VENICE OF THE NORTH
Seems like every trip to Europe has gone through Amsterdam, yet I never set foot outside the airport, that is until our last trip in 2012 when we finally experienced this fascinating city. While not exactly Venice it does have its share of water and water transportation. There are canals throughout this city and people are as at home on the water as they are on solid ground. Every canal is lined by houseboats and jammed with every sort of craft from water taxis and pleasure boats to a variety of work boats. The other thing that struck me about Amsterdam were bicycles, thousands of them. Obviously this is the preferred mode of transportation for locals. Every street seemed lined with rows of bicycles; how people keep track of which one is their's remains a mystery to me. Maybe it doesn't matter. A few years back Santa Cruz tried a "borrow a bike" program, painted them all yellow so they could be identified. In two weeks time there wasn't a yellow bike in town!
Another measure of a city to me is its culture. Amsterdam is home to numerous museums and other cultural attractions. Of particular interest to me was the Concertgebouw (one of the world's finest venues for classical music), the Rijksmuseum, Van Gogh Museum, and the Hermitage Amsterdam.
As a visitor on foot perhaps what impressed me most about the city, and indeed most large European cities, is their public transportation systems. We found it easy to navigate either by light rail or water taxi. One can reach nearly any part of the city by either means for a reasonable cost, and obviously many locals solved their problems with two-wheeled transportation, e.g. the bycycle. While many large U. S. cities boast excellent public transportation (L.A. is not one of them) smaller cities across the country, like my home Santa Cruz, had better start serious thinking about where we go in the next twenty-years. It often takes 30-40 minutes to move two or three miles, then find there is no place to park once there. I thought of this today while sitting in traffic going nowhere. And all we do is complain and commission yet another study that will ultimately be rejected...in favor of yet another study. We are simply so wedded to the convenience and freedom of our cars that we refuse to entertain any alternative; and yet the day is approaching when we will have no alternative but change...or come to a complete halt.
It seems to me we could take a lesson from many European cities on how to solve this problem. There is no ideal answer but cities like Amsterdam seem to have employed a variety of means to get around. Why can't we do likewise?
The other thing where we might learn from the Dutch, and maybe the Venetians as well, is how to hold back the sea in this era of rising seas. I think of the cute story of the little Dutch boy with his finger in the dike to hold back the sea; but it's only a half joke, they really do have a problem in the Low Countries, and they seem to know what they're doing. Cities like New York, Boston, Miami, New Orleans, San Francisco/Oakland, Seattle, and others are going to have to deal with this. New Orleans has already paid a huge price but I'm not sure any U.S. city is truly ready to cope with this all too real threat.
Amsterdam is one of the world's most liberal minded cities and seems to attract the younger generation. We saw thousands of youth throughout the city at all hours of the day & night. Public mores are far more progressive than our's in the U.S., and whether this is good or bad depends on your point of view, however, I must say they seem to get along just fine. The worst thing I saw was a man smoking a joint on a street corner, oblivious to what was going on, but otherwise doing no harm to anyone. I see worse than that every day in Santa Cruz. And the guy smoking a joint? Well, he was a good photo subject.
The major thing I don't care for in Amsterdam is Schiphol Airport. It is huge...a major connecting point for all of Europe. One is going to walk a lot getting from one terminal to the other, go through what seems like a never ending series of checkpoints. I just seemed to be caught up in the current of humanity until I eventually arrived where I needed to be. I also found the signage confusing, maybe because I don't read Dutch? I guess I would have to say the experience is much like New York's Kennedy or Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson! I don't read Spanish very well either.
So what's all this got to do with photography? Nothing really, except for maybe the guy with the joint.
The Emerald Isle
I recently posted several images created in Ireland in 1984 to my VISIONS OF EUROPE portfolio. Made in the "old days" long before digital photography was available these images have been scanned and digitized from 35mm slides. Back in those days my equipment (camera and lens) were a far cry from what I'm using today. To take this a step further my own skills were not what they are today. So if there's a bit of a drop in quality compared to more recent images that's the reason.
Still, these images belong in my portfolio if for no other reason than that trip marked my first visit to Europe. My even being on this trip was kind of an after-thought as my wife and her mother originally planned the trip. I had decided not to go, then late in the game changed my mind. For my mother-in-law it was the fulfillment of a life-long dream as her ancestors came from Neanaugh in County Tipperary. She was 82 at the time and I was somewhat concerned about her physical ability to cope with the rigors of travel, but was I in for a surprise. She not only coped but kept us going day and night for three weeks. She is the only octogenarian I ever saw run for a train...and catch it!
Ireland in 1984 was a step back in time. It was like life in my home town in 1945, unhurried, laid-back, where people cared about one another. We stayed almost exclusively in bed & breakfast establishments and the first thing we learned was that they wanted to talk. So whatever sight-seeing we did came after the visiting was done. On one occasion, in Cork, we planned to go out that evening and hadn't been given a key to the door. I told the landlady that we might be out a bit late and asked how we might get in when we returned, thinking that would remind her to give me a key. She looked surprised and said, "just open the door!" I asked if she didn't lock it at night, and she replied, "Now why would I want to be doing that?" Different times, different places. We found Ireland to be a lovely place and the people charming.
We didn't visit Northern Ireland as there was a different environment there at the time. We did cross the border once to visit Belleek where the famous Irish chinaware is handmade. Belleek was just a couple miles over the border into Northern Ireland. There was a check point to enter but it was kind of like going through a toll booth. We weren't questioned, bothered or detained. Oh, they did wish us a happy "holiday". We purchased a couple pieces of Belleek china to add to our collection and got it home intact only to lose that, and all the rest, in the Loma Prieta earthquake that rattled our home in Santa Cruz in 1989.
So we have several good reasons to return to Ireland if for no other reason than to check out the north which I understand is just as beautiful as the south. I also acquired a taste for some stuff called Guinness which for some reason tasted better in the presence of convivial company in the many pubs. Erin Go Braugh
RIVERS AND RAINFORESTS
RIVERS AND RAINFORESTS is the latest portfolio on my website and includes images created in October 2014.
The Pacific Northwest is at once the best of places and the worst of places in terms of weather for photography, or I suppose anything involving outdoor activity. I have photographed and backpacked extensively in Oregon and Washington over the course of 20 years or so and have experienced extremes of conditions. On one hand if the weather is fair it is hard to equal the beauty of the Cascades and coastlines to be seen in both states. On the other hand one can spend weeks on end sheltered from rain that would intimidate Noah.
This last trip was typical. We experienced incessant showers interrupted periodically by deluges. At Silver Falls State Park near Salem, OR, it rained constantly for over 24 hours. Then came the best of times, for photography in the deep forest at least. We got a window of no rain for nearly six hours, but it remained overcast. The overcast was important because sun shining through leaves, especially when wet, creates unmanageable contrast. The even, low lighting conditions produced ideal lighting conditions for photographing the falls with long exposures to produce the beautiful flowing effect of water. It also produced evenly exposed, highly color saturated images, where highlights were not "blown out" or shadows "blocked up", and because I shoot RAW I had a great deal of latitude to work with in post processing. But, because the window of opportunity is so short it is absolutely imperative that one be prepared to act when the moment arrives. That sometimes means being "out there" in the rain or snow hoping that conditions will allow an opportunity; sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. When things come together it!s hard to take a bad photo. I find that pre-visualizing the type of photography and conditions under which I will be shooting helpful in being able to respond quickly when opportunity strikes. This is something I always incorporate into the planning process long before I ever get into the field to shoot. Preparation, luck, and yes, the right weather and lighting conditions are keys to obtaining stunning photos.
i have photographed in Oregon and Washington on numerous occasions, and on all but maybe one occasion I've been rained on. So, no matter what type photography one is doing he/she needs to be prepared for inclement weather. The good news is that bad weather often opens the window for stunning photographs. So don't let a little bad weather "dampen" your spirits. Stay out there and be ready when opportunity presents itself.
AMSTERDAM ADDED!
Thirty-five new images from Amsterdam take their place in my VISIONS OF EUROPE portfolio.
DERAILED...TEMPORARILY
Last September I wrote about the failure of my computer hard drive (See "Disaster", September 26, 2014) that necessitated a total rebuilding of my drive. In that posting I credited redundancy, domiciling my images on external hard drives and backing them up on separate hard drives, as essential for turning what might be a disaster into an inconvenience. But what happens when an external drive fails? Well, I have some practical experience to provide the answer to that question.
In October, just a month after rebuilding my computer and reinstalling all its software, I traveled by RV to the Pacific Northwest to photograph fall color (some of those images appear in "Painterly Gardens" on this site). As is my long standing custom I carried relevant external drives with me so I could edit images while on the road. I carry those drives in a hard shell Pelican case that is well padded against shock on the inside. That procedure is going to change. Apparently the state of highways in this country is so poor that even Pelican cases afford inadequate protection for those delicate drives. After a day of shake, rattle, and roll on California's I-5 I tried to fire up the drive containing my entire California, Canada, and Great Basin portfilios (thousands of images)...and nothing. I assumed I had a poor connection but repeated tries with connection cords that worked with other drives failed to realize positive results. Fortunately the images were backed up (or so I thought) so again I was faced with a restructure exercise but not a disaster. Not so fast! I quickly realized that I had not backed my edits consistently and even some of the backups of original RAW images had failed without my knowledge. Suddenly I was not so smug as both those failures were squarely on me, not flaws in my work flow but negligence in execution. Now I had a problem, no two problems. The lost edits could be recreated, in time, but the lost originals were gone forever, some which I had invested a great deal of time and money to create. THIS WAS A DISASTER! Now I needed not a geek but a genius to hopefully recover data.
If you ever need to recover data the first thing you will learn is that this is a highly specialized process that comes at a price...a very dear price. Computer technicians are expensive, but those who recover data from failed drives...well, let's just say you're in a different world. The first prognosis was very doubtful and way out of range of practibility in terms of cost. It seemed the jarring and jolting from the highway caused deep scoring of my hard drive's disk surface; significant work and a degree of luck would be necessary to recover those images, not to mention the expense that went with it. The only way I could justify such cost was if my images were essential for preservation of my business or for forensic purposes. I am a photographer with a serious hobby and I don't rely on my images for my livelihood. Nor were there any legal implications involved where data was critical to prove a case. Nevertheless I was faced with significant albeit mostly emotional loss.
I won't go into detail, but subsequent negotiation resulted in an arrangement satisfactory to me and the recovery expert and was a win-win situation for us both. He was successful in recovering 100% of my images intact and I have now rebuilt my Lightroom catalogs. The only loss was time which one might argue is significant. Still, I came away with lessons learned: (1) hereafter the external hard drives stay home; I will defer uploading my images until I return, and (2) I need to be more diligent in executing my own work flow, e.g., assuring edits are backed up regularly, and assuring backup images successfully copy to the backup disk. Subsequent backup attempts have taught me that the copy process is not fool proof. In other words take nothing for granted and VERIFY.
I was lucky this time.