 This is the third of four images I’m posting from the Cathedral this week. It’s probably my least favorite but I still consider it worthwhile. I also posted an alternate version on Flickr here. I guess I like the spare emptiness and lack of color, but in the end both of those features make me want to overdo the processing to punch it up.
I do not know if the fellow on the right is St. Boniface. I never saw any representations of him that look like this – effectively a knight with wings. This is one of seven chapels in the Cathedral, sometimes called the Chapels of the Seven Languages or the Chapels of Tongues, that were designed to provide regular services in different languages for the first major immigrant populations in New York. I believe that never happened, but then again, the Cathedral is not finished. Boniface is credited with bringing Christianity to Germany, so this is the German chapel. I also do not know why the chapel has no seats.
 This shot was taken from the same spot as the previous photo in my stream, but turned towards the altar. It is not as crisp as the one looking towards the back of the cathedral, probably because I did not have a railing to brace my arms against. Processed using built-in HDR of Photoshop and new Topaz Detail 2.
I have about 4 photos from the cathedral that I’m happy with. I’ll try to get them all up this week.
When I went to Columbia University undergrad and law school, I lived within a few minutes walking distance of this cathedral for seven years but never visited it. I’m not sure why. It was always, and I believe still is, the object of some fond jokes for being the perpetually unfinished cathedral. I took this shot a little over a month ago, from an open walkway between the choir and altar, which had a railing that afforded me a bit more stability for the hand held bracketed set. Processed using Bracketeer and some Lucis Pro.
 
I passed by this parking garage entrance during a night time photo walk about 2 months ago, and was struck by how clean, bright, and colorful it was compared to similar establishments. I took a 5-shot bracketed set, but never quite managed to re-create the effect I saw with my eyes. This result comes the closest, but I went through a ton of alternate versions. I have also posted 3 alternate version on Flickr, and if you click on the image you should be taken to this image in my photostream, where the others should be easy to find. I would be interested in all opinions about the different versions and results. Thanks.
UPDATE: One more version and I’m walking away from this image that’s giben me so much trouble. This version is based on Michael Tuuk’s comments below. View full post »
A few months ago I came across a reference to the 100 Strangers project/idea for photographers. There is a Flickr group and a website, www.100Strangers.com. Those links have all the details, but the short idea is that a photographer approaches people in public, asks for permission to take some portraits, and posts the results, with the goal of reaching 100 photographs of strangers. Candid shots you take without the subjects knowledge do not count. You have to interact with the subjects. I have been toying with the idea of undertaking the project, and probably will start in the spring or summer.
In the meantime, I had the pleasure of having someone ask me to take his picture a few weeks ago. Joel is a dentist in Sylacauga, Alabama. Among other passions, he has a fondness for bicycling in cities at night, and has well-developed ideas about which cities are best. For a recent trip to New York, he shipped a bicycle and went exploring on a warmish winter night. He ran into me at Columbus Circle, while I was taking this photo. He came up to me just as I was finishing the last exposure and asked if I would take his picture. He offered me a card and explained that nobody would believe he was doing what he was doing without pictures.
It was fortunate that I had just finished, because the last few shots in a bracketed set at night can take a couple of minutes. As it was, I had to switch away from my super-wide 14-24mm telephoto to a Tamron 28-300, which is my full-frame all-purpose lens. Its biggest weakness is it doesn’t have a particularly wide aperture (f3.5-6.3 depending on length), but it compensates a bit with Tamron’s version of vibration reduction which it calls Vibration Compensation (VC). I also had to quickly fumble through all the needed setting changes, like turning off auto-bracketing, increasing the ISO and adjusting to a faster shutter speed. Joel was patient enough to wait for this, and then we fired off 8-10 shots. I was lucky, given how unprepared I was, that 2-3 of them came out OK, and the 2 best are shown here. After we finished he asked for advice for purchasing a good cigar, and I’m afraid I wasn’t much help, but I understand he managed to find one and enjoyed it in Times Square a few minutes later. He is also a regular visitor to NY and teaches a course at the NYU School of Dentistry,
I emailed him the images about a week later, and he also graciously answered a few questions so I could incorporate some more detail about his trip in this post. I am not counting this as an official 100 Strangers photo, and therefore designating it as “0 of 100,” because I wasn’t really thinking about the project, and haven’t yet committed to it. The pleasure of this experience, however, makes it more likely I will do so. Thanks Joel.
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Erik kerstenbeck - Hi
Looks like we have the same vision on this particular Catherdral – nice shot by the way!
Original Batman: http://t.co/OOa7C1P
Regards, Erik