shooting in shutter priority only - awkward. I suppose I could use Program mode, but this is all about becoming more intentional, and that wouldn't move me in that direction. Next week, I'll be using a more modern (1996-2004) Nikon F5 which allows for controlling shutter and aperture settings with dual control wheels - this will allow for manual mode and aperture priority. I thought about picking up a lens that has an aperture ring on it, but it was way cheaper to pick up a used Nikon F5 since they are now a fraction of the cost of a lens. I'm currently shooting a roll of Fujicolor PRO 400H - cost is $10.29 for 36 exposures. The look to the Fuji 400H is somewhat subdued based on examples I've seen. I just finished a roll of Elite Chrome the other day (slide film) - I plan to have it cross processed for interesting colors.
Our boom operator makes a sweet contact:
The receiver gets his fuel:
The AWACS descends 1000 feet and we go our separate ways:
This is the landing gear handle with the attitude indicator display in the background.
If things go really bad, there's still a standby attitude indicator. This was taken with the macro function of the old Nikon 35-70mm f/2.8:
This handle raises the spoilers up to 60 degrees reducing lift:
The "Ready" light shines in the red glow of the boom pod at night:
The KC-135 yoke comes equipped with a heading slew switch:
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Once home, I clone the data from the travel drive to a stay-at-home drive. With data in three places, I confirm the data integrity between my laptop photos and those copied to the travel hard drive before I delete the photos from my laptop. I use a program from the iTunes Store for the Mac descriptively called "Compare Folders." What this does is compare the data copied between two folders. The free version compares file names, but does not run a more time consuming "Checksum" to validate the actual copied data. I ponied up the $4.99 for the full version so I could have the piece of mind knowing that the files were copied correctly.
In the image below, I clipped a Nikon SB-900 flash into the interior of the boom pod on "aircraft left" pointing it straight up allowing the light to bounce off the insulation above the boom operator and also hit her directly in the face from her left. I remotely triggered the flash with a pair of Yongnuo remote radio triggers (model RF-603N). Note the pair of crew chiefs at the front of the KC-135R. I like the complementary colors in this image - the blue of the sky vs the orange glow of the flightline lights.
For this next image, the crew chiefs graciously lent me one of their "B-4" maintenance stands so I could shoot these two aviators from eye level. I think these two pilots were doing instructor upgrade training meaning that the pilot closest to the camera is becoming an instructor while the farther pilot is instructing the other how to instruct. I set the flash on the dashboard pointing straight back where it lit both their faces. If I were to reshoot, I might try a small modifier to soften the light. I would also shoot the scene without the flash in it so I could easily remove the flash unit itself in Photoshop. I think the flash was set to 1/4 power in both of these cases...at least that's a good starting point for you.
Hardware detail shot with equine statue in the background:
On the opposite side of the room is a beautiful built-in where books and artwork are displayed. A backlit panel of honey onyx creates a striking background for a statue.
The pizza oven features a hand applied copper verdigris finish. The concrete floor is stained to complement the cabinetry and oven.
Known as "The Cold Storage" building, built in the early 1900s, it used to house perishables from the railroad which runs directly behind the building.
Edison bulbs in these fixtures give the room a warm cast.
On the below image, I employed a technique called "Focus Stacking" where I blended together 5 shots all focused on different parts of the scene to create an image that appears fully in focus. This is much more in focus than I could have achieved with simply a high depth of field. You can see that everything from the near light fixture to the moon is in sharp focus.
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Pole Dancing
I love the public transportation in the city; not only is it a pretty efficient way to get around town, but it's also great for people watching. The subway is full of helpful PSA ("Dude, stop the spread") and one in particular has always intrigued me.
I've been waiting a quite awhile to see a prohibited subway pole dance routine. Note the expressions on the audience's faces across the aisle.
Break time.
South of Times Square.
Naked Cowgirl.
Bank Account Solicitation.
Voodoo Queen reader in Penn Station.
Subway commuters.
7 Train Commuters.
Wedding Photography, Grand Central.
Generational Differences.
Man plays erhu.
Woman watches man watch corroded girder in Grand Central Terminal.
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I have a primary 3TB hard drive with which I travel that I keep safe in a small, hard plastic case called a Dolfin Box. I connect this drive to my computer using a "Plugable USB 3.0 SuperSpeed SATA III Lay-Flat Hard Drive Docking Station" which I got from Amazon for under $25. I keep both the hard drive case and the dock wrapped up in clothing in my carry-on luggage. When I get home, I clone my travel drive to my home drive using a piece of Mac software called Carbon Copy Cloner which copies all of the new data from the working drive onto the home drive. I name each drive with a number suffix of "1" or "2". Currently, my travel drive is "Cheesecake 1." When I get home, I clone "Cheesecake 1" onto "Cheesecake 2." While I'm home, I keep these drives separated when possible, so that if something bad happens, the data resides in different locations. Periodically, I will travel with "Cheesecake 2" and leave "Cheasecake 1" at home to share the wear and tear on the drives.
My hard drives are Western Digital Red 3TB NAS drives. The Red drives have both a longer warranty and a longer lifespan than the WD Green drives.
I used to travel with small self contained hard drives, but I found these drives to be much less reliable that the high quality NAS drives that I use now.
A next step - which I do in some cases - would be upload the best of my pictures to cloud storage. A final step - yet to be implemented - would be to print out high quality images onto archival paper to have a physical copy.
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