No, not that avenue. Not really even actually an avenue but a street — 36th Street in Hampden, its sobriquet being "The Avenue". Up early for a holiday, not many others out. Since this wasn't meant to be a people kind of street excursion, it was good. Once again the A7r with the Nikon 20 in pursuit of formal composition. No shortage of leading lines.
Click on the snap below to see the rest on Smugmug.
The quintessential Hampden establishment
A trip through what the USGS calls 13d - the High Plains, at least part of the part in Eastern Colorado. First that and then Denver. Four days with snaps, here is the rota:
Day 1: Genoa, Arriba, Flagler, Siebert, Vona, Stafford
Day 2: Cheyenne Wells, Kit Carson, Wild Horse, Hugo, Denver (from Hotel)
Day 3: Kiowa, Calhan, Ramah, Simla, Matheson, Denver (Lo Do and Da Vita HQ)
Day 4: Denver (Colfax in Goosetown, a few residential snaps, a few in Cherry Creek)
Click on the snaps below to see the contact sheets - The captions indicate the days. Great weather, until the typical Colorado afternoon cloudbursts. All with the A7r and mostly with the Sony/Ziess 55 1.8. The Denver Lo Do snaps with the Nikon 20. Back to the grindstone early in the AM.
Slow uploads from the hotel, so likely another hour before they are all uploaded. Not very consistent with the thinly curated contact sheet approach.
Day 1: Vona, CO
Day 2: Cheyenne Wells, CO
Day 3: Ramah, CO
Day 4: Goosetown, Colfax Avenue, Denver
A dose of cabin fever, coupled with the desire to fix the Carrie Furnace no batteries fiasco of several years ago - so off to Pittsburg on a last minute whim. Hmmm, maybe a little too underplanned. Rain in the forecast for Saturday, a Pirates game across from the hotel and a ticket for a guided tour.
Ugh, traffic worse than Manhattan (everything in P'burg is worse than Manhattan — unfortunately), steady rain Saturday morning and a Carrie Furnace pipsqueek with a severe napolonic complex - "guided is guided". Bagged the furnaces (both short and long term - over photoed now in any case) and set off to some backup sites.
The ball game provided a closed Clemente bridge (the northernmost of three matched self-anchored suspension bridges in a short six block space over the last half mile of the Alleghany. The others heading south are the Andy Wharhol (obviously the same evaluation of the relative merits of the two waterbound cities) and Rachel Carson (apparently from just up the Ohio). Lots of bridge shots with PNC Park (didn't it have a better name before being commercialized) in the background. A few more around the hotel (right at the downtown side of the Clemente bridge, wrapped up by a few in the morning rain in Historic (ahem) Braddock, PA. BTW, General Braddock has his name splashed on pretty much everything that doesn't say PNC on it in the greater P'burg region and out to very exburbs.
From there US 30, to US 119 and finally US 40 back to Cumberland, MD and the stunning I68 for the sprint back to B'more.
Lots of lenses in the bag but only the Nikkor 20 and the Canon 45 TS-E saw any use on the A7r. Pretty much trying to stay in the Friedlander mode with the 20, less sucessfully, faux Stephen Shore and Walker Evans with the 45 TS-E. One Evans knockoff in Mt. Pleasant of the WWI memorial (see below). The towns along 119 surprisingly have very vibrant downtowns and for some unknown reason a plethora of Marriott properties. That intersection looks like a combo that will get worked, starting in the fall. Three F. L. Wright houses in the vicinity. All within in about a three hour drive of home. All good.
Four galleries, two each for P'burg and the US 119 corridor, split in B&W and color. Color is pretty much done, B&W are just getting started. Click per the snap captions to head off to the respective gallery.
Click for P'burg Color gallery
Click for P'burg B&W gallery
Click for 119 Color gallery
Click for 119 B&W gallery
Went back to Glyndon again for the annual seven minute Fourth of July Parade. Three fire trucks, three cars (a 20's ish antique, a minimoke and a 911T Targa - lots of diversity) three golf carts and then what looks to be half of the town with the kids on bikes and the adults walking their dogs. The other half of the town is sittiing on their front lawn taking it all in. Hah!
The increasing disdain for telephoto lenses meant the 5D Mk III and all of the longer stuff stayed at home. Took the A7r with the Nikon 20 mounted and the Zeiss 55 in a pouch. Shot it all with the 20, not such a good idea, really need some fore/middle/background interest to make the wide-angle work and so it didn't.
The images I am willing to show are all, except for one, snaps of structures and mostly those I saw on the way out, I guess it took a while to get warmed up — the inbound structures snaps were as bad as the parade images. All with the A7r and the Nikon 20 f/f2.8 AIs at f/8.0 all converted to VSCO faux Tri-X 400.
The snap below likely the best of the lot, on Bultler Road in town. Click here or on the snap below to see the rest on smugmug.
PS. Just noticed this snap wears a serial number of 30257. It was close to but not the last of the AM - that means over 30,000 snaps with the A7r since it arrived on December 3rd of last year. Hmmm, quite a lot of practice in a relatively short period of time
Same old walk through the streets and alleys of Butcher's Hill and Upper Fells Point with the now standard configuarion of the Nikon 20mm f/2.8 AIs mounted via the rayqual. Also the same is the route to see the rest, click here or the snap.
Yet more snaps — the third post and fourth gallery of the weekend. Short drive today, Mount Vernon and Station North Neighborhoods. Actually, the only images in Station North are from Graffiti Alley. Once again working lines and layering the bad on the good. Not going to get too many architects calling with comissions — quite all right with me. A7r with the Nikon 20 f/2.8 AIs again. This combo is likely to be the go to configuration until I get a prime in the 16 - 17mm range for the A7r.
Time to cut mats and foam core for four more snaps to join the eight already done in 12 Ikea 20"x20" Ribba frames. Well at least the frame and the glass is cheap. The rest is archival, Rising Museum Board with the prints on Canson Platine Rag. Tomorrow will be a blast hanging them all — six each on each side of the LR fireplace.
But for now, as soon as the mats are done, a Hendricks and tonic awaits — in a glass designed and sized for Guiness.
Click on the snap below or here to check out the rest of the snaps on smugmug.
Up Sunday at noon, back Friday at noon. Photo Ops on Sunday afternoon and Tuesday evening. The rest of the time occupied with clients. Sunday walk from the Algonquin to the Hudson and back along the 40's, Tuesday along 44th to the east up Lex from Grand Central to Citicorp Center, then a zigzag route back to the Algonquin. Only about 250 snaps over both days — not many for me. Forgot the Mac at home so only some inital post processing done on the iPad with Photogene up there. Actually wasn't too bad. A7r Wifi and the Sony IOS app got the snaps into the iPad.
All with the A7r and the Nikon 20 f/2.8 AIs and finished in VSCO faux Tri-X 400 — cropped square. Most of the crops from the center which is what I am trying to compose using the grid in the Sony viewfinder.
Click on the day Sunday and Tuesday or the snaps below to head off to the smugmug galleries. Basically contact sheets, so a fairly large number of snaps in each.
Sunday afternoon 
Tuesday evening
A lttile OCD this weekend with the Nikon 20mm f/s.8 AIs. Back out again trying to deal with the OOF foreground. Got that solved at the expense of distant focus. Just need to backup I guess - most people don,t get close enough — I can't seem to back off enough.
Afoot again. This time 2 blocks north, one and half west and half block east. All A7r, all Nikon 20mm. Feel like I might actually be out of energy — so the last item for the weekend. The other four below. Clicking the snap below brings up the smugmug gallery (again more contact sheet than gallery) as does clicking here
Trying walking distance only for a while. Fills the rehab gap and moves the focus to taking shots rather than researching and driving road trips. Down the hill toward but not to Fells Point. The A7r and the Nikon 20 f/2.8. Still getting some close in stuff OOF — more practice needed. Again more like a contact sheet than a gallery. Cut by the raw haul slightly by more than half.
Posted at 2:42PM while the snaps are uploading - likely to take another hour or so to get them all on smugmug. Click here or on the Mark V to replace boredom with snoozing on a long flight.
This is the fourth post since Friday night so this weekends WIP is spread between this item and the three below.
The AVAM annual race. Starts in Federal Hill in the AM gets to Patterson Park after lunch for the sand and mud pits. As usual I go to the sand pit. Snaps to from and at the parade in the gallery. A couple of the architectural dig going on in the park re: War of 1812. Same camera configuration as the earlier-in-the-day alley snaps. I think I should have switched to the 28 the 20 was too wide or at least it was too wide for me doing this kind of stuff.
Big flurry of new blog items here since Friday night, this is the third, so there might be some ones unseen in the two below. Per usual click here or on the snap to see the rest.
Humming to the tune of Autry's Back in the saddle again. Redux of last evenings passes through the alley behind Maderia and then north on Maderia. This time with the the Nikon 20mm f/2.8 AIs on the now almost ubiquitous A7r. Still trying to use formal elements in ways that make the photos seem informal. Poles, fences and the bane of the landscape photographer, those wonderful power and cable wires.
The red gate is one again the entry way in to the sliced-in-half galery. Click on the snap or here to see the rest.
If you are not so quick looking after a blog update message you may need to look at the item below too, posted late last night.
