Archive for the ‘Photowalks’ Category
corporeal presences
The Halve Maen floats in for maritime sunday.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Just a couple of weeks ago, the replica ship Halve Maen, or Half Moon, was spotted while it was plying the harbor just off the coast of Breuckelen. Back during the days of the Dutch decadence, this sort of thing would have been a fairly common sight, just like public floggings.
from wikipedia
Another replica of the Halve Maen (officially Anglicized as Half Moon) was constructed in Albany, New York in 1989 by the New Netherland Museum. The museum contracted with Nicholas S. Benton to design and build the replica. Mr. Benton, a master ship-rigger and shipwright, was president of the Rigging Gang of Middletown, Rhode Island, which specialized in colonial ship restoration and design. To prepare for building the Half Moon, a $1 million project, he visited maritime museums in the Netherlands and the United States. After his death while assisting with the rigging of another vessel, the construction of the Half Moon was completed by the New Netherland Museum. The year 2009 marks the 400th anniversary of the Halve Maen’s voyage. For the anniversary, the crown prince of the Netherlands and his wife were on board, as well as students from a Dutch school. This anniversary was marked in September 2009 with festivals, music, sailing ships parading around New York Harbor.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday – October 19, 2013
The Insalubrious Valley of the Newtown Creek with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale soon.
Sunday- October 20th, 2013
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek with Brooklyn Brainery- tickets on sale now
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
crawled out
Today’s post is late, it’s late!
– photo by Mitch Waxman
For the next few days, it’s going to be a single image and a short but pithy comment from a humble narrator at this, your Newtown Pentacle. I need to take a little break, and gear up a major series of posts which will be coming your way very soon. The big Newtown Creek boat tour on Saturday appears to be completely sold out, by the way.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
Saturday – October 19, 2013
The Insalubrious Valley of the Newtown Creek with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale soon.
Sunday- October 20th, 2013
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek with Brooklyn Brainery- tickets on sale now
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
suffocating crawl
Moon crazed scenery in today’s post.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Finally, the swelter and perspiration choked season of summer has ended, as signaled by the appearance of the eye of Hecate in the eastern sky. One such as myself normally enjoys the summer, but the season just passed in 2013 bore more than a passing verisimilitude to tropical climes, weather which produced naught but dripping perspiration and dangerous levels of ennui. The filthy black raincoat has left the closet and hangs upon a hook awaiting a return to duty and its winter campaign. Finally, it is spooky time once again, in the Newtown Pentacle.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Diana is best appreciated when she hangs over the water, say I, lending her bluish glowings to the inky waves of NY Harbor. That glow is the reflected magnificence of the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself, of course, which travels through weird wavelengths on its journey to the water. My little dog Zuzu is often in an odd psychological state during this time of the month. The moon provides a psychological menses for the canine race, during which they are prone to nervous barking and short tempers. Perhaps the keen sensory prowess for which Zuzu’s kind are renowned are cogent enough to realize that which we can or choose not to witness, and that the dogs know something about the planetoid which we dross primates cannot discern.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Selene herself appeared before me recently, her position in the sky during the autumn months is complimentary to the position of Newtown Pentacle HQ upon the earth, and one decided to break out the whole kit and kaboodle to capture her likeness. Using one of my worst (albeit “longest”) lenses, whose already spotty resolution was further degraded by the use of a “teleconverter”, I managed to pull the shot above off somehow. This was a tripod shot, which is a necessity when attempting anything involving the night sky with a somewhat telescopic lens attached. I set the camera to f18, iso 100, and left the shutter open for nearly a full second. The moon is nearly as bright as the burning thermonuclear eye of god itself, despite appearances to the human eye, and it is quite a challenge to capture in a fashion acceptable for one such as myself.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
Saturday – October 19, 2013
The Insalubrious Valley of the Newtown Creek with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale soon.
Sunday- October 20th, 2013
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek with Brooklyn Brainery- tickets on sale now
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
moon cast
The center of the earth is the end of the world, if you think about it.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Night shooting has been something which I have been working on for the last six months or so. The problem presented by lowered illumination is the need for equipment such as tripods and lighting devices such as flashes. Spontaneous moments of joy such as a train entering the elevated station are denied by such techniques. I’m a handheld kind of guy, I’m afraid, but I hate the distracting presence of color noise and the weird oranges it produces. High ISO night shots are necessarily noisy, but produce weird colors straight out of the camera- especially under the influence of NY Cty street lamps which are kind of yellow anyway.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Recent acquisition of a brighter lens (capable of large apertures) than the one I normally use as my general contractor has aided immensely in the pursuit of working around both my limitations and those of the capture device. The remarkable Sigma 18-35 allows for apertures as bright as 1.8, and is sharper than heck, and it is currently jutting out of the camera obscenely- it’s a very nice piece of glass. The problem which I’ve been trying to solve is a purely digital one presented by the camera software itself, and the incongruities encountered between capturing the image and processing it. I’ve long worked as an advertising photo retoucher, what can I tell you, this is the sort of stuff one ponders.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
The image, as captured by the camera, is assigned settings whose parameters are determined by an onboard suite of software which assesses and assigns color temperatures when it is written to card. The camera also sets the shot to certain levels of bright and shadow, contrast and saturation. The camera, except in bright sunlight, almost always gets it wrong. Fixing these matters in a compressed format like jpeg is not so easy, so I shoot in raw format which allows me to noodle things around a little bit and get the image a little it closer to what I actually experienced in situ.
What I’ve been working on, feverishly, is using the information typically captured in the raw file (a 16 bit file richer in image data than an 8 bit jpeg) to create a predictive shooting protocol. In English- trying to figure out what the camera sees, and why, and creating a series of moves on the raw image to better represent the real life colors and range of tone which exist within the range of human vision. Nowhere even close yet, but I’m starting to think that the path lays before me.
Here’s a tip- canon’s higher iso settings produce a huge amount of noise on the red and green plates, shifting an image to colder temperatures will reduce the color noise significantly.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 21, 2013
13 Steps Around Dutch Kills Walking Tour with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale now.
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
Saturday – October 19, 2013
The Insalubrious Valley of the Newtown Creek with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale soon.
Sunday- October 20th, 2013
The Poison Cauldron of the Newtown Creek with Brooklyn Brainery- tickets on sale now
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
always pedantic
Astoria, Queens rules.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Having sense enough not to schedule any walking tours against the Jewish holiday last weekend allowed me to have an actual day off last Saturday. Our Lady of the Pentacle and I decided to take a stroll around the neighborhood, soon finding ourselves nearby Astoria Park. Having company such as Our Lady along on my perambulations is a pleasant change to my normally lonely round, although one does have to slow his gait. Our Lady doesn’t dawdle, instead I walk preternaturally fast.
from wikipedia
A loner is a person who avoids or does not actively seek human interaction or prefers to be alone. There are many reasons for solitude, intentional or otherwise, and “loner” does not imply a specific cause. Intentional reasons include spiritual and religious considerations or personal philosophies. Unintentional reasons involve temperament, being highly sensitive, having more extreme forms of shyness, or various mental disorders. The modern term “loner” can be used with a negative connotation in the belief that human beings are social creatures and those that do not participate are deviant.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
Yom Kippur is one of those holidays I’ve never understood. “Day of Atonement” and all. If I need to atone and account for my actions to some sort of extra dimensional super being who invisibly observes all that I do in minute detail, it will be after I’m dead and am standing in front of some supernatural court. Also, I have very little that I feel guilty about, as I don’t go out of my way to screw others over nor hurt them. It meant a lot to my parents, this day of atonement, but I’ve never had any use for all the shouting and jumping about that religions bring.
from wikipedia
Anthropophobia or Anthrophobia (literally “fear of people”, from Greek: ανθρωπος, ánthropos, “man” and φόβος, phóbos, “fear”), also called interpersonal relation phobia or social phobia, is pathological fear of people or human company.
Anthropophobia is an extreme, pathological form of shyness and timidity. Being a form of social phobia, it may manifest as fears of blushing or meeting others’ gaze, awkwardness and uneasiness when appearing in society, etc. A specific Japanese cultural form is known as taijin kyofusho.
– photo by Mitch Waxman
We spotted this roughly scrawled graffito over on 20th avenue, on the fenced walls adjoining the ConEd property. Odd, ironic, and frankly- a bit more literate than the stuff you normally see around the ancient village. I did not see anybody wearing a hunting cap lurking about, and kept moving. It was nice actually having a day off, something one such as myself doesn’t get much of these days.
from wikipedia
Holden Caulfield is the 16-year-old protagonist of author J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye. Since the book’s 1951 publication, Holden has become an icon for teenage rebellion and angst, and now stands among the most important characters of 20th-century American literature. The name Holden Caulfield was used in an unpublished short story written in 1942 and first appeared in print in 1945.
Upcoming Tours
Saturday- September 21, 2013
13 Steps Around Dutch Kills Walking Tour with Atlas Obscura- tickets on sale now.
Saturday- September 28, 2013
Newtown Creek Boat Tour with the Working Harbor Committee- tickets on sale now.
“follow” me on Twitter- @newtownpentacle
The Newtown Pentacle 