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I find that the Chinese Scholar's garden at Snug Harbor, here in Staten Island, is a wonderful place to go to capture beautiful as well as interesting architectural shots.
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I find that the Chinese Scholar's garden at Snug Harbor, here in Staten Island, is a wonderful place to go to capture beautiful as well as interesting architectural shots.

Staten IslandSnug HarborspringChinese Scholar's gardenscenic

  • DSC_1036 riding shotgun
  • A frequent companion on our trips across the bay since Sept. 11th, the Coast Guard is here ever ready.
  • I was hoping to capture a shot of this man gazing at the Coast Guard gun ship ideally as he looked forward. Or leaning from the other side and looking backwards at it. But of all the juxtapositions that took place, neither of those was one of them, as he rarely if ever looked at the gunship. <br /> <br /> But sometimes the story that lies in front of you is good enough. A man feeling safe enough after Sept. 11th and all the terror attacks world wide, to enjoy standing outside in the warm sunshine as the Coast Guard dutifully traveled by our side, to help ensure his reason for feeling that way.
  • The name of this yacht is the same name that my brother in California, chose for the license plate of his car. I thought he'd get a kick out of it.
  • The last time I came here to the Marina at Battery Park City on a beautiful clear night, I just missed capturing some great shots of a fantastic sunset backdrop to the great yachts docked here. So this time with another clear night predicted, I came here a lot earlier, to make sure I was in position to get some great shots. The sunset wasn't as spectacular this time, but the weather sure was, and as I walked around in the idyllic conditions I still captured some nice shots - not spectacular ones like I had hoped, but very pleasing all the same.
  • The last time I came here on a stunningly clear evening, I arrived minutes too late to capture some nice photo's of yachts back lit by a fabulous sunset skyline. So this time when the prediction was for an equally gorgeous night I made sure to get here early enough to record it. And while it turned out that this sunset was a touch less beautiful than the one that first night (only a touch), the weather was even better.<br /> <br /> One of the most perfect evenings of the entire year, the light warm breeze off the river combined with the idyllic scenery and both gently encouraged me to stroll up and down the Marina and soak in the whole experience. Every now and then I would wake up my camera, a silent companion resting quietly by my side, and ask it to record a nice looking scene coming into view...
  • DSC_1950 the Maas Trader
  • A warm pleasant morning found me standing outside on the ferry instead of sitting down inside, eyes closed snoozing to the rhythm of the ferries gentle motion. Every now and then I'd see some harbor traffic that looked interesting in the early morning light.
  • DSC_2031 sunset over Ellis Island
  • DSC_2249 early morning fishing in the park
  • Having just missed the tide coming in by 10 minutes or so, this shot was not quite the composition I was looking for. Nor was the lighting as dramatic as I desired. But this remnant of a pier long returned to the sea by time and tide, made for such an interesting image that I thought it was worth the wait to get just the shot I was looking for in my head. So seeing that I had already done an inordinate amount of walking with 2 bags of heavy camera equipment this morning, I decided I could use the break, and set up camp right here. Pulling out my tripod, I picked just the composition I wanted, then waited for the tide to come back in which I figured would be in another 3 hours or so, right around when the sun would be going down in the sky for the evening. This would transform this scene into a really nice shot.With food, my radio, and a collapsible seat all stowed in with my photo gear, I was well prepared for the wait. <br /> <br /> Now the lighting I was looking for never materialised, and I determined that I would have to come back at a different time of year when the sun would set a bit further to the east then it was doing now. But I did get a lot of other shots from my "perch" while I waited. If any of you are curious, you can see them in my other galleries here on Smugmug. (By clicking on the keyword "New Dorp beach" you see below, Smugmug will make a nice neat temporary gallery of all the shots I took this day at the only shore of Staten Island that faces the ocean. I will be back next year to collect that sunset shot I really want.
  • "Kitbashing" is a term familiar to probably all model enthusiasts. The term means to take two or more commercially available models and combine them to make a new one that isn't publicly available for sale. Often done on HO train models of every type and description, the massive popularity of model railroading guaranteed that no amount of companies would ever be able to make every engine, boxcar, caboose, and building that their devoted followers wanted to put in their layouts, and thus kitbashing was born or taken to a new level - I'm not sure which. Many of the models you'll find of every type of plane, train, boat and car are just spectacular to behold. Warhammer encourages it's members to kitbash their hearts away, as they create for the company free new vehicles to use in their worldwide empire. They are so into the practice and so well known in gaming circles for doing so that if you look up the word "Kitbashing" in Wikipedia you will find they actually mention the Games Workshop franchise by name. The creating and highly skilled painting of Warhammer items is so popular that some people who don't even play the game come to the many Games Workshop stores to make and paint the endless amounts of models and creatures that inhabit their fantasy realm.<br /> <br /> Here Scott used over a dozen models available in stores and WELL over a dozen foray's onto EBay to get all the necessary pieces he needed to make this "tank/ship" hybrid. Reminiscent to me of the Jawas massive dessert tank from Star Wars, this landship as Scott calls it, is an apt creation that some Orc army might assemble. As in game terms they are well known to scavenge the battle field for parts that they then combine and make into weapons and vehicles, to augment their massive armies. Once Scott finishes painting it (and he's going to hand paint every part of it right down to the last rivet) he will dull down the colorful paint job slightly to give it a more realistic "weathered from battles" look.
  • DSC_3294 prize winning entry
  • While I was their photographing Scott working on his model I also looked around at the many people inhabiting this tunnel shaped store. Most were assembling and painting a huge variety of creatures and weapons. This guy here fascinated me the most, for it is both creature AND weapon. A "demon canon", I'm guessing it can inflict either physical or spiritual / transformitcal damage to anything unfortunate enough to get hit by it. I'd love to know the stats for it. Plus it looks SOOOOOO freakin' cool!!<br /> <br /> Looking in the store window at all the painted models I can't help but be reminded of the fancy game shops that devote much of their store to exotic chess sets, with figurines in the shapes of everything from Civil war characters, to the 27' Yankees. In Warhammer the different playing pieces all have their own unique movement and attack abilities, and you have a chess like strategy you need to master while deploying your men, but with the unpredictability of luck, both good and bad, and weapons fire not landing exactly where you aimed it, when you started shooting. In this regard it more mimics real life skirmishes, as chess has (in war terms) the unrealistic certainty of every encounter in battle. Every chess piece on the battlefield moves exactly where it's game statistics say it can move if you choose to move it, and it always wins the battle if it is the attacker. Not so in Warhammer as the unpredictability of war runs through encounter after encounter.
  • A few of the many scale pieces that will adorn the deck of his tank ship. The green guy surrounded by the impressive array of huge guns is the orc captain. Since all these pieces are done to scale and up to specs, they will actually be used in combat and will have to be reckoned with by anything trying to attack the tank in whatever Warhammer campaign Scott enters it in. And something definitely will want to attack it. One of the great things about this store is the comradery it creates. People join in to help create a big object like his tank/ship and try to take it down in battle. Scott's friend Matthew already bought a large Warhammer tank model specifically to take Scott's Goliath creation out. I just love this place!
  • DSC_3847 returning home for the evening
  • DSC_4317 the Gotland Marieann
  • This is my final vacation for the year, taken with the idea to hopefully capture the changing colors of early fall, so far that has proven to be a bit disappointing, but there are always other things to photograph. Walking through a serenely quiet Battery Park a short while after sunrise, I had my camera in hand and my radio headset on a low volume in my ears. As I arrived at a crossroad on the dirt path I was traveling down, I looked to my right and really liked this gardening cart.
  • I find that the Chinese Scholar's garden at Snug Harbor, here in Staten Island, is a wonderful place to go to capture beautiful as well as interesting architectural shots.
  • DSC_4619 tourists enjoying the round trip
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