Category Archives: Chicago

A retro Night Out

It seems to have been a musical time for me recently. The other week I saw Thomas Dolby do a short performance which was great (although if you read the blog post you will have noted my disappointment at the session afterwards – all of which was my fault). This time it was another throwback to my youth.

Howard Jones has recently reworked his first two albums and was undertaking a mini-tour to promote them. He came to Chicago and performed at the Bottom Lounge so we went along to see him. The show was in two halves with one album for each half. First things first. It was excellent. You often wonder how a performer will be after a few years (quite a few) out of the spotlight.

He really did a great job for us. The venue was a nice size to feel involved and he certainly got the crowd involved with it all. Being someone who based his music on synths, getting a big stage effect is not going to happen. However, he did still make a good job of it – even if I did chuckle a little at his two support musicians. His drummer was too cool for school and the guy running the sequencer amongst other things at the back looked like he was more comfortable in a studio than on stage.

Still, a crowd that was predisposed to be welcoming certainly got what they wanted and I have to say we were very pleased to go. (I suspect a few members of the audience had been brought by their friends but why they couldn’t head to the back of the room if they want to ignore the stage and talk is a mystery to me. Rudeness is alive and well in the US!)

Thanks, Howard, for making an old git feel a bit younger for a while!

Something Fishy

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Let’s get the statements of the obvious out of the way first. Yes, I am a bit of a “gear head”. I am quite partial to stuff! Does this mean that I sometimes get things that I don’t necessarily “need”? Yes, of course. Having got past that, let’s move on.

One thing I have been pondering for a while on the lens front was a fish-eye. Not something that is needed on a regular basis but something that has its moments. Canon had a couple of fishes that I was looking at. They had the 8mm fish and the 15mm fish, both of which had things that interested me. Which one was better for me? My two main bodies are 1.3 crops but I do have a couple of APS-C sensor cameras which have the 1.6 crop. All of this impacts the effect. Besides, when buying lenses, who knows whether I will have a full frame camera at some point.

The result of all of these variables was that I never bought a fish-eye at all. I just pondered what I should do at length and did nothing in the mean time. Imagine, then, my delight when Canon announced the introduction of the 8-15mm fish-eye zoom. Have they been bugging my thoughts to find out what I want? I guess so. That reminds me, I must start thinking more about other things I want them to develop!

Of course, the announcement of a new lens does not mean the availability of a new lens. Recently, it seems the announcement can be far ahead of the delivery. Obviously the issues in Japan resulting from the earthquake and tsunami have had a major impact but I suspect there is more to it than that. Anyway, the thing is finally in the wild. My friend Jim Koepnick was the first person I saw to have one. They would appear in stores and be gone almost as fast. No biggie since it wasn’t like I had been struggling without it. Once they were regularly in store I placed my order.

I have to say, I love the thing. It feels great in the hand and, despite what I have heard from some reviews, I have had no issues with the lens cap. It is also a chance for me to start learning what can be done with such a lens. There are the obvious effects you can get and the access to a lot of width in tight spaces. However, it can also create interesting effects by changing the angle at which you hold it.

I went out in the city to give some time to experimentation. I ended up in Millennium Park which is a slightly odd place to play with a fish since many of the features already have a slightly “fishy” look to them anyway. Of course, that does sometimes allow the subject to be more tolerant of some distorting effects. It was a fun place to shoot since it is always busy and getting close and using the fish provides some options as well as making surrounding people disappear into the background quite quickly.

I also played around with a couple of effects. There is a metal frame across the lawn at the Pritzker Pavilion. By tilting the camera down, I could really emphasise the curvature but by tilting it up, the frame became almost totally flat. Something to remember. I also played around with slightly rotating the camera. This made the edge of the frame level and the receding horizon appears to turn up dramatically. Not something to overdo but still a concept to remember for the future.

I am certainly happy that I have added the fish to the arsenal. Now I have to make sure I make good use of it without slipping over the edge into using it when I shouldn’t. Hopefully my friends will warn me if that is the case. That, and I have to remember to keep myself out of my own shots!

Funky FedEx

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The other day while I was sitting at my desk, I happened to look out of the window and across the river. (Under no circumstances should you conclude that I was spending a large amount of time staring out of the window. There is no evidence to support such allegations!)

As I looked across to Wacker Drive, I saw a FedEx delivery truck that looked very unusual. It had a very aerodynamic looking front end and didn’t look anything like their normal trucks. A while later, I googled FedEx and delivery trucks to see if anything came up and, sure enough, there was a feature on their website about a number of new trucks that they are running trials on, some of which are here in Chicago.

The trials are for new designs that are either light weight conventional designs or alternative propulsion designs. They are trying the different concepts out on different routes to see which ones are best suited to which routes rather than having a one size fits all approach. Apparently, we have some electric vehicles here in the city.

I didn’t think much more about it until a few days later when I was out in the Loop. As I came down a back street, a came across one of the new trucks. It certainly has a very modern look about it. The driver was not around so I had a bit of time to look around it. Apparently, there is not a door to the outside on the cab. It seems you have to go back through the truck. There were some quite jazzy looking electronic access controls so it has all the bells and whistles fitted.

It will be interesting to see how the trials go and whether these become a regular sight. Given how many miles FedEx puts in, they must have plenty of scope to save cash!

Michigan Avenue Bridgehouse

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The Chicago tourist activities have been continuing. Another local attraction I have never been to – and this one has no excuse since I have known about it for ages and it is visible from my window! – is the bridgehouse for the Michigan Avenue bridge.

Chicago has a large number of movable bridges across the Chicago and Calumet rivers. A large number of them are bascule bridges. For those of you not familiar with French descriptions of bridges, bascule bridges are counterbalanced and rotate out of the way using very little power due to the excellent balance. (Bascule is French for seesaw.)

The museum is in the tower at one end of the bridge. It is a pretty small museum but it provides access to the mechanisms that move the bridge. This is something that interests an engineering type like me. I think they could have made things a little better though. There is very little lighting down there so it is hard to make out all of the parts of the machinery. They could also provide a bit more of a guide to this. As a photographer, the amount of fencing in the way is a nuisance but I doubt there is much they could do about that.

As a result of the relatively limited nature of the bridge, the rest of the museum is a history of Chicago, its rivers and the water supply. It certainly provides more to look at and is quite worth a look. There are also some slightly different views of the river. Since it was only $4 to get in, I think it was worth a look. Now to see how I can make some suggestions to them about improvements.

More Walking Around Chicago

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The walk with my Mum also took in some spots I have been to before. Never one to travel sans camera I ended up taking some new shots. Whether they are better than ones taken before, I have yet to decide.

We stopped off in Union Station. No trying to repeat the gun battle from The Untouchables for us. Just a look around. It is a very impressive hall and it would be nice to think that there would be some larger use for it but the commuters never come this way so it is a smattering of travelers that end up here – plus tourists and film buffs of course.

We then wandered up along the river and stopped off at the Holiday Inn. Its location on the confluence of the north and south branches of the Chicago River gives it a great view of the city. The clouds had started to roll in so it wasn’t at its best but still worth a look.

Around Chicago

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Continuing the theme of my Mum’s visit, the two of us took a stroll through the city the other day. It is always fun to exploit the visit of someone to do some touristy wandering that you would otherwise never do. It also makes you explore some things that you haven’t seen before.

We included the Cultural Center on our route but I was surprised yet again by this place. Having only recently discovered it courtesy of friends visiting in the past (see this posting), during this visit I found another room that I hadn’t been to before. It was an empty room but quite ornate. It was very dark so getting a good shot was tricky. I tried a bit of HDR which was okay but I will have to go back again at some point to try again I think.

Another stop was at the Palmer House Hotel. Now a Hilton, my Dad stayed there recently when he was visiting and told me about the grandiose lobby it has. I had never been in before – why visit hotels when you live in the city – and it was impressive so we stopped in to take a look. How many other things from the city have I missed?

Sunset at the Botanic Gardens

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I have had my Mum visiting . We try and find some fun things to do while she is staying and maybe even tie them in to things I have been meaning to do. One of these things was a trip to the Botanic Gardens. The thing that made this different is that, during the summer they have been having a late opening until 9pm. The evening light should provide some good opportunities with the camera.

It certainly is a good time to visit. The crowds are not there as they would be normally (although there are still a fair number of people around) so you have less of a feeling of being rushed by people around you. Also, having a tripod is not a problem! As the evening draws in, the light gets lovely and then, once the sunset passes, you can play around with some night photography.

You do have to pay attention to which areas will get the nice light since the terrain will block certain parts of the gardens but, apart from that, you can really have a nice time wandering around and looking for nice shots.

Here are some more samples of what I saw.

Stormy Skies

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The forecast the other morning was for some big storms. I decided that this would be a good time to head down to the lakefront. When a storm hits us, I see a lot of lightning around us but there is little that I can do to get a good shot since the buildings are too close to get any perspective. Before Trump was built, there was a lot more to see but that is no longer the case.

Instead, i thought the Adler planetarium would provide a good view of the city as the storm rolled in so I hopped in the car and headed over there. There was a local TV crew setting up when I got there so I thought they must agree with my planning. The sky was certainly looking darker.

As it turned out, we were both wrong. The sky got very moody and some crazy looking clouds bubbled across but no storm showed up. Instead, it just started raining and my enthusiasm reduced significantly! Eventually I headed home and the storm ended up skirting south of us. Oh well.

Chicago Air and Water Show

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The Air and Water Show, here in Chicago, has been a regular for me since moving here – and why wouldn’t it be when I can actually walk to the show!? This year, though, I was not so inspired. The line up was not looking to be too diverse (at least as far as the things I like to shoot) and they had moved it an hour earlier which means more of the show is in the harsh lighting from a bad angle.

I skipped practice day and Saturday was almost rained out. Sunday the weather was good and I eventually found I couldn’t quite quit cold turkey and grabbed one camera and one lens (plus a bottle of water) and decided to walk slowly up the lakefront. This would give me a chance to take some shots from further away but looking more up the display line. It also made the sun angles a bit better.

As the show progressed, I gradually drifted up the lakeshore until I got the North Avenue beach, around show center, just in time for the Thunderbirds display. I should point out my timing was better than that of the Golden Knights and the Thunderbirds. The Golden Knights had finished their jump and were lined up on the beach being introduced by their commentator. Each member of the jump team was given a personal introduction and they were just getting to their special guest of the day who was getting the ceremonial baton when the Thunderbirds roared in from behind the crowd.

That was the end of the presentations as far as the majority of the crowd were concerned since the PA was switched over to the Thunderbirds commentary team who had probably been doing their introductions previously without knowing that no-one was hearing them. Don’t know whether the Golden Knights were running late or the Thunderbirds were early but, either way, not a smooth handover. The Golden Knights jump ship had been orbiting offshore awaiting its final pass but I guess they were told to make themselves scarce once the show box was handed over to the Thunderbirds!

The show was not too bad. I’m glad I went and I took the reverse stroll home which also worked pretty well. I guess I can’t pass up an airshow on my doorstep, even if the schedule doesn’t get me too excited!

Looking down on the world

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After a bit of a false start this week, I did a short job for a local company in partnership with some people I have worked with before. This job was to get some aerial shots of a tractor factory in the Chicago suburbs. The job was tied to another sortie so the timing was based on when that would happen. However, the aim was for a morning launch, hopefully to get some reasonable light.

The plant was not far from the base of the helicopter so I strapped myself into my harness and sat in the door of the S-58 to get the shots. A few orbits of the location later, a selection of shots were in the bag. They were looking for something straightforward so no great artistic expression on these. However, hopefully we got something that they like.

The main shots are going to them at the moment but here are some from the others I got on the trip.