Panorama Series

As the New York City work hit 50 images I felt the need to change my posts to something different. I have decided to do a series of panorama images I made with Linhof 617 and Fuji GX617 cameras over the years. Some of the images have never been posted before anywhere and have never been outside their protective sleeves for a good many years. Shooting with a large panorama camera which sees in a 3:1 ratio can be challenging. I do love the 3:1 format, but I need to keep in mind that a person’s eyes will tend to travel from the left side across to the right and I must have a subject that stops the eye from simply traveling off the edge of the image and encourages it instead to pause and return back into the image again.

This camera produces 6×17cm images on medium format film. I get 4 images on a roll of 120 and 8 on a roll of 220. Shooting with this or any other of my large cameras, I must first look for a potential image before setting up my camera. Fortunately, this camera has a removable finder that allows me to scan for an image with the finder up to my eye and only after having found the spot to shoot do I set up my tripod and mount the camera to it. I sold this camera a few years back when in need of money, but I am having yearning for one again. I have always loved seeing in the panoramic mode and I can stitch together images digitally, sometimes with outstanding results. Some photographers say a camera is just a tool, but I happen to love the process of using them as well and this particular camera was a complete joy to me.

Let’s get started with the series!

July 1st is Canada Day, and you know there is going to be a fireworks show!! While waiting for the show to start on English Bay in Vancouver, British Columbia I decided to make a long exposure to catch all the boats moving around the bay. Someone out there decided to fire off an emergency flare and soon all the boaters were firing them off. Throw in some onlookers along the shore and the moon for good measure and you have an interesting recipe for a rather unique image.

New York City 50

Well, here is the 50th image from New York City. I think I’ll end it here with a slightly different view of a New York City icon. This image was made from aboard a Statue Island boat heading towards the Statue of Liberty. My good friend that was the impetus for this whole trip, Murray Lawrence, is seen with the light shining through his glasses, straining to see out the window to get a glimpse of Lady Liberty as we got close. It was a wonderful trip Murray, I only wish things had worked themselves out differently, but I guess life has it’s ways. We’ll have to go on another foray together again someday.

I have really enjoyed working on these images, and transforming them into a Lomography type Holga look, was very satisfying. I think it adds some charm and uniqueness that just doesn’t come across in your everyday digital snapshot. When everything is clear and undistorted , photographs can have a very clinical clean feel to them, kind of along the lines of listening to CD’s instead of a vinyl LP. I’m not saying that superb images can’t be made when everything is perfect or that CD’s don’t have a good sound, just that they’re different. There is a place for both and really can depend on a persons mood and feelings. I’ve worked these images before trying to perfect them, and sometimes it worked. This past while though, reworking them in a different manner, has been a joy and very rewarding. I found that I have chosen some of the same images as the first go round, but many of them are images I never considered as holding any value visually. Hopefully you have enjoyed these images. I plan on doing a few different things photographically than I am used to doing. For example, I have an old Kodak box Brownie that I am going to load up and a Holga pinhole panorama camera that looks to be a very exciting camera to work with. Where this will all lead I don’t know, but I do know that I can’t wait to get out shooting again with a different outlook to what the final product might look like.

New York City 49

This parking garage in downtown Manhattan was jammed full for a mere $25.00/hour! I don’t understand why a person would drive their vehicle into downtown, only to pay an astronomical price to park, when you could jump onto the subway for only $2.00.

New York City 48

New York City 47

New York City 46

Strand Books 828 Broadway (at 12th St.) is really a superb bookstore that couldn’t be missed. They have more used and overstock photography books alone than the the University of Calgary Library has. Really amazing place that I could spend countless hours in. How, though do you pick just one book to fly home with!!?? I managed to find a volume by Ray McSavaney that I had been searching for a very long time to find used, and it was in excellent condition – so that’s the one that came home.

New York City 45

New York City 43 & 44

Gate and door along 5th Avenue across from Central Park.

New York City 42

Looking north at Manhattan from Liberty Island which is located in New Jersey waters. The land of Liberty Island is within the territorial jurisdiction of the State of New York, a status that was established in 1664, reaffirmed in 1834, and which has never been officially disputed. Who knew?

New York City 41

It was a dark and stormy night….

not really, but it looks a bit spooky.