Zeca Bettax, 16 August 2012

Why yes, I do have more photos to share!

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park
Camera: Zeca Bettax
Lens: Schneider-Kreuznach 105mm f/4.5 Radionar
Film: Kodak TMax 100 (120)

The subject of the first photo is the Century Theater on Clark Street just north of Diversey. My AIA Guide to Chicago does not contain any information about this building, but I did find the following website with some information about the theater’s history. As noted on the website, the original interior no longer exists, and the shopping center that now takes its place is also rather uninspiring; the one time I went inside, I was rather unimpressed by the design, and the fact that many of the shops were vacant.

I also don’t know anything about the building in the second photo; all I know is that it now houses, as you can see, a Starbucks. Yup…they’re everywhere. One interesting matter though, is that in the older neighborhoods of the city, this is a fairly common sight, not just for Starbucks, but also for a number of other chain restaurants / retailers that would otherwise stick to standardized designs for their various locations. I like the fact that in the older neighborhoods, places such as this tend to be a little less obtrusive, and a little more respectful of the existing buildings they inhabit.

The subject of the third photo is a lantern on the bridge over the entrance / exit for Diversey Harbor. The bridge and particularly this lantern (there are four total, one at each corner of the bridge) have a vaguely Art Deco appearance to them, which is why I wanted to photograph them.

Enjoy!

Lincoln Park Fireworks – 08 August 2012

Yes, I know…I’m finally getting around to posting the last of my fireworks photos. It sure is a good thing I don’t do this for money, because I don’t know that I’d ever get paid on anything like a regular schedule! Okay, okay…to be fair, if I were getting paid, I’d have more incentive to actually get things done on time, so there’s that. Anyways, enjoy the last of the shots. Til next year, that is.

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park
Camera: Nikon D80
Lens: Nikon Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX

Enjoy!

Lincoln Park Fireworks 2012 – 31 July 2012

Yup…more photos of the fireworks show in Lincoln Park.

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park
Camera: Nikon D80
Lens: Nikon Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX

Enjoy!

Lincoln Park Fireworks 2012 – 25 July 2012

So, as I mentioned previously, after the official fireworks show at Navy Pier concluded, the neighborhood show in Lincoln Park started up. Since I was sitting at the tip of northern end of the Belmont Harbor breakwater, the Lincoln Park show was much, much closer – just based on what I could see of it, I suspect it was staged somewhere near the Lincoln Park Zoo. Anyways, here are the first of the photos I shot of that show.

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park
Camera: Nikon D80
Lens: Nikon Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX

You’ll have to excuse the people standing in the bottom of the shots; they didn’t know they were being photographed, and I suspect they (like I) were surprised by the startup of the Lincoln Park show…the standing guy had originally gotten up to go, and stayed to watch after the show started. It’s also a bit of my own fault; I didn’t know that the show in Lincoln Park was going to start up, so while I chose my shooting location to have an unobstructed line of sight to the show at Navy Pier, when I turned my camera towards Lincoln Park (which was slightly southwest of where I was sitting), I was facing the backs of some folks who were sitting further south of where I was.

Note also that these photos, unlike the Navy Pier ones, were shot with my 35mm normal lens, not the long telephoto lens I was using to shoot the Navy Pier show. This is a good example of why it’s a good idea to carry a selection of lenses. Not knowing that the Lincoln Park show was going to start up, I could very easily have just carried my 300mm telephoto lens and no other (lord knows that lens alone is very weighty), but then, I would not have been prepared to shoot the Lincoln Park show. As it was, I actually had pretty much my entire lineup of lenses along for the ride (including my wideangle lens – that got no use at all – and two other, shorter telephoto lenses; I was fair sure I’d need the 300mm, but I brought the shorter ones in case I wanted wider shots of the fireworks and Navy Pier)…so, as you can imagine, along with my 2L Camelbak bladder and 10-lb tripod, I had a pretty hefty pack to shoulder…on a night when it was 95 degrees and humid. Yes, I know…I’m crazy. But hey, OTOH…fireworks!

Enjoy.

Chicago Blizzard 2011, 11 November 2011

In “honor” of yesterday’s brief snowfall, here are some more of my film photos from last winter’s blizzard!

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Uptown Neighborhood (Photos 1 thru 5); Lincoln Park (Photo 6); Chicago Loop (Photos 7 thru 10)
Camera: Nikon FM-2
Lens: Nikon Nikkor 50mm f1.2
Film: Kodak TMax 100 (135)

In photos 2 & 4, you can (again) see how folks were mostly walking in the streets, rather than on the sidewalks, as the snowplows kept the snow buildup from getting too deep as compared to the sidewalks, where the snow would pile up anywhere from 18 to 24 inches (or more, depending on snowdrifts and such). In photo 3, you can see how the snowdrifts built up under the CTA elevated rail tracks – in some cases, the drifts were closer the three feet deep. I made the mistake of trying to slog through this area…tired myself out quite effectively – not surprisingly, it isn’t easy to force your way through two or three feet of piled-up snow.

Photo 6 shows part of Lincoln Park at Montrose on the day after the snowfall stopped; I went out to watch sunrise, only afterwards realizing that the ambient temperature at the time was below zero (Fahrenheit) – after I got back to my apartment a couple hours later, I checked the weather, and the ambient temperature after the sun had been up for a couple hours was 5. Yes…FIVE. Before sunrise, it must’ve been much, much lower. Of course, the overall high that day topped out around 12, IIRC.

In photos 7 thru 10, you can see how the snow affected downtown – which is to say, not as much as  you might think. Sure, the snow piled up there, too, but the DOT kept the streets effectively plowed, so the day after the snowfall stopped, business resumed (mostly) as usual.

Enjoy.

Obligatory Autumnal Blog Post, 08 November 2011

Since I’ve been spending most of my time playing around with a 70+ year old camera and black and white film, I haven’t been looking for much in the way of color on my recent excursions. Of course, how could I not post something related to the changing of the seasons?

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park
Camera: Nikon D80
Lens: Nikon Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX (Photos 1 & 2); Nikon Nikkor 80-200mm f/4.5-5.6 (Photo 3)

These trees are in Lincoln Park, just north of Belmont Harbor. Pretty, aren’t they?

Enjoy.

Zeca Bettax, 07 November 2011

You’d think that sooner or later, I’d get bored with such a simple camera…and you would be wrong…so very wrong. Actually, it’s quite fun trying to get good shots with a camera that doesn’t have all the bells and whistles of all these sophisticated modern ones.

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Photo Information:

Camera: Zeca Bettax
Lens: Schneider-Kreuznach 105mm f/4.5 Radionar
Film: Fuji Neopan Acros 100 (120)

Photo 1
Location: Chicago, Illinois; Uptown Neighborhood

This building sits at the northeast corner of Clark & Montrose on the western side of the Uptown Neighborhood on Chicago’s north side. Uptown, for those of y’all who’ve never been there, is quite an eclectic neighborhood. The area where I live (Buena Park) is fairly quiet and uneventful – about the only issues I have is the distinct lack of local restaurant options; other parts of the neighborhood are more…colorful, to say the least. This particular intersection is really neither…it’s not “depressed”, but there isn’t much to recommend it, either. OTOH, there’s this magnificent building, with all its terra cotta splendor!

Photo 2:
Location: Chicago, Illinois; Andersonville Neighborhood

Just a few blocks north on Clark from the intersection in the previous shot is the Andersonville Neighborhood, which has and entirely different feel than Uptown; it’s full of unique shops and restaurants, and lots of quiet residential streets. This particular building is part of a strip that includes a few such shops and restaurants (locals will probably recognize it as the storefront just north of Edgewater Produce). As with the previous building, there’s quite a bit of amazing terra cotta detail – and that curved corner.

Photo 3:
Location: Chicago, Illinois; Chicago Loop

This is the Banker’s Building (completed in 1927 and designed by Burnham Bros.) on the southwest corner of Clark and Adams, pretty close to the center of the Loop, and just half a block east of the heart of the financial district on LaSalle Street. The building is quite prominently visible behind the USPS Loop Station when viewed from Federal Plaza (the black shape on the right of the photo is part of one of the two towers in Federal Center). Stylistically, the building is somewhere in between traditional and Art Deco (the latter being most noticeable at the main entrance to the building) – not surprising, given its date of completion.

Photo 4:
Location: Chicago, Illinois; Uptown Neighborhood

This building sits at the southwest corner of Broadway and Winona in the Uptown Neighborhood. While the upper floors follow a fairly typical pattern for corner buildings in the city (apart from the rather elaborate turret roof), the building is perhaps most notable for the horizontal extension to the south and the corresponding shift in materials and design – both of which are rather less typical. The upper floors (again, apart from the turret roof) follow a pretty standard style for turn-of-the-century (19C – 20C, mind you…not 20C – 21C) buildings; the lower floor is more Tudor Eclectic, and I have no idea how to classify the turret roof. Overall, quite an eclectic building – oh, and for further amusement, the building no longer houses a restaurant, despite the prominent sign advertising otherwise.

Photo 5:
Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park

In this case, the building is literally in Lincoln Park – the park not the neighborhood. The building, as you can see from the sign on the front, is Cafe Brauer (completed in 1908 and designed by Perkins & Hamilton; formerly the South Pond Refectory). I know the photo is a bit washed-out, but it was necessary so that the terra cotta and brick details below the roof eave would be visible; stylistically, the building falls under the Prairie Style, a style common in the Midwest around the time the building was designed and built.

Enjoy.

Fog, 26 October 2011

I don’t often get to wander around when there’s fog about, so I was quite excited when I did get the chance to do so a few months back (of course, the fact that I was able to get away is because, well…I wasn’t “getting away” from anything – being unemployed kinda does that).

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Photo Information:

Location: Chicago, Illinois; Lincoln Park
Camera: Nikon D80
Lens: Nikon Nikkor 35mm f/1.8 DX

Yes, I know…two photos of trees. Hey, y’all know I love trees. The second photo was a happy accident…I saw the guy walking past on the golf course, so I shot the photo quickly – a little too quickly as it turns out, since I didn’t meter it correctly. Thankfully, I could adjust the exposure in post-processing, so I got it mostly corrected.

Enjoy.