When I go to places by myself, with my camera around my neck I never feel alone.
Fruit-loopy
There really is no purpose to this post other than sharing photos of two yummy and beautiful fruits and one gross moldy one with cool colors. Also, everyone loves a bit of juxtaposition. Also fruit always tastes like summer, which swept through NYC for two days this week. It was wonderful.
Happy Holi New York City
A couple of portraits from Holi festivities in Manhattan today.
Black and White after the break
I don’t know whether it was the ridiculously long winter (which still isn’t quite over), iphone laziness, or just a lack of inspiration, but today was the first time in 3 months when I actually felt like taking photos….and had a great deal of fun doing it.
Winter sunset in NYC
I haven’t been posting much lately because my computer appears to be on it’s last legs and doing even the simplest of tasks generally requires four restarts. Today I finally managed to clean up and sort out some of my photo files and to transfer these pics on to my iPhone (courtesy of which I’m posting this). It is a bit cheesy to post New York sunset pictures but the sunsets and sunrises are pretty spectacular here and I can’t get enough. Lately I’ve been flooding my Instagram feed with dozens of photos taken on morning runs or on the way to work – it’s amazing how that sight can just keep you in a good mood all day.
Anyways, these were taken from Brooklyn heights a few weeks ago when my mom was still here. I spent most of the time cursing my stupid tripod and trying to stop my hands from freezing. Also I only had a 50mm and a wide angle so I wasn’t very well prepared for this session but I was fairly pleased how well the ones of the setting sun came out with the 50 sans tripod. Also, while the Brooklyn heights promenade is a great spot to watch the sunset from I wouldn’t call it the best for taking photos for two reasons: 1. Unless you own a heavy duty tripod, the promenade shakes every time a truck drives under it – not great for long exposure shots. 2. There are some annoying and ugly buildings/construction elements in the foreground that you need to work around/crop out later.
As much as I always complain about my tripod it is very light and I can carry it all day with only moderate back/arm ache. I really want a new and better tripod but I have a feeling I won’t get much use out of it living in NYC where I don’t have a car, or when I travel. If anyone has any recommendations for solid but lightweight tripods they will be most welcome.
Philly by night
Two weeks ago my mom and I went on a day trip to Philadelphia. We opted for the bus seeing as the tickets were significantly cheaper and I was actually pleasantly surprised at how efficient it was. I spent the entire day dragging around my tripod to take some night shots for 30 minutes…not sure if it was worth it in the end. These were the three best pics of City Hall.
Every Opposite
I have a folder on my computer very unimaginatively named “Randoms to edit”. It contains a bizarre selection of photos I have taken over the past year which never got edited because they weren’t attached to anything special. These two photos are part of that collection and they finally got a quick once-over in Lightroom after I decided that I couldn’t think of a better subject for my first post of 2013 than Zaki Ibrahim.
Zaki is a South African singer and she is absolutely amazing.I first saw her live in Johannesburg at the very event in Greenside where I took these fabulously average photos. (The reason why she is behind glass in these photos because she was in a recording studio – part of 5fm’s live performance feature)
Listening to Zaki while living in New York always makes me really happy, but it makes me miss Joburg at the same time.
Zaki’s album Every Opposite is available on Spotify if you want to take a listen. Draw the Line, Something in the Water, The Do, The Brave Ones are my favourites, although the number one spot belongs to the most sultry sexy song ever – Conjure.
Happy Fri-yay.
All aboard…
“Nostalgia is denial – denial of the painful present… the name for this denial is golden age thinking – the erroneous notion that a different time period is better than the one ones living in – its a flaw in the romantic imagination of those people who find it difficult to cope with the present” – Midnight in Paris
Two weekends ago, and again this past weekend, I took a ride on the nostalgia train in New York City. This is a train composed of museum train cars that were used on the subway lines between 1931 and the 1970s. It was so much fun seeing everyone dressed up for the occasion and to read some of the advertising signage inside the old cars, which had ceiling fans and not air-conditioning (obviously). The train runs during the winter holidays on Sundays, along the M line, making all the stops between the 2nd Ave and Queens Plaza stations.
There is only one weekend left this year (30 December) – for more information, visit the MTA website.
In the mi(d)st of it all
Yesterday morning I checked the weather outside and saw a warning about heavy fog in Manhattan. I threw on some clothes and ran outside looking completely disheveled because I didn’t want to miss the opportunity to shoot the city enveloped by fog. By the time I made it outside the fog was already more of a mist and the photos weren’t really what I had in mind. These are the only three I felt were worth the upload. Proof again that for the most part, good photos require the perfect combination of planning and luck.
On the street in Bangkok
I saw this man across the road and he looked so incredibly cool I really wanted to photograph him. At first I was too shy to go and ask him if he would be okay with me snapping a pic, so I just took one from across the road and started walking. But I quickly changed my mind and decided that in the worst case he would just shout at me and tell me he didn’t want his photo taken. But he didn’t. yay
