up the stairs
External fire escape stairs always fascinated me, maybe because they are such an uncommon sight in european architecture. So when I was in the US I took lots of photos of early 20th century buildings with external metal staircases. This example is from Chicago city center.
-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : Initial tone and final crop.
Photoshop: Clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.
Common view in the Chicago city center, the raised tracks of the "Loop".
Under the L
-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : Initial tone and final crop.
Photoshop: Clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.
Chicago_20150328_025
Another great example of residential architecture just outside the centre of Chicago. This building was on my way back to the hotel, and each day I tried to to get a clean photo of the whole facade without any cars parked in front. And I got lucky. This building is comprised of 9 homes with a rather high price tag, it seems to be part of a time when this was a nicer part of town.
-- Gear Fujifilm X-PRO1 Samyang 8mm f2.8 Fisheye -- Post Lightroom : Initial toning and final crop Photoshop: Sharpening, colour blending and clean up NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.
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As you walk a few blocks from the center of Chicago, the architecture changes dramatically. Whereas in Manhattan most of the have at least a few scattered skyscrapers, or at least the majority of the buildings is around the 10 stories high, in Chicago the change is more abrupt. All of a sudden the comercial buildings are only one or two stories high, and the residential hardly reach 5.
-- Gear Fujifilm X-T1 Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR -- Post Lightroom : Initial tone and final crop. Photoshop: Clean up and sharpening. NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.
Chicago, the windy city, gave us a sunny and chilli welcome. The clear blue sky, and the strong sun makes it look like a summer day, but the freezing air temperature, coupled with the ever present wind, made it clear that the city had just survived one of the worst Winters in recent memory. For the first few hours in the city I was just trying to get a feel for this town, that looks so different than New York where I spent the previous week. This was taken on the North side of Michigan Ave. Probably one of the busiest streets of the center, right on the Magnificent Mile. On the other side of the road, dwarfed by the skyscrapers, stands the Fourth Presbyterian Church. Built in 1912 in the Gothic Revival style and designed by architect Ralph Adams Cram.
This marks the start of me showing the great images taken from this great city in the three days I had the pleasure to spend there. This series will probably run into the fifth month of my project.
-- Gear Fujifilm X-PRO1 Samyang 8mm f2.8 Fisheye -- Post Lightroom : Initial toning and final crop Photoshop: Sharpening, colour blending and clean up Macphun AuroraHDR: HDR toning
Roaming the streets of the big apple.
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This 8.8-acre downtown park is the perfect spot for afternoon lunch meetings as well as people-watching—newlyweds coming from the new Manhattan Marriage Bureau are often seen strolling the grounds. The park is home to more than a dozen monuments, and its bike path leads to the Brooklyn Bridge. In 1999, a $34.6 million project not only added a central walkway and gardens but also helped to bring a restored Jacob Wrey Mould fountain back to the park from the Bronx's Crotona Park. Almost all other photos I could find of this fountain show it with flowing water, but I guess that because of the harsh winter they have cut off the water and treated it as a garden. The Bethesda fountain at Central Park was also dry at this time of the year.
-- Gear Fujifilm X-PRO1 Samyang 8mm f2.8 Fisheye -- Post Lightroom : HDR photomerge, initial toning and final crop Photoshop: Sharpening and colour blending NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction
NewYork_20150322_082
Fifth Avenue at Midtown Manhattan, NYC, is known worldwide as the epicentre of designer shops and luxury retail. But like many other idiosyncrasies in the city, you can also find some sanctuaries for the soul. Here is the Presbyterian Church, located on Fifth Avenue at 55th Street. In 1875, when it was dedicated, it was the tallest building in Manhattan with its steeple rising 87 meters high. Designed by Carl Pfeiffer, whose engineering skills are evident in the technological innovations he introduced in the sanctuary. Wooden louvers installed beneath the pews allowed warm air to rise into the sanctuary from steam pipes in the basement. On warm days, enormous blocks of ice were delivered to the basement, where fans blew cooling air upward. The Sanctuary did not have modern air conditioning until 2003.
-- Gear Fujifilm X-PRO1 Samyang 8mm f2.8 Fisheye -- Post Lightroom : HDR photomerge, initial toning and final crop Photoshop: Manual layer blending, sharpening and colour blending NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction
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The chinese flag is flying high above a building in New York's Chinatown. On a country dominated by it's own flag, for an european this is always strange, seeing this flag on top of a building really jumped out at me. But then, this is Chinatown, the home of the largest enclave of Chinese people in the Western Hemisphere. Located in Lower Manhattan, next to the Lower East Side and south of Little Italy with an estimated population of 100,00 people. The architecture is typical 19th century New York, like its surrounding neighborhoods, but at street level it does feel like you are in the far east, with shops occupying every available space, sometimes stalls set up in front of another shop window, and selling all sorts of foreign produce.
-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : HDR merge, initial tone and final crop.
Photoshop: Perspective correction, clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Color Efex Pro 4: Toning and Detail extraction.
NewYork_20150323_137
Walking from Midtown Manhattan to Chinatown feels like moving from Metropolis to a small city, if that small city was located in China. The huge skyscrapers start to become less ubiquitous and slowly give way completely to streets full of 5 stories buildings. The grand avenues transform themselves into narrow streets, and the storefronts go from the franchise clones to a colorfully chaotic mash of exotic produce and homewares. The city also loses a layer of veneer and becomes more gritty, this also changes the way I approach documenting and lends to a harsher black and white tone on this street scene.
-- Gear
Fujifilm X-T1
Fujifilm XF18-135mmF3.5-5.6R LM OIS WR
-- Post
Lightroom : Initial tone, final crop and vignette
Photoshop: Minor clean up and sharpening.
NikCollection Silver Efex Pro 4: Toning, detail extraction and black & white conversion