8 posts tagged “nyc”
The USS New York - a battleship that has 7 tons of steel from WTC recycled into its hull - sailed into New York on the Hudson river yesterday (Nov 2). It was quite a spectacle. It was about 8am on a gloomy morning. The all grey USS New York almost blended in the background and the photos look like they are black and white!
The traditional twin beams which make up the "Tribute in Light" went up on the night of 9/11. It was a rainy day and I bore the brunt of it on a much delayed flight from Minneapolis. I landed past 12 am (so technically 9/12) and could see the tops of the beams on way from Newark airport on the Pulaski Skyway. This is a very dignified, yet poignant, way to remember 9/11. As far as I can recall, the tribute in light used to run for about a week until Sep 11 but this time it was only a day. The beams go up to the south of the original site and disperse among the clouds creating a bit of a halo. For those of us that saw the whole chain of events unfold on that fateful Tue morning, watching this tribute strikes a chord.
The Highline Park in Manhattan is a result of clever use of unused real estate by essentially creating a park on stilts along disused railroad lines. Apparently, freight trains used to run here till about 1980 for the meatpacking trade. Now, an 8 or so city block length of this has been converted into a park - with more to come later. Unlike other rails to trails, they have not covered up the tracks completely - so once can see the ballast, wooden sleepers and the bands of metal and get the perspective. Also, the elevation gives interesting views of the intersecting streets and of the river and the New Jersey skyline as well.
You will not find manicured lawns but relatively wild grass, though flower beds exist at regular intervals. It is, for the most part, narrow and there is plenty of seating that seems to try to blend in with the whole railroad theme. My kid loved it. Unlike a regular park, there were unexpected views of streets and buildings. pebbles and wild grass and the tracks themselves. Restrooms have been provided and there is an elevator on 16th St. There is also a clever deck that seems to hang on top of 10th Av with amphitheater like seating. All in all, very much worth a visit. Was pretty crowded, though, on Sat afternoon.
Jersey City, NJ offers, unquestionably, some of the best Manhattan views.
And it has a semblance of a skyline itself. The Goldman Sachs building (see below) is undoubtedly the crowning glory of the JC skyline. The Colgate clock next to it provides an interesting contrast. Seen from the riverfront next to the Hyatt (which kind of juts into the Hudson), you also see the Verrazano bridge all lit up.
Here's another of my experiments with HDR. The liberty marina is just opposite where I live. I took this a few days back - a day on which there was a very deep orange glow in the sky.
Also, see another HDR photo of midtown Manhattan
BTW, HDR is a technique of taking photos with different exposures and merging them. So this one was taken with 4 different exposure and merged using photomatix (you see their watermark because this is a trial version. I still cannot bring myself to buy it for $99 - at least not yet!)
This post is about my experiments with photography
I have been experimenting a little with this technique called HDR in photography. This essentially involves taking photos with different exposures and combining them. You can see that I am using a trial version of this software called photomatix. Today was a particularly clear day, well suited for this kind of an exercise.
Another one of my better HDRs is teh following one
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bharatsrao/3417087770/
I also have a couple of slide shows
1) Earth Hour: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bharatsrao/sets/72157616051107502/show/
2) Cruise Ship: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bharatsrao/sets/72157616051107502/show/
I have not really seen the "transition" in the New York skyline at 8.30 pm on earlier Earth hours, so I decided to check it out armed with my faithful SD1000. For those who missed it, "Earth Hour" basically involves dimming or turning off lights between 8.30 pm - 9.30 pm wherever you are in the world on Mar 28. Promoting conservation is the idea.
It was a wonderful day - a comfortable 50F, clear and no rain and not particularly windy. Here's what I saw of downtown and midtown before 8.30 pm: The spires of the midtown buildings were shining bright. In downtown, the WFC was resplendent
I was in downtown Jersey city - facing downtown NY and at an angle to midtown. A little before 8.30, I could see lights go out floor by floor in WFC. In midtown, the effect was more dramatic - the spires all went dark at once. In downtown, apart from WFC, the dimming was not that discernable. But notice the change in WFC.
Watch the slideshow: http://www.flickr.com/photos/bharatsrao/sets/72157616051107502/show/
I started walking back home when the thought of raising a toast to Earth hour crossed my mind and I made a quick pit stop at a pub. I asked the bartender if she had any Earth Hour specials. She goes "Sorry, what specials? did you ask for food specials? we have mussels....". So I gave her the dope on Earth day and she goes "Oh wow! How come I didn't know? What a good concept. You know what? We always keep our lights dim."
As I nursed my long island iced tea and nibbled at bruschetta, I thought if ever there was a case of making a virtue out of a necessity while, some may add, perpetuating a vice, this was it: A dimply lit pub claiming credit on Earth hour
Cheers to Earth Hour!
Q: Why is Earth hour not part of Earth day? It's so confusing!
More R160 train sets are definitely being introduced on the E and I have seen several cars in the 9300 series. My rides in R160s are getting more frequent as are sightings. It does appear that there are consecutive pairs of R160s running which makes sightings of two of them at WTC pretty frequent. The ride in the 53rd street tunnel is noticeably smoother and less noisy in the R160. No complaints on the lighting and temperature control front either. However, I’ve seen two recent automated announcement system glitches. The first one was when the automated announcement and the electronic display decided to play truant in tandem. Here I was on a WTC bound train hurtling towards Penn station and the announcement system insisted that this was a “Manhattan bound E Express train” next stop was “Archer Avenue JFK Airport”. The frustrated conductor would then come on line, apologize for the glitch and announce the correct stop. This continued till WTC. Even as it arrived in WTC, the loud and clear announcement was that the next stop was Woodhaven Blvd! creating confusion among some of the waiting crowd and elicitng quite a few what the f…? The other incident was when the audio announcement was correct but the electronic display was stubbornly stuck in Queens when we were at W4! In both cases, some kind of re-set ensured that the the audio and visual information was corrected before the trains left WTC. I wonder what kind of overrides do the conductors have?
