The Red Cube

So, on the corner of Broadway and Liberty Place is this huge red cube. It is an art work, which is called "The Red Cube", done by the artist Isamu Noguchi.

It's kind of out of place amongst the tall black buildings. And, it is in a tourist location, near Wall Street and the World Trade Center site. People like to pose with it, pretending they are holding it up from afar (like the Leaning Tower of Pisa). It's also interesting in various types of weather. In the winter, it's kind of like a square igloo on its side.

In rainy weather, if you stand in the right place you can be kind of protected from the elements.

But the main reason I'm writing about this is because of this abstract picture I took through the center with perfect positioning to see this reflection of the building across the street.

Film Shoot

Was wandering through Chelsea around 9PM when a large crowd and bright lights were spotted. It was a movie shoot. There were screams from the people on the street surrounding the subjects.

The setup was a car scene, with a hotrod-type car mounted to a moving platform. In the earlier days of movies, there would just be a studio shot with people sitting in front of a projection of traffic behind. I guess the same thing could be done with a green screen, but this certainly ends up being more realistic, I guess. The setup is so elaborate with a camera vehicle and a lighting vehicle preceding the actual actors vehicle. It was a chaotic scene, not to mention the rubbernecking from traffic on Sixth avenue.

I snapped off a few shots, but didn't recognize the actor. He turned out to be Jay Baruchel (never heard of him but he has decent credits). He had a dog on his lap also. A tour bus came up aside of the setup. More screaming, as those up top hovered over the scene. The driving actor seemed to be enjoying the attention and snapped off a wink to the crowd.

I started to move away and then heard that Nicholas Cage was in the car, on the other side (which I couldn't see). I moved closer and saw him, but wasn't able to get a shot. In the past when I've encountered various movie shoots taking place in the City, I was annoyed by the authoritative declarations of crowd control production assistants who always seemed to be Jr. High Schoolers telling you to get out of the way. But, I kind of liked the handler below in the Yankee hat, who gave updates to the crowd, and even gave information about the film and what was happening.

By the way, the film is a Disney movie called The Sorcerer's Apprentice. It's coming out July 16th, 2010.

WTC down below

There is some progress now becoming visible at the World Trade Center site. Some parts of the construction are now above ground level (primarily the Freedom Tower, which has been renamed to "One World Trade Center", it is at the upper right of the picture).

This is what the site now looks like from the building across the street (height 32nd floor). I would need a bit more of a wide angle to get it all in. The square shaped construction with the square metal hole in it is in the footprint of one of the former buildings and will be a memorial. I think the second memorial is part of the square pattern below that area and to the left of it.

Flyover Flew Over

It is Fleet Week in New York City. That's when the Navy hits town with their sailors and battleships. There are boat parades and other events. Scheduled at 11:45am today was a flyover of military F-18 planes which were to head up over the Hudson River at 1000 feet. That's so low that they had multiple announcements to warn the NY public regarding the low flying aircraft.

Since I was well situated on the 32nd floor of a building that looked directly out to the Hudson, I was geared up, excited and ready for the planes to zip by. I pre-set my camera to a fast shutter speed and arrived at the window at 11:40am. I took a shot of a battleship as it went by and waited with a few others for the planes.

One guy said, "You missed it", they went by at 11:35am. He had the air of jocularity and I didn't pay any attention. I saw crowds along the riverfront and on buildings overlooking the water so they would have left if the planes had gone by... obviously.

Well, soon it was noon, and then it was 12:15pm. No planes. Apparently they had passed by already. So much for military precision.

The Look

Some of the most interesting interaction between street strangers is when attractive women (or women who think they are attractive) pass by men (who think they themselves are attractive and try to spark something or might just enjoy looking).

One instance previously noted was the "Millionaire's Girl" comment, a rather aggressive method. But, here are a couple of other shots with guys noticing women passing.

1) This is in Foley Square. This woman was strutting for a few blocks and captured the gaze of this guy as she was about to descend into the subway (just out of site, but which he appeared to be guarding).

2) Another one, this woman was getting quite a bit of attention for several blocks after her Starbucks run, but I think the little sideways "hi" here was an interesting unthreatening gesture from a man passing out leaflets for cheap suits.

Lottery Competition

I took this picture of several people making purchases at a newsstand. Lottery tickets are a hot item at this particular location. This picture of the interaction between two women I thought was interesting. It looked to me that woman #1 on the left was glaring at the complacent woman behind her on line. I was going to call it "Newsstand Glare".
However, when I zoomed in on #1's eyes, it became clear that she was looking down at the lottery picks that the second woman was about to make. So, the essence of the picture changed, as you could interpret that she was not happy that others were participating in the contest. I renamed the picture to be called "Lottery Competition".

Phone Booth trio

About a year ago, I noticed that an area of construction on the corner of Fulton and Broadway had a rather artistic spin around the scaffolding. The street has been dug up and there appeared an arty orange striped arrow structure. On the street I noted three telephone booths, that alone is a vestige of an old New York. There might be one here or there, but three together is unusual.
Now, more than a year later, of course, the construction is still in progress but has evolved somewhat. The orange striping is gone, replaced with a solid blue wall. The street is repaired but there is no traffic yet. And, the three phone booths are more prominent. It caught my eye again the other day, and the blue seemed like a good background to frame the three phones (especially when I saw a green milk crate next to it). Also, it was a cloudy day, which provided a nice even light to the scene.

So, I setup and waited for people to work their way through the scene rushing by on the sidewalk. I timed the shots as people were in various spots in balance with the phones. Here are a few of them:

1) The green jacket balances the green crate in this one.
2) This one was going to be my pick of the group, as I like the urgency of the guy coming in on the right and the opposition of the girl with the orange pants heading the opposite way.
3) But, when I looked at them in a smaller format, the three figures in this one, I thought, was the most unusual.
4) The next day I went back, this time it was a sunny day so I was curious to see if it would be a different type of shot, and I actually saw a guy on the phone (what? in this day of cell phones!).

Conversations

More people are hanging out on the street and engaging in conversation as the weather improves. I noticed a couple of sets of people today in heated discussions. Or should I say one of the people in each of the chats was obviously the talker, while the other was the listener. Each of the talkers contributed their portion of the dialogue for at least three minutes without a break to listen.

This guy was standing at a section of Broadway that was undergoing construction. Because part of the street was blocked off, he had a nice little niche for his discussion. I call this picture, "What About Me?"

These two guys were near the PATH train. The orange fellow was quite expressive with his hands. This one is called "Orange Talker".

Foley Square

It was wonderful weather and I took a stroll up towards Foley Square. This is the home of the legal system in New York City. There are many court houses in the area, as well as a prison called The Tombs. I've been on jury duty three separate times here (twice on murder cases), so I kind of know the area (which is close to Chinese food - Chinatown).

The primary building has grand steps that people like to stand on as it kills time between court sessions and presents a great view of the surrounding area. The guy below seems like an attorney to me.
There is a bit of a slope in the geography on the west side of Foley Square. This area was called Five Points at one time, and there was a stagnant pond in this area that reeked of odor. Five Points was also the setting of the film "Gangs of New York". They basically demolished the neighborhood and built the courts.

I'm not sure if this slope is related to the prior landscape, but I thought the shot below was quite interesting. From the perspective with the zoom lens, the buff security guard towers over the little walker to the left. He is the giant of the law. Behind, is a swiveling diagonally striped barrier that comes up from the street to block any traffic. It is lowered if you're a good citizen. There are similar barriers around Wall Street. In the picture, you can see the guards checking the underside of the car with a mirror.

By just swiveling in the same spot to the north, the City Clerk building is viewable. This is where marriages are performed. The couple in the picture had just gotten married. I thought this shot was interesting, catching the kiss, but also showing how this little bit of drama is absorbed by the activity of New York City.

Waiting for Ugly Betty

I guess since the weather is warming up, there is more film production taking place in New York. Last evening there were two productions within two blocks of each other near City Hall. These events can be easily spotted by the trucks that take over the street parking. There are equipment trucks, catering trucks and trailers for actors.

Since the parking is reserved, there are signs that get posted to hold the parking. These signs mention the name of the production company and of the movie /TV Show. I guess the main draw this time was "Ugly Betty". But, as I was passing it looked like it would be some time before they would start shooting (probably when it was dark).

That meant that there would be a lot of waiting around for the crew. I noticed these two production members killing time, sitting in the truck and waiting and waiting.... looked like they had some unloading to do into the colored bins when the time came.

Tourists

I spend a lot of time in the neighborhood of the site of 9/11. So much time that it is now a routine part of my life. I regularly take the PATH train that circles the base of the site looking at the active construction. My office has a birdeye view of the pit from the building across the street. And, while I was not in the immediate region during the time of the event, I did watch it as it happened from a distance.

The area is very crowded, primarily by tourists, although there are quite a few business people on the streets as it is in the heart of the financial district. Large tour groups pass through as their guides lead them, holding umbrellas high, looking to be followed through the crowds and back to the buses.

Sometimes there are hundreds of people in a single tour, and they like to perch on the steps of One Liberty Plaza, an office building that overlooks the site, has a nice view, and has steps to rest upon. With the warmer weather coming, there are substantially more people sitting on the steps. Like typical tourists, they pose and take pictures of each other, and chat, listen to the tour guides and mill about. Sometimes there are those who seem to be emotional about the events that happened there, but mostly it is a standard tourist stop.

This time when I passed, there was a particularly large group on the steps and they were clustered in kind of an interesting formation. I took several pictures and thought it was ironic that the tourists are the ones usually taking the pictures and now they were the subjects.

Upon closer inspection, I found the picture above to be interesting. There are several groupings that stand out. And, it seems that this was a particularly emotional group. Looking at the large master, it is pretty much just a group sitting on the steps until you zoom in and look at the gestures and expressions. Here are some of the individual croppings:

A family obviously, the gestures draw attention, the boy pointing towards the site. Either he's bored, or was told something about the event and is making some sort of reference to it. I think more likely he is responding to the many cranes. It is a giant construction site with tall objects and trucks. The father appears to be reacting, perhaps to what happened. But, I looked at subsequent shots in the series and found him pointing and looking up, so I conclude he is also interested in the construction.

This woman is obviously disturbed. Those who are with her appear to be consoling her. A followup shot showed the man putting his arm around her. I believe she may be responding to the site's history.

This woman also seems to be on the verge of tears. A later shot made it more apparent. This is a bit more of a reaction that I commonly see in the visitors. Later in the day, I heard there had been a big crowd of perhaps 1000 people at the site. I did a google search to see if there was some sort of activity taking place but couldn't find anything. An explanation might be that there was some sort of organized 9/11 event happening. This usually happens at the yearly commemoration on September 11th, but perhaps there was something else. I really don't know.

The Coffee Cart

Another rainy morning, this time I observed the activity at the coffee truck near Park Row, across from City Hall. I watched as various formations of people and umbrella made interesting patterns. It was windy and cold, shiny and bright.

Various people visited the cart for their breakfast, regulars mostly. Sometimes there are tourists but that is generally rare, and usually not on a rainy day during the morning commute. The tourists slow down the routine for the regulars.

As I took pictures, a construction worker stormed towards the truck. I could hear him even though I was fairly far away. He was steamed. "Look at this! Do you see what you did?" He held the bag up to display the contents to the coffee vendor, who looked puzzled. The coffee guy shook his head like he understood that the guy was complaining, but not what he was complaining about.

I was trying to think what was the issue? Was it the wrong order? In the end, I thought that it might be that they didn't put the coffee lids on tight enough and the pastries and rolls might have gotten wet. But, I really don't know. Any rate, it didn't matter if the vendor understood or not, as the customer is always right.

Some time passed while the order was fixed. It appeared to be a rather large order.

Finally, the construction worker left, appearing satisfied somewhat. He walked right up next to me, oblivious, and pulled out a walky talky and called his supervisor to explain why he was not yet back on the job with their food.

Under an Awning

Sometimes the best shots just happen as you're moving along... something catches your eye, you take a few shots and you're done. But, if you exhibit patience (hard to come by), you can stay in one spot, setup and hope something manifests itself.

In the rain the other day, I took the latter approach (because it was wet) and parked myself at a doorway and just shot as people walked past. I didn't realize it was an "active" doorway until the door behind me opened and pushed me out into the rain. I repositioned myself underneath the awning of a corner Sushi fast food restaurant. This spot was dry and I could look in multiple directions.

I waited and shot, and waited and shot. All together 117 shots. And, I considered these three of the most worthwhile.

"Wet"

"You Look So Relaxed"

"Jealous"

Millionaire's Girl

It was one of the first nice days of the spring and the street was full of people.

This girl had a certain walk as she moved quickly through the crowd walking east on Wall Street. She attracted attention from all sides, with her sunglasses and stylish boots. As she slipped past some guys standing in front of 44 Wall Street, a voice called out, "Hey Sweetheart!" She was obviously experienced in avoiding street interaction and kept her quick pace without a comment.

Ten seconds later, the same guy said, "Next time a MILLIONAIRE talks to you, answer him back!".

She continued on for about 5 seconds, and then paused, turned around and gawked back with a look of disbelief... huh? She shook her head and mouthed the word, "Asshole" and then continued on.

That would have been the decisive moment for this series of pictures. I saw it and was shooting, but missed the shot.

Perspective

Cab Trio
Originally uploaded by John Fraissinet

With a "long" lens, things that are far apart can look like they are on top of each other. This shot is with a 135mm lens.

I took this shot from about a quarter mile away from the cabs down around Bowling Green park at the end of Broadway. The real distance, though, is from the taxis all the way back to the Chrysler Building behind. It looks fairly close but actually the Chrysler is all the way up at 42nd street which is about 4 miles further up the road (I looked the distance up on Google maps).

It still amazes me how close everything appears, and I really like how the three cabs line up so nicely.

Arm Crossed Couple

Sometimes grabbing a quick shot on the street ends up with a pleasing blur effect. Depending on the colors and subject, this can turn into a surrealistically abstract piece of work. Like a painting.

This one is of a couple strolling near the World Trade Center site. The woman's coat is what caught my eye. I later learned they were German. They were walking with their crossed arms for a while, but by the time I was rattled off the one shot they were disconnected.

James Dean

I originally titled this picture - Marlboro Man. But, upon reflection, there is something about this picture that made me think of the coolness of James Dean with his dangling cigarette. It's not the looks, it's the style and energy.

Rainy Corner

Rainy Corner
Originally uploaded by John Fraissinet

There are a couple of elements that I find interesting about this picture which makes it one of my new favorites.

Besides, the brightness of the light blue umbrella and the red Don't Walk sign, there is a surrealistic feel to it. I shot it with a slow shutter speed because it was dark, and this added to the blur of the image. But, you can see that the building and signs are sharp, so the motion is from street activity and not camera shake.

I find the "characters" in the picture are also expressive. The main somber woman with the blue umbrella. The elderly couple to the right who have come from shopping (and the rolled up newspaper or something in his back pocket). The center umbrella creates a triad of focal points above those two sets of characters. And, the rush of the figure approaching on the left adds a bit of clutter and dynamic.

When I took the picture, I was attracted to the light blue umbrella. Like most of my pictures, the core was not planned but was discovered after I got to review it.

Sliver of Light

Another cold sunny day. I hadn't been out to the streets with my camera for a while so I forced a quick trip. Close by is an elevated plaza that serves as an excellent perch to observe the street traffic. This time the light coming from the south up the avenue illuminated the walkway in a singular strip. I planted myself at the plaza's corner for ten minutes and grabbed these shots. Then quickly returned to my warm building.

Distinct Activities

It was a rare warm February day and I took a lunch time stroll along the river looking towards Jersey City (the tower in the distance). I was watching the work being done by the two men on the crane on the huge torch (I think based on the Statue of Liberty which is out of frame off to the left). I noticed in the picture all the distinct individual activities happening. Besides the torch workers, there is an overall balance to the others. None are in groups, and all have their own agenda.