Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Labels: Art, Transportation, Watercolor
Liquidated, 2009; watercolor on paper, approximately 16 x 25 inches.
Well that took a bit longer than expected.
Liquidated is the second in my 99W Series of paintings. This is a planned sequence of images using the thread of old Pacific Highway West through Western Oregon as a common theme. The road forms a cross section of the western portion of the state, stretching from urban Portland through to the rural prairies of the Willamette Valley. This latest painting follows the earlier Morning Rush, Portland....
...Earlier by two years.
It is really amusing because Morning Rush, Portland I completed in January 2007, and immediately afterwards began Liquidated. My academic activities, however, quickly took over my time and attention. For the longest time, the painting sat clipped to an oversized Masonite clipboard, 2/3rds done. Every time I looked at it, I felt guilt, as if it were an abandoned child. There was never enough time. There was never enough motivation. Always my calendar had something else to do, some other thing that needed my attention. If the painting had been a garden it would have been growing dandelions.
Now that the 2008-2009 academic year has wound down, I've been playing catch up. There's been lots of cleaning, straightening, book sorting -- scarily enough there are over forty books I have collected over the year that have yet to be read -- and all manner of other reprioritization that is now possible with the additional time on my hands. One of the activities that immediately rose to the top of the to-do list: complete Liquidated.
Monday saw me heading downtown on WES to supplement my disintegrating brush collection. Tuesday morning saw me cleaning out the paintbox, the old dried up palettes, the caked and dead tubes of paint. Tuesday night saw me marathoning until 1:30 in the morning, the smell of wet cotton paper in the air and my fingers stained with viridian green and Prussian blue.
Creating -- be it writing, photography, or watercolors -- is a vital part of me, but somewhere along the way of the last four years, I lost that. I came, somehow, to the conclusion that I had to set that part of me aside to get more important things done. The reality is, however, that that act of creating was what was important all along. The ground is familiar now, and it feels good.
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Monday, May 25, 2009
(If you hear Top Gear's Jeremy Clarkson reading this to you in your head, don't be surprised.) Labels: Design, Photography, Technology
Nearly one year ago, I, a dedicated film photographer, did something unthinkable: I bought a digital camera. No, I hadn't eaten one too many happy pills. No, I hadn't drank my fixer one too many times. (Mmm, fixer!) No, rather, I had come to the conclusion that I needed to stop burning film on snapshots and marginal images, and a digital camera would help me fix that.
For the last decade, the Canon G series have been amongst the best performing digital cameras in the world. These little machines have been the backbone of advanced amateur photographers, especially photographers shooting candid images -- you know, street photographers, wannabe pornographers, and stalkers. Over the years, though, the G series has wandered. As Canon introduced more and cheaper and better digital SLR cameras, the company began intentionally crippling the G series, to reduce in-house competition. Things came to a head when, with the introduction of the G7, RAW file format capabilities went the way of the 110 instamatic.
So it is with some trepidation that the news of the G7's replacement was greeted in 2007. What would be gone next? No manual controls? No viewfinder? No hotshoe?
But no. The bitch, as Sir Elton would say, is back. Meet the Canon Powershot G9.
The Canon Powershot G9, courtesy khedra @ flickr
Like all its G series forebearers, the G9 is a handsome machine. It has the classic lines of a mid-20th century rangefinder. The body is sleek and matte black. And unlike many of the competing cameras in the G9's market segment, it isn't made of the same material as Jacko's nose; the G9 is metal bodied with only a small plastic piece closing in the top of the camera. The result is a body that feels solid and rugged. It also makes the camera heavy; unlike, say, a Fuji Finepix S100, if you swung this thing on it's neck strap you could probably kill someone with it. This handy trait should make the G9 quite popular in, say, Detroit, or South Central Los Angeles.
But forget how it looks. What really matters is how the G9 performs as a camera. The first thing you notice when you pick it up is... dials! The G9, like every proper camera ever made, has little round turnable dials! In this case, one controls ISO, while the other scrolls through shooting mode. While the camera does have special "idiot modes", they are mercifully buried under a single dial entry labelled "SCN". The rest of the dial cycles through video, a panorama mode, an all automatic mode, program, shutter priority, aperture priority, manual, and two customizable settings.
The back of the camera sports some buttons, along with a rotating selector, and a truly massive 3" LCD screen. Although bright sunlight can still play havoc with the latter, the LCD is unusually bright and has a wide acceptable viewing angle. Unfortunately the screen is hard attached to the back -- no fold out tilting screen like older G series cameras, meaning that its a bit harder to do those sneaky, creepy candid shots. Those buttons allow the user to customize the camera settings, including --mercifully! -- the ability to turn off those dumb "look at me I'm taking a picture!" system sounds and that absolutely pointless fake shutter mirror sound.
Once you've shed the poser features of the camera, you discover all sorts of other customizable options, like how long the LCD will stay on after no activity is detected, or if you want digital zoom, or enabling advanced features like image stabilization and red eye reduction. And of course, you can also set it to remember whatever settings you are in now via one of those customizable dial entries up top. Be warned that it will not only remember your white balance, color mode, control method, and so on, but also your exact aperture and shutter settings. Be sure to set it when you're in typical conditions for the mode you're saving, or you might find yourself constantly resetting the shutter speed from 1/8th like I was. I didn't bother playing with the idiot modes; they are, after all, for idiots.
Image quality is outstanding. The camera has a whopping 12.1 megapixels. To put that in perspective, when the Nikon D1 came out just about nine years ago and revolutionized newsrooms with digital photography, it had 4.3 megapixels. The G9 has nearly three times that. That's more megapixels than the original digital Rebel, more megapixels than Nikon D80, more megapixels than the Moon. Images shot at ISO 400 came out crisp with only a marginal grain that is comparable to most 400 speed films, and ISO tops out at a stunning (albeit somewhat grainy) 3200!
Basic adjustments like white balance, color modes, and the like is easily accessed via a button on the back, and can be made rapidly on the fly. Intriguingly the camera includes a built-in neutral density filter, three different metering modes, and the ability to fine tune flash output. You can even select auto bracketing, and switching between resolutions, image sizes, and file formats can all be handled in seconds. It's absolutely brilliant.
Of course, not all is perfect with the G9. The manual focusing is accomplished by hitting a button on the camera back and then using a rotating selector to fine tune the focus, which can be monitored on the LCD display. This is fine except that the LCD version of a focus screen is still relatively small and hard to judge by.
In addition, the G9 feels too small. In the typical "how small can we go" digital camera theory, the G9 is a lot smaller in person than in photos. The big screen on the back will within seconds of opening the box begin to collect thumbprints from your left hand. You get the impression that if Canon had stopped trying to make the camera smaller, there would have been room for a slightly more intuitive manual focusing system.
...Or perhaps to fix the viewfinder. Now on a camera in this price point, you'd expect the viewfinder to be sharp and poised. And... you'd be wrong. The image seen though it is on 80% of the visible scene, and what's worse, it's not centered, horizontally or vertically. It's utter rubbish. You could always get used to cropping your images, but what's the point of 12.1 megapixels if you can't use them all? The least they could have done is properly centered the 80% you can see. Ironically, it is equipped with a manually adjustable diopter to accommodate for the user's eyesight. To see what? 80% of a scene with no idea what portion that 80% is of? Totally useless!
Still, the overall feel of holding the G9 in your hand is hard to beat. It feels like a quality product, and despite a totally useless viewfinder and a body size about 20% too small, it quickly becomes very intuitive to shoot with. Putting it through its paces on city streets, the G9 becomes a fast blast for quick images. And its size is also a plus point, as it can easily be tucked into a pocket or under a coat and not attract any attention at all.
There is one more downside, however. After a hard day of shooting, the next morning the G9 will not have your breakfast fixed. This is actually one of the camera's redeeming features. Most camera makers offer machines these days that not only take photographs, but do your washing, balance your checkbook, call your mother, take the dog for a walk, and iron your shirts. And all this before tea time. But does the G9 have any of these extra features? No. The G9 is a photographer's camera. Sure, it has some useless idiot modes, but with the turn of a sleek and very familiar feeling metal dial, the camera becomes a precision image making machine.
The Powershot G9 is simply brilliant. I can't say enough good things about it. Weighing in at nearly $500, it's not a cheap camera. But for the price of a crippled entry level dSLR made of recycled styrofoam coffee cups and cheese, you can have one of the best made, best performing digital point-and-shoot cameras ever. Canon just announced an improved version called the G10 with added megapixels, but really, a good closeout or used G9 is a much better bargain. It's a more than worthy successor to the 35mm rangefinders of the last century.
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Thursday, April 2, 2009
Biting the hand that "frills" you
Labels: Books, Food, Journalism, Media, Portland
From my cold dead hands, Mr. Bingham.
Opening up today's Oregonian is quite an education sometimes. In today's paper, staff writer Larry Bingham outlines an in and out list, of "how life in the Northwest is shaking out in lean times." The title is "The Frill is Gone."
And the list? The list of outs include microbrews, Powell's Books, New Seasons Market, boutique coffee, the Portland Opera, Oregon wine, and heirloom tomatoes from the local farmer's market. In? Pabst, the library, Grocery Outlet, Folgers, radio broadcasts, California 2-buck-chuck, and home grown tomatoes.
When I first read it, I was shocked at the stupidity behind it. Let's step backwards for a bit of perspective. Yesterday, Moody's down-rated the status of Macy's bonds to junk status. Macy's just happens to be one of the biggest advertisers that the Big O has. Without them, the paper would be in serious revenue trouble.
Now journalism isn't about advertisement, (or at least it shouldn't be,) but I would hardly call a puff piece on trends from the "How We Live" section journalism anyway. Given that, is it smart to be, in essence, insulting potential and actual advertisers in this way? Last I checked, New Seasons inserts their weekly sales ads into the Big O, and in fact they are a partner in one of the paper's promotions on the back side of the very page this story appeared on. Ah, irony.
But this is more than just a matter of keeping advertisers happy. The economy is, indeed, in a dark, dark place. People are being laid off, and markets are shrinking. In this time of all times, our brewers, booksellers, grocers, farmers, and artists do not need to be listed on an "out" list. They do not need the region's largest newspaper advising people that spending money on these things is a poor choice. To suggest that spending on these things is "out" is a cruel blow, is kicking these sectors while they are down.
For all of these reasons, the Oregonian in general, and Larry Bingham in particular owe an apology to everyone on that "out" list, from Apple at the top of the chain (iTunes was ruled as an "out") to the smallest farmer at the local farmer's market.
But it is an even deeper mistake than all of this.
Microbrews, books, good coffee, local and organic produce; these aren't "frills". Bingham writes that "some would even say good riddance to our age of excess." These things are not excess. They are our culture. What Bingham proposes would be akin to asking the French to give up bread and wine, the Carolinas to give up Cheerwine and Q, or Wisconsin to give up grilled bratwurst and beer. And for the sake of what? Saving money? Yes, money is tighter now than it was, but to suggest that we would give up our culture for the sake of our wallets is preposterous and insulting. Mr. Bingham, you will have to pry the heirloom tomato from my cold dead hand.
I, for one, know the perfect protest. I am going to Powell's this afternoon to buy a book.
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Friday, March 27, 2009
It began with, as usual, a Monday lunch. Dan, Portland blogger, avowed transit geek, and ideas guy, had a question: were transit systems in the northwest well developed enough that a person could ride from Portland to Seattle, purely by using local busses? No Greyhound, Gray line, Amtrak, or charter systems. True, public busses. Labels: Photography, Transportation, Writing
For a long time, the answer seemed to be no. But some intensive Google digging turned up the critical gem: a rural transit program out of Longview. It was not only possible to get to Seattle using local busses, but plausible that it could be done in one day, and in time to return to Portland via Amtrak!
It had to be tested. It was begging to be tested.
TriMet No. 12 at about 5:25 A.M.
This was the second 12 of the day according to the schedule. I was unsure how popular the bus would be. Empty? Jam packed? In the end it was neither, yet it was about as busy as it was on a typical normal (non commuter) hour of the day, which surprised me. There truly are some early risers in the P-town region.
With almost no traffic and in the light rain, the ride went very smooth and fast. Before I knew it, I was being dumped off at 4th & Hall near PSU, where I was to make my first connection of the morning. The city was dark, quiet, empty. I had once had a theory that the lack of nightlife in Portland was because the city was a morning town. Now? Now I'm not so sure. The cafe behind me was almost clinical in its absence of life, with vinyl letters on the door stating that it did not open until 7 A.M. Useless.
Busses stopped about every five minutes, with sporadic passengers. I was ever watchful for my quarry, C-Tran 134, the Salmon Creek Express. I had time, fortunately. There were at least two of these expresses I could catch and still make the following connection, but where were they? As I stood eagerly looking at my watch, along came a C-Tran bus. It was close to the right time, and I didn't have my schedule out. The reader board said I-5 express, but there was no mention of Salmon Creek. Was this the right bus?
"You go to Salmon Creek?" I asked the driver through the open door. He seemed not to notice, so I repeated my question hesitatingly.
"Yeah, eventually," he replied. I climbed aboard.
Inside, the bus was clean and neat. The layout felt a tad more open than a TriMet bus, and it had that bright, Shell-station-at-2am quality to the illumination. Aboard were a smattering of people, including some elderly women. I took my seat and we charged off. The bus had one more stop to make in Portland, down at 2nd and Alder, and there the elderly women left. The driver announced "next stop, Vancouver!" and we charged over the Morrison Bridge and onto the interstate. I glanced around me. Who was he announcing to? Me? There was nobody else left on the bus, and I certainly didn't need loudspeaker announcements to hear the driver.
Backhaul commuting apparently isn't too popular.
We crossed over the river, and in Vancouver, picked up a couple more passengers, including an elderly man with a massive backpack, a long gray beard, and a walking stick. Then back on the freeway we went. About this time, it occurred to me that I was not on the bus I had wanted to be on. Outside the window, in the fast lane, a 134 Salmon Creek Express passed us by at such speed that I feared we'd never see it again in our lifetimes. If that bus, headed to Salmon Creek, had been one of the ones I had needed to make my connection, just how slow were we? How long did the driver really mean when he said that we would "eventually" get to Salmon Creek?
I fretted, and the minutes passed slowly in the rainy darkness. Then, we were once more pulling off the freeway. Shortly after, we turned into a large transit center with great sweeping wood-rooved shelters lit artistically from below. I had seen the place before, from the freeway back when I had a car still, and always recalled it as being attractive. It was rather large, too. Surely, this must be Salmon Creek. Saved! There was plenty of time left before my scheduled connection.
Or not. The driver: "99th Street Transit Center!"
99th Street? Where the heck is 99th Street? My ignorance of Clark County was not helping me any here. I dug out a C-Tran map and sure enough, we were only on the outskirts of Vancouver proper, but not yet at Salmon Creek. With the map not to scale, it was hard to know just how much farther that really was, much less what it looked like.
Back on the freeway we went. Outside, the sky was getting a bit lighter, turning from black to shades of deep larkspur. Dawn was approaching, and this was bad. It simply reinforced what I knew: that time was moving onwards, and I was still not at my connection. If I missed it, the challenge would fail. I would still be able to reach Seattle, but not return the same day, meaning that I would have to cut my trip short no later than Tacoma at best, and Olympia at worst.
We began to sidle off of Interstate 5 again. A couple of turns, and we entered a rather sketchy parking lot. Another stop along the way? Must be. And yet... we stopped. Here, in this dull parking lot, with almost no architectural form whatsoever, we stopped. Yes, this, this was Salmon Creek.
Salmon Creek, landmark of the masses.
On the bright side, I was well within my target time. It was 6:45 or thereabouts, and my next connection was at 7:05. I cannot stress what elation I felt. If I had missed this connection, failure would have been certain. Making it was the first and, really, the most critical of the narrow gateways I had needed to pass.
At seven, a little van-bus pulled into the lot, the kind that are often used for paratransit services, complete with the massive side door to accommodate wheelchair access. Welcome to the Lower Columbia Community Action Program Rural Transit line. Open to the public for $1 each way.
I once recall reading legislator (and future governor of Oregon) Theodore Geer's account of riding a ramshackle narrow-gauge railway in Oregon's Willamette Valley during the 1880s. He recounted the horrendous ride, the slowness of the pace, the utter uselessness of the employees. I felt much in sympathy with Governor Geer, and believe I have found a spiritual successor to that railway line. The seats felt as if they had been trampled on by a heard of bison, and smelt like it too. The driver was sterner looking than an Easter Island carving and about as taciturn, with his only utterances being to curse under his breath at fellow drivers. With no interior light, I huddled against one of the windows to try and read my book and forget. Sadly, though, the ride had more texture than Joan Rivers' face, and half the time my eyes bounced a few inches northward on the page, forcing me to reread the same sentence over and over until we got to smoother road.
The interior signage was rather amusing. "No food / or drink / allowed", in red letters, with not one but two exclamation marks at the end. A second sign read "Please" (underlined) "do not ask the / driver to make / unauthorized stops." Another: "Absolutely / No food or drink / " (last three words underlined) "you will be put off the van / immediately and permanently / (last three words in red letters) "if you do" (one exclamation mark). Lastly, "if you vandalize the can / the appropriate police agency / will be called and you will / be prosecuted" (one exclamation mark). One is glad for their sake that punctuation is free.
Longview could not come quickly enough, and nor could I wait to leave it again. The transit center was amazingly busy, with every stall filled with a clean if dated looking bus. Passengers stood around in fair number, smoking and waiting for their departures. I could see why the system was busy. Looking about me, I saw more twenty-year-old domestic automobiles than I had seen since a trip to West Virginia years back. Probably none of them ran, or even if they did, it was widely agreed that it was preferable to be seen in a bus. Beyond the transit center, it was the typical sad sight of former lumber towns like Longview: Meth alley. Cinder blocks, badly painted buildings, decay, gambling parlors that had the effrontery to claim to share a professional tradition with the likes of The Sands. 
And by here I knew how T. T. Geer felt.
Then Longview surprised me. At 8 A.M., sharp, every bus in the lot started up their engines. People scattered, and then each of the vehicles departed. All at once. At the same time. It made me wonder if their schedules had been planned by someone who had worked in school transportation in their past.
Once they had gone, about five of us were left at the very, very empty transit center. Our "bus" from Salmon Creek had left us here and drive off, perhaps back to the Hades from whence it had come. I hoped, likely in vain, that it had not simply gone off to refuel before returning for us. Please, please, please, be a different vehicle, or at least a different driver!
Another van-bus pulled into the lot, looking much as the other had done, and stopped before us. The doors opened, and prayers were answered. Not only was the driver different, but so was the van. This one was clean, and did not smell, and had a driver who actually asked a friendly question or two, remarked on the coldness of the weather, and cranked up the heat. It was 8:05, and we were off.
The ride from here was a long one, one that would take me from the waters of the Columbia River and its tributaries, to those of Puget Sound. Along the way, we would pass through the heart of Washington's timber country, a land that was once a cash cow for the state but has sadly turned sour. Environmental restrictions and international trade have conspired to make logging in the region less and less attractive. While protectionists had and have good intentions, the communities that once depended on the timber monies have, like Longview, declined rapidly. The ride filled me with bittersweet thoughts. Sure the forests are beautiful, but humanity here? Perhaps it's unfair, but it's hard to ignore the meth houses, the abandoned trailer houses, the closed mills, the empty storefronts. Centralia has, perhaps, fared the best, as it tries to convert itself into a tourist center. Antique stores have settled like a benign rash on it's main streets. But even here, you have the distinct feeling that anyone who wants a better life for themselves and their families goes to seek their fortunes elsewhere. For many it's a place to be from, but no longer one to call home.
This long ride was scheduled to terminate in Tumwater, just south of Olympia, where I would be able to transfer to the local transit agency, Intercity Transit. The point of embarkation: Tumwater Square. I wondered what it would look like. For a time, I had lived in Olympia, but I had rarely had occasion to visit Tumwater. Would Tumwater Square be some kind of transit center? Perhaps it was a suburban mall of some kind. Maybe, just maybe it was some kind of transit oriented development? The Olympia region does have a progressive streak, it was possible. It was surely, however, a very impressive name.
Too impressive, by half. Tumwater Square consisted of a pair of bus shelters on either side of a road, amongst the swanky delights of two gas stations and a Safeway. 
Is it square because the streets are at right angles?
Shortly afterwards, IT No. 13 rescued me from oblivion, and we charged into downtown Olympia. The route followed Capitol Boulevard, whose streetcar era bones show through today in the gentle curves and continuous lines of bungalows. Past these residences, the road and the bus route begin the slow descent through downtown Olympia. Not far after this descent begins, the dome of the capitol building pops into sight to the left, but even before then you can tell you are in a seat of state power. There's lots of concrete buildings and a hollow, haunted look to the streets. Subconsciously, you just can't figure out why the city exists. It is large, yet looks poor. It seems to have more importance than other towns, and yet it lacks the bustling air of a city. It is the whiff of futile dreams, suspended in the amber of bureaucracy.
Olympia Transit Center has always impressed me. It is clean, modern, white and glass, and appears by all observances functional and busy. Arrival here was a kind of celebration, really. This was the hump. Here, actually on the waters of Puget Sound, everything suddenly became "downhill." Now the question turned away from if and towards when: when would I reach Seattle? I was hungry, I wanted food, I had not eaten yet and I had been up for nearly six hours. I pondered walking around the harbor, gloating in the waters of the sound, dining beside them at someplace-or-other from years before.
But over at the north edge of the transit center, a Tacoma bus idled. 
Aboard the Tacoma express at 10:30 A.M.
The bus was rather on the full side, and I was lucky to find a seat. Up front, the driver was rather garrulous, chatting with a flight attendant headed to SeaTac International to work a flight to Japan. "If I had my way," the driver noted, "you'd ride free. Transportation people would always be free." Returned the steward, "yeah, and you'd fly free too, right?" The driver rather liked this notion.
I glanced at my private timetable and noted my progress. My original goal had been to be aboard a 603 to Tacoma departing Olympia at noon, and here I was 90 minutes earlier than that. If things continued as planned, and assuming that my connections were available when I got to Tacoma Dome Station, I'd be in Seattle near lunch time. We made an odd circuit of Olympia and Lacey, stopping at park-and-ride lots to pick up people here and there, and then we hit the freeway and sailed down into the Nisqually River Delta. With the crossing of the delta, I had entered Pierce County, and soon after, Tacoma.
Then there was another snag. We pulled off to another nondescript park-and-ride, this one somewhere near the McChord Air Force Base. "This is the SR 512 Park and Ride," yelled the driver. "Transfers here to SeaTac and Seattle!" I puzzled over this. Was not the 603 bound for Tacoma, where I could make my transfer as planned? As nearly the entire bus emptied out, I took a gamble, and got out too, trusting that we couldn't all be wrong.
On reflection, this was likely a mistake. The 603 did indeed touch on Tacoma at Tacoma Dome, where I could have transfered to a Sound Transit bus to Seattle. But no, instead of staying in the warm bus, I got out with the crowd to stand in the cold and await my transfer. It is very, very likely that the bus I had to take -- Sound Transit 594 for Seattle -- was the same exact one I would have caught in Tacoma proper, meaning my wait was no longer. But here, at the SR 512 lot, there was nothingness. Some shelters. Some garbage cans. Freeway exit ramps. Parked cars. No food, no warm drinks. I dug into my stash of snacks for the first time that day, but found little comfort in them. I was cold, I was wondering not for the first time why I hadn't done this in warmer months. But it was too late now.
Twenty minutes passed. Other busses came and went, including those from Pierce Transit, Tacoma's transit provider, and a massive boat of a bus from Sound Transit. This was ST 574, the SeaTac express, a bus very similar to those used by Greyhound, complete with dual rear axles and cushy reclining seats. Ah, the thought of reclining seats! And warmth, too. The moments dripped by slowly. But finally, finally, a blue-and-white bus pulled in the lot with the name SEATTLE on its destination sign, and I stepped aboard.
My stomach was growling, my eyelids were drooping, and I was lulled ever more to sleep by the warmth inside the bus. The seats were nicely cushioned, though annoyingly they did not recline despite the presence of headrests. I checked to be sure multiple times. But it didn't matter. I was down $13.80, and I was nearly there. I only opened my eyes a few times, mostly to note passing through Tacoma. This city has always been my favorite on the sound. It retains a blue collar edge and an honest, industrial vibe. It is no city, and likely never will be, but it is a fine, fine town, the likes that few are fortunate enough to be. The fact that our bus had exited the freeway for a slow and prolonged trip down surface streets, making stops every two or four blocks? That was only mildly annoying, for it gave me time to glance about and try and remember the buildings I had been inside of. And then, we were back on the freeway, and my head was nodding back, and I was asleep.
~12:48 P.M., Pike Street at 3rd.
I woke with a jolt as we exited the freeway and traversed Spokane Street, bound for Fourth. Alongside the latter road, to one side were the rails of a BNSF switching line, and along the other side were the tracks of Sound Transit's first light rail line. Shoehorned into an area vastly comprising of light industry and railway yards, I really wasn't sure why they bothered to put stations in so frequently. I counted at least two in the industrial flats, places that by the nature of the constrained rail assets of the region will never be anything other than railroad infrastructure. I shrugged. It's Sound Transit's first light rail line, and this is hardly the biggest lesson they have yet to learn.
Then we ascended the viaduct beside King Street Station, and passed into downtown itself. I kept an eye out for the streets, waiting for the one I wanted. Jackson, no. Cherry, no. Spring, no. Then there it was. Union. I gathered my bags, my stomach growling louder still, and began to plan where I would find my lunch. Outside, the pavement was wet, but it was not raining. I checked my watch, and found that it was 12:45 in Seattle.
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Sunday, March 22, 2009
One more bit of site news: two more blogs go onto the blogroll under "Other Notable Blogs". Labels: Site News
First up, railohio.com, run by my friend Brian Schmidt, covers the rather odd combination of railroads, photography, food, and anime. Then again, perhaps that's not so strange really, if you consider how railroad obsessed Japan is. Hey Brian, can you make a post that connects all three? (Perhaps a scene from Testudo no Tabi?)
The other addition to the links today is Streetsblog, an advocacy site for livable urban design. They have three sub-blogs, one each for NYC, LA, and San Francisco. (Sadly, no Portland one.)
Check 'em out.
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Spring is here, and after a few days of laborious Photoshop work and HTML composing, the site may look a tad different. Sadly Firefox doesn't render the new design as nicely as does Safari, and I have yet to test it in Explorer. However, it is rather simple so it ought to be okay.... Labels: Site News
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Sunday, March 15, 2009
Even when you try and stay away, you just can't. Labels: Photography, Portland
The last time I shot film in any serious way was in the middle of 2008. At the time, I was in the middle of a number of simultaneous changes in my life, professional, academic, and personal. The end result of that was that I had somehow lost my way when it came to photography. The passion was simply gone, the meaning lost. The idea that I would never make a photograph again struck me, even in the darkest hours, as unlikely. I knew better than that. I knew it wasn't a matter of if I kept making photographs, but when, and what of. In the meanwhile, though, I packed away the Nikons and swore to myself that I was taking a sabbatical. My only tool in the meanwhile would be the G9, a camera I considered to be magnificent but still only a toy, and even that I used only sparingly.
Yet events conspired without my approval. First, a friend picked up a Nikon FG at a garage sale. I, the camera "expert" (heh, got him fooled!) got the honor of testing it to be certain it was fully functional. So sometime in January, I took out the FG and its good old student-standard 50mm lens and ran a roll of TMY through it. Holding a film camera again -- especially a manual like the FG -- felt good. The images produced weren't too bad either, just a random collection of downtown Portland street photos, but still, not a disappointment.
From the test roll: A food cart at S.W. 2nd & Oak, Portland.
The greatest irony, however, struck the following month.
My first real camera -- read SLR -- was a Pentax K-1000. Most anyone shooting film knows these cameras. They were small, solid, fairly light, and pretty durable. They had lenses that were rather small when compared to what we use today. (Their narrow size made them fit inside of chain link, a very handy attribute for urban shooters.) This one cost me $150, used. I didn't have enough, so my mother went halves with me on it. I was 17, and the camera went everywhere with me after that, serving as my "mechanical sketchbook".
Later, I went Nikon, financing the "upgrade" by helping my brother with a mural project for Salvador Molly's on Belmont. (The mural, sadly, has since been painted over with beige paint. Bastards.) The theory behind the switch was that when I finally made the leap to Nikon, I'd have a stock of Nikon lenses to use. It was a logical choice, but it left me with my Pentax gear unused. I lent and then subsequently sold off the K-1000 to a friend, with the promise that if he ever wanted to sell it, I'd have first dibs.
And now, with the Nikon gear sitting idle in a cardboard box, my phone rang.
The rest is self evident. Today, the K-1000 -- complete with the lens strap my father made me still attached -- sits on my workbench, alongside the G9 and my Canonet. I have yet to run film through it, but I have no doubt that I will.
In the meanwhile, you can view the rest of the Nikon FG test roll shots over at flickr.
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