Tag Archives: monochrome

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: People, Photographs: Urban/Street

The Train Guys

January 31, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Subway rail fans waiting at the station for the historic “nostalgia” train, Manhattan

A few days earlier we visited the Subway Museum in Brooklyn, where we had a chance to wander through a bunch of old to very old historic subway cars. I was fascinated by how old some of the rolling stock is, and by the history of the system that I had not known about. I was also a but surprised to realize that some of the trains currently still on the tracks have been there for a long time. A big draw at the museum is the fact that the old subway cars are parked in this old station and one can wander in and out of them.

With this visit fresh in our minds we decided to catch the historic “nostalgia trains” event that brings many of these trains out of the museum and runs them on the subway system for one day in December. Not surprisingly this draws out lots of fans of New York history and a lot of “train people.” (It also surprises a few folks who don’t know what is going on when these really old trains arrive at their stations!) I’m not sure what it is about train people, but the seem to stand out. These guys had apparently ridden the train partway up Manhattan, crossed to the adjacent platform, and were now waiting to the train to come back for their return trip.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Night, Photographs: Urban/Street

Halal Food Cart, Night

January 24, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A sidewalk halal food cart at night, Manhattan

These food carts and lots of other similar versions are all over Manhattan. I know that isn’t news to New Yorkers, but it is a bit impressive to those of us who visit the place. I have yet to eat at one, but my sons tell me that the food isn’t bad.

I photographed this one (obviously!) at night as we wandered around a crowded portion of Fifth Avenue on Christmas Eve, not far from Rockefeller Center and lots of other stuff that drew huge crowds there on this evening. Against that dark background, the wildly lit cart, festooned with colorful signs describing the food and stacked with bottles of soda was surrounded in a cloud of smoke from food preparation.

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Lower Manhattan, Bridge Cables

January 21, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Lower Manhattan as seen from the Brooklyn Bridge

In late December 2015 we spent a week in New York, staying in Brooklyn very close to the Bridge. For most of the week we mostly didn’t pay a lot of attention to this landmark, but near the end of our visit we had some time to kill one morning before meeting our sons in Manhattan, so we decided to take the famous walk out onto the bridge. It was a fairly cold morning, threatening rain, so the scene had a wintry appearance. That didn’t stop the crowds though, and we shared the bridge with lots of other walkers.

Photographing from the bridge I made a conscious decision to not make “that photograph” of the cables leading up to the towers. Instead I looked to subjects that included the cables and other elements of the bridge structure either as the primary subject or as part of the setting for other subjects. I decided to “play” a bit in post with this photograph. One way to stretch post-processing skills is to think about how to replicate effects that we see in the work of other photographers. This isn’t about imitating them — it is about trying to broaden one’s skills as a photographer. In this case, I went towards (but not all the way to) a kind of processing that I see in some currently popular urban and architectural photography… and I learned a few things by doing so.

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Black and White Photography

January 18, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A Whitney Museum employee photographs a family.

During our December 2015 visit to New York I had my first opportunity to visit the new Whitney Museum in Chelsea, at the south end of the High Line Park. I hadn’t been to the old Whitney, so I was especially interested in the new museum — not only would I see work that I hadn’t looked at before, but I would have a chance to visit a brand new piece of architecture. In fact, I thought the building was fascinating, especially outdoor terraces on each of the floors that I visited. (I started at the top and got through the collections on the 6th, 7th, and 8th floors.) The highest levels thrust out into space, providing dizzying and spectacular New York views, and the visual appearance looking up from the lower terraces is quite something, too.

I like photographing at and around museums. Often the architecture itself is interesting, but even more, the people at museums are fascinating subjects. Perhaps it is just because there are often so many of them packed so tightly together. Maybe it is something about a change in appearance and demeanor among people who are looking at and thinking about art. I spent a lot of time out on those terraces making quick photographs, and when I saw this family lining up against the wall of the museum, asking a museum employee (who was quite cooperative) to take the camera and record their antics, I quickly clicked of a sequence of photographs.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: monochrome

The Train Guys

Halal Food Cart, Night

Lower Manhattan, Bridge Cables

Black and White Photography

Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.