Some of the subway stations have amazing mosaic tile work…
Preparing for dinner at Casa Mono, a wonderful Gramercy Park Spanish tapas restaurant…
It was Halloween, so we could expect a few ghosts and other characters…
A parade of costumes in Gramercy Park…
Window detail…
The iconic Chrysler Building from below
Before I left for my recent trip to New York City, I made a shot list, and on it were several of my favorite places. In previous posts I’ve featured the Flatiron Building and Central Park, which were right at the top.
But I also wanted to shoot Grand Central Terminal, the New York Public Library, Times Square, the Chrysler Building and the Grace Building, all places I had been before, but wanted to see again through my camera’s lens. But I doubted I’d have the time to shoot all of them since my visit was quite short.
Luckily I stumbled on a solution. I found out about a small group photo safari offered by a knowledgeable photographer. It was highly rated by Trip Advisor and so I signed up for it online. It was a three-hour tour of iconic places and buildings, many of which were on my list.
Zim: we couldn’t have had a better or more passionate instructor/guide…
The morning of the safari, I met up with my group of seven at a breakfast spot across from Grand Central Terminal. I got there early, after figuring out my way on the subway with no problems. The first two people I saw with cameras were a lovely mother and daughter team from Birmingham, England.
Over coffee I learned that Sharon was treating Molly to a trip to New York to celebrate her 18th birthday. Sharon was enthusiastic about photography and just learning her new DSLR. Molly was on a point and shoot. They had arrived in New York City the day before and were still adjusting to the time change and the overwhelming sights and sounds.But they were gung ho to make the most of their week in the Big Apple.
Gradually the others arrived and then we met our fearless leader, Zim, and did a round of introductions. In addition to Molly and Sharon, on the tour were three Australians, one American living in Singapore and me, the token Canadian. Some of us had DSLRs, some point and shoots and some smart phones. Jack, a serious hobby photographer, told me this was his fourth photo safari during his three-week trip to New York. He was shooting with a wide angle 10-20mm lens that made me drool with envy.
But Zim did not discriminate. Her safari offered something for everyone — at all skill and experience levels — and we all left with wonderful images of New York City after the three hours, which just flew by.
Zim had a route that she followed to cover the major icons, but she left plenty of room for spontaneous shooting. As she led us, she walked ahead, but backwards, so she could talk to us.
Zim encouraged us to shoot icons like taxis and police cars and dispelled the idea that it’s illegal to photograph police or their cars.
Every so often she would stop and point and say: shoot this! We would snap away, and because the group was so small, she could easily do the rounds to comment on our composition and exposure etc. and make very helpful suggestions to improve our captures. One of the things I liked most about this photo safari was the immediate feedback you received and the easy tips that you could put into practice right away.
It was crazy busy on the streets of midtown Manhattan. A true New Yorker, Zim did not wait for lights to cross the street. She just charged ahead in the middle, followed by her merry band. At one point, as we all forced the oncoming traffic to stop for us (yikes, I hate jaywalking!), I waved to the fancy black sedan in thanks. Zim called out: “You didn’t just wave thanks to that car did you?” And I called back: “Sure I did, I’m Canadian!”
I’m definitely going to do another safari in New York (next time it’ll be Times Square at night) — and other places as well, where I can. I highly recommend the experience. I came back with so many images that I haven’t even begun to process. If you have any questions about this photo safari, please feel free to ask me in the comments.
Kids coming home from school with Mom…
I find street photography to be one of the most challenging types of photography to do well, but since people are endlessly fascinating to observe and wonder about, I can’t help wanting to try it when I travel.
Framing and composing the image and pressing the shutter at just the right time to tell an interesting story is not easy. Especially when the subjects are moving — since they often have no idea they are being photographed. So many times I miss the most interesting action or cut somebody’s head off or something…
And then there’s the question, black and white or colour? Fortunately, that decision doesn’t have to be made until afterward, in post-processing. I read a helpful interview with New York photographer James Maher, which helped me decide which of my images I would convert to black and white and which ones I would leave in colour.
These are just a few of my favorite candid images of people doing what they do in New York City….
“How the heck are we going to get there from here?”
“As long as I have my cell phone, I’ll be fine…” at Grand Central Terminal
Putting up the tree lights near Rockefeller Plaza
“Some weird lady is taking a picture of me…”
Planting ornamental cabbages on the street for winter colour…
Still on the Flatiron Building today in this the fifth part of my New York City series…You can scroll back to see the other four parts, if you wish. I feature shots of Central Park and the Manhattan skyline.
Because a lot of the joy of looking at the Flatiron Building is in the details, I wanted to show them to you closer up. This was taken with my 70-200 mm zoom, at 70mm. It has been cropped.
Before I cropped it, I took three different exposures into Photomatix and processed them as a High Dynamic Range (HDR) photograph, but with a natural look. Then I converted one to monochrome, leaving a hint of blue.
I may print this one, or one like it. Just curious, which version do you prefer?
Thanks so much for helping me out today — and I really appreciate all your kind and thoughtful comments on this series. I read and smile at every single one!
I would forgive you if you called me obsessed by the Flatiron Building in New York. Given how much time I spent trying to capture its lovely uniqueness from different angles, even on different days and at different times and with different lenses, I could not argue. (And no doubt I will do the same next time I’m in New York — trying yet again to capture its essence.)
This is the building I love — way more than the Empire State or the Chrysler or any of the other iconic buildings. The Flatiron says New York to me…
Completed in 1902, it’s shaped like an old fashioned cast iron clothes iron, thus the name. It sits on a triangular island-block formed by Fifth Avenue, Broadway and East 22nd Street.
It was designed by Chicago’s Daniel Burnham as a vertical Renaissance palazzo with Beaux-Arts styling. The bottom of its facade is limestone changing to glazed terra cotta from Staten Island.
H.G. Wells wrote of the Flatiron Building in 1906:
I found myself agape, admiring a sky-scraper the prow of the Flat-iron Building, to be particular, ploughing up through the traffic of Broadway and Fifth Avenue in the afternoon light.
Now I get one of the reasons I love it. It reminds me of a ship!
I also love the cast iron clock not far from it on Fifth Avenue. I set out to try to capture them in the same image. Not a terribly easy task, given that the best spot to stand was smack in the midst of crazy traffic. I didn’t try that.
(I hadn’t noticed the sign in the lower right of the first image until just now. “Have an idea. Make it happen.” Appropriate.)
The clock was installed in 1909. One of the most ornate of New York’s cast-iron street clocks, it’s composed of a rectangular, classically ornamented base, and fluted Ionic column. The two dials, marked by Roman numerals, are framed by wreaths of oak leaves and crowned by a cartouche. A masterpiece of cast-iron workmanship, it is beautifully designed, and a prominent sidewalk landmark.
Such old, historic and delicately intricate beauties make New York City endlessly fascinating to me and are why I return time after time.
I am a huge fan of black and white photography. Most of the photographs that are not mine and that hang on my walls at home are black and white. My favorite photographs of my father’s are his black and whites. I consider Ansel Adams a hero, along with Vivian Maier and Dorothea Lange. And yet I rarely create a black and white image myself.
On my recent trip to New York I set about to change all that. It was a clear intention of mine to come back with some images that looked good in black and white.
It really isn’t that difficult in this city. Many New York images cry out for black and white treatment, since so much available subject matter is architecture, cityscapes and street photography. Remember Woody Allen’s Manhattan? Iconic New York. Shot all in black and white.
I love how black and white photography strips things down to the essentials. Colours can often be distracting and may even make a photo look messy and disjointed. In black and white images, the subject is much easier to zero in on.
Black and white is also superb for revealing great composition and texture. It allows you to focus on shapes, light and shadows, lines and perspective. Some images that look positively banal in colour take on a new life and importance in black and white.
Black and white images can be more dramatic and authoritative looking, especially if combined with great lighting. Think of Karsh’s portrait of Churchill.
And you can’t ignore the classy and exquisite feel of black and white images. They are often more timeless looking. My parents’ wedding photos were done in black and white and they still look classic and fabulous to this day.
In all my times in New York, I had never seen the Manhattan Skyline from the Brooklyn Bridge Park or shot the Brooklyn Bridge itself. So those shots went on the shot list, and that trip went on the agenda. The day I went to Brooklyn was quite grey and dreary so the resulting images had little or no colour to begin with. They worked perfectly in black and white.
I have only begun to process the keepers from my trip to New York City, but I’m hopeful there are a few more that will lend themselves to a black and white treatment — and some that may even make it to my walls!
Yesterday I posted an overview of Central Park in autumn shot from the Top of the Rockefeller Plaza. Today, let’s go into the park and enjoy some more intimate views…
Before I left for New York, I made a shot list. I knew that there was so much to see and capture in New York City that I might get overwhelmed if I didn’t at least have an idea of what I was hoping to photograph. It turned out to be a good idea for me. I didn’t get everything on the list and I got lots of shots I didn’t plan to, just by being open to what I was drawn to in the environment, but overall I feel that doing some advance research was well worth the effort.
Let me give you an example. I knew I wanted to shoot Central Park. But where? As was evident in yesterday’s shot, the park is huge and you could walk around in it for days…I knew I didn’t have a whole lot of time and I had plenty of other places on my list, so I decided to be selective.
I figured New York, being south of where I live, was still likely to have colourful leaves on the trees. So I googled fall foliage in New York and discovered that the fall colour was likely to be at its peak last week. Good start!
Then I went to one of my favorite photo sharing sites — 500 px — and did a search for Central Park. This site is chock full of wonderful high-quality images that provide great inspiration. The search function works really well (much better than flickr) because it can filter by date and also by popularity.
Lo and behold I saw a stunning image of a beautiful stone bridge covered with red ivy. I could see that it had been taken only a few days before so that confirmed that the colours were still quite glorious.
I could also see that it was called the Gapstow Bridge. I love stone bridges (covered with ivy especially) and this is a beauty. It did not take long to find out that this particular bridge was in the southeast corner of the park, not far from the entrance. Bingo! I had a great destination all picked out.
Once I got into the park, I had to ask directions to the bridge, but it was only a short walk and there it was! I was in my element running back and forth trying to capture the bridge from a variety of perspectives with a few different lenses. It was obvious that it had a completely different personality and feel shot from different vantage points. It was late afternoon so the sun was providing fairly nice light.
I am more comfortable with intimate landscapes than really large ones, so that is what I tend to shoot. But it was good practice to try to capture some wider shots as well.
I had to work around the people who were walking across the bridge and feeding the ducks at the water’s edge. Sometimes I like to have people in my shots, but I did want to make sure I got some of just the bridge.
I probably could have stayed there a good while longer, but the Metropolitan Opera’s performance of Tosca was on the agenda for that evening, so I had to reluctantly wrap it up. (Little did I know then that by the end of the night I would become a raving fan of opera and especially Roberto Alagna! If you’re curious why, click here to hear.)
As I walked out of the park, I managed to get a few shots of the park’s trees with the New York skyline behind.
I just love images that show the natural and built worlds side by side, which stands out so clearly at the edge of Central Park. Such a study in contrast.
If you’re going to New York and don’t have days to wander at will, a bit of advance research can really save you a lot of time.
I’ve been to New York City a few times before — 12 to be exact — but this was the first trip I had a good camera — and it was autumn in the city. That made for a great combination!
You probably won’t be surprised to hear that I took hundreds of photographs. I plan to spread some of them out over a series of blog posts.
I’m starting with this image since Central Park is one of my favorite places in the world.
I wanted to see what it looked like from a great height in the fall with the trees leafed out in their beautiful colour, so I took the elevator up the 67 floors to the observation deck on the Top of the Rockefeller Plaza on a sunny perfect fall day.
What a vista!
In this photo, you’re looking north and you see the west side of the park and the buildings of the Upper West Side.
A few years ago, my mother and sister and I took a guided walking tour of Central Park, which we thoroughly enjoyed. Up until then, I simply had no idea what a massive accomplishment this park is and how unique it is.
Central Park was the first public landscaped park in all of the United States. In 1853, the state legislature first set aside land for a major public park. City commissioners spent $14 million for the land and the construction of the park, which extended from 59th Street to 106th Street, between Fifth and Eighth Avenues.
The designers, Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux were chosen in public competition in 1858. The park was developed over a span of 16 years.
(Olmsted is considered the father of landscape architecture and he went on to design Prospect Park in Brooklyn and many other North American parks, such as Boston’s Emerald Necklace, Biltmore Estate in North Carolina, Mount Royal in Montreal, and the grounds of the U.S. Capitol and the White House. Here are ten lessons for landscape design you can pick up from him.)
Central Park occupies 843 acres in Manhattan, 6% of its total acreage. You could fit 16 billion New York apartments in the park.
The park includes seven water bodies totaling 150 acres (some of which you can see above), 136 acres of woodlands and 250 acres of lawns. There are 58 miles of walking paths and 4.25 miles of bridle paths.
It also boasts more than 26,000 trees, 36 bridges and arches and nearly 9,000 benches.
It surprised me to learn that there are 215 species of birds in a 6.1-acre sanctuary, many rare to the area including the peregrine falcon.
The 25 million people that visit every year can also enjoy 26 ballfields; 30 tennis courts; 21 playgrounds; one carousel and two ice-skating rinks, one of which is converted into a swimming pool in the summer.
Stay tuned for more images inside the park…
The scene here is the Philosopher’s Walk in Toronto, a scenic footpath not far from the famous intersection of Yonge and Bloor (where I used to work many years ago).
This hidden byway runs in the north-south direction. On one side is the Royal Ontario Museum and on the other is the Royal Conservatory of Music. As you walk (or bicycle) you are surrounded by beautiful Old Victorian buildings and stately old trees. Sometimes you will hear musicians rehearsing in the courtyards. This is the heart of the University of Toronto campus. If you head south from Bloor, you reach the trendy Annex neighbourhood. It’s a handy shortcut for many.
I was surprised to learn that the path follows a ravine landscape created by Taddle Creek, which was once a natural waterway and is now flowing underground. People from all over of all ages come here to people watch and enjoy the verdant loveliness right in the heart of the city. And perhaps to philosophize.
This image was taken a few years ago on a trip to Copenhagen. On the right is Nyhavn 17, a bar/cafe/restaurant in a 17th century waterfront building that just oozes history.
I recently processed the image with some Radlab filters to try to capture the feeling I had when I was there.
I get a kick of looking at other photos of iconic places I go to see the way other photographers perceived the same scene, how they shot it and how they processed and presented it.
What about you? Do you ever google the places you shoot either before or after you make your images?
Sherrygaley.com 