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Taken with my old manual focus 85mm f2 lens, I had to make a trip over to Stapleton, about 15 minutes from my house when I spotted this scene and grabbed this shot on a whim.
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Taken with my old manual focus 85mm f2 lens, I had to make a trip over to Stapleton, about 15 minutes from my house when I spotted this scene and grabbed this shot on a whim.

Staten IslandfallStapleton

  • It was the last day of October 1985 and waking up rather groggily, my fuzzy eyes were having trouble focusing in on a ceiling that seemed different somehow this morning. Moments later my backside chimed in that the bed didn't feel like my convertible bed usually felt. I then looked around some more at my domicile trying to get my brain to make sense of all this. Slowly I started to remember I wasn't at home on my mother's convertible living room couch in the Bronx, I was in the living room of my best friend Scott, here in Staten Island instead. I had asked him a few days before if he and his two roommates wouldn't mind if I slept on their couch for a few days so I could be closer to the Staten Island zoo. The trip there from the Bronx was way too long and left little time to photograph everything I wanted to, chief of which was capturing a nice shot of what had to be the fattest prairie dogs in creation. They were so cute and frisky, but I never got the chance to set up my camera before the zoo was getting ready to close. Now leaving from Scott's house here on the island I would have all the time I'd need.<br /> <br /> But at that moment my brain was still getting me up to speed with my plans for the day and my temporary new surrounds. Absolutely loving pets but not having any ones at mom's apt. to play with, I was thoroughly enjoying staying at a place that had an outrageously affectionate pit bull, a python and four cats. Friendliest of all the cats was Eeeyow (hey it was their cat they could name him whatever they wanted. In this case he was named after the sound he made when he meowed.) A 20lbs. tabby with a really loud "purr" he loved being petted and in this case getting up in the morning and sitting on this box when the early morning sunlight poured in from their dinning room window on it. The empty box had held Scott's newest birthday present from his mother a large color TV set. And he just hadn't gotten around to throwing the box out yet. A situation Eeeyow now took delight in. At this point I was completely aware of where I was and why I was there. And for that reason I knew I had my camera equipment with me.<br /> <br /> Noticing Eeeyow walking around the dinning room and then gracefully leaping onto the empty TV box, I loved how the early morning window lighting fell on him. Quickly setting up my tripod I then grabbed my 50mm lens for its' super wide maximum aperture which gave me as high a shutter speed as possible. Framing a shot that pleased me to no end I still had one niggling problem, the contrast ratio and lighting conditions were formidable for the camera's of the day.<br /> <br /> Not having either of my flashes with me, I pulled out a white index card and held it close to Eeeyow's face to bounce some light on it. But every time I got it close enough to reflect a large enough amount of light onto his face, Eeeyow would turn and look at the card instead. Finally, for after what seemed like an eternity, he grew bored of the index card and as he turned his head back towards the living room I grabbed my shot while the getting was good.<br /> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br /> Nikon FA<br /> Ectachrome 200<br /> 1/8th sec.<br /> 50mm f1.8 series E lens<br /> F1.8
  • Less than 5 minutes after stepping off our cruise ship, on the first stop of our island hoping cruise in 07', I was already frustrated with point n' shoot cameras. This was my first time shooting with a camera in over 15 years, and I was hoping I could get shots easier than I could with my old film based cameras of yore. And while this definitely proved to be the case, a couple of things were starting to bug me. First of which was not having the sweeping field of view I used to have with my 20mm nikkor on one of my 35mm cameras. Here wide as I could go, I frustratedly felt like someone trying to stretch a queen sized sheet on a king sized mattress. Finally giving up, I settled for the next best composition of our cruise ship docked next to her sister ship the "Zuiderdam" as I could.
  • Once I decided resume my love affair with my favorite hobby, I momentarily wavered on the decision to try and make due with my two point and shoot camera's, or shell out large funds that I didn't have in order to buy a new fangled DSLR to replace my old SLR's. One thing that ultimately made me devote the lion's share of my upcoming tax return on a new DSLR was shots like this. The complete inability to control depth of field with my point and shoots' was really irking me. When I walked by these colorful masks while on vacation in Barbados I wanted to throw everything behind them out of focus, or at the very least slightly soft. But due to the law of physics, when you have a tiny image sensor the point and shoot camera the sensor's sitting inside of is going to have almost unlimited depth of field, no matter what aperture you choose. Only getting right up on top of your subject will reduce depth of field and usually that will kill your composition.<br /> <br /> So five months after I took this shot (along with the generous and unsolicited help of my best friend Scott) I plunked down a large wad of dough on my first digital Nikon camera and a few new lenses to go with it, and inevitably these online galleries of my photographic adventures was born.
  • There are times where your point and shoot camera's limitless depth of field is not an issue, and since you always need to work with the tools you've got, I quickly learned to look for shots that any point and shoot camera would do well. Thus, I got a ton of great shots while on vacation on our island hopping cruise of 2007'. But once I got back home, finding scenes of endless beauty that could take all the depth of field you could give it, were a bit harder to find - unless you were capturing the truly fabulous fall colors this year. Fortunately my eye became quick to spot scenes like this one which allowed my "G9" to shine.
  • Lucky I had my handy little point n' shoot, tucked conveniently in my backpack as I walked by this live taping of the movie "Sorcerer's apprentice".
  • dscf_0998 Sorcerer's apprentice shooting
  • After I finished taking early evening scenic shots of the city skyline from the Westside piers for one of my other galleries here in Smugmug, I headed for the number 1 train to take me back to the ferry terminal. As I arrived at the corner I noticed this relaxing open air scene in front of me at this restaurant in the Village named Malatesta's. Since my camera was still dangling around my neck at the time, I took the opportunity to click off a few quick shots.
  • It was the middle of November in 1987 I was living in Staten Island , renting an apartment with my best friend Scott. And on this afternoon I was in our dining room actually setting up my equipment for a different shot then this one, when Scott's oldest cat Eeeyow (his name sounds just like the noise a cartoon character makes when an anvil falls on their foot), jumped up into this chair at our table. This was the same dining room I took a picture of him in two years before while sitting on that empty box one morning. <br /> <br /> When I saw him sitting here like he was waiting for us to give him his supper, there was just NO WAY I wasn't taking this picture.<br /> -----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------<br /> Nikon F3<br /> Fuji 50D<br /> 1/80th sec.<br /> nikon 50mm f1.8 series E lens<br /> F5.6<br /> main light - Nikon SB-16 flash<br /> fill light - Sunpac 622pro flash at half power
  • dsc_ 2158 the Jane Bouchard (b5)
  • Movie night
  • dsc_4541 family enjoy's america's pastime
  • I live on an interesting block. Sally is my neighbor in the townhouse next to me. Her sister AmyLynn lives in the townhouse next to her. Amy's husband Eddie has a son Edwin who a few years ago met and married a girl from the DR. Recently they were able to finally move back to the states and are now renting an apartment across the street and just 4 houses down from me! (There was even a time when Eddie's sister Lourdes lived right across the street from me too! And her daughter BrightEyes still lives in the apartment). It's quite a family affair and now it's getting even bigger. Edwin and his wife were expecting their first baby this month. The other evening when I was walking home from the bus I noticed the cutest sign in front of their apartment. They rented the sign holder for a week so I decided to take a picture of it before the company came to take it back.<br /> <br /> Congrats to the happy couple!!
  • DSCF_1249 sunrise on NY Bay
  • DSCF_1282 sunrise on NY Bay
  • Traveling to Bermuda on our cruise ship in the fall of 09', I went hunting for some of the girls in our group who said they were going to take in the after dinner show taking place in the main auditorium. I didn't spot any of them when I got there, but I did get this nice shot of the main act on stage.
  • On our cruise to Bermuda with the gang from work, my bed was the only one near the balcony, and I drew the curtain behind me closed so the sunlight wouldn't disturb Michael and Ron who were fast asleep, like most people should be on vacation at 8 in the morning. I on the other hand am not most people, and the sight of sunlight when I pulled the drapes away from the sliding glass door, made me jump out of bed and go outside on the veranda.<br /> <br /> The warm air felt great, but the sky was still too cloudy to get the kind of rich golden sunrise shot with my camera I was hoping for. So after taking a few somewhat disappointing shots of the sea and sky, I turned to go back inside and noticed my reflection in the glass. The right side of my body looked golden brown in the early morning sunlight, and I decided to let my camera snap another shot or two before crawling back into bed to catch a few more Z's before breakfast.
  • My old 35mm f1.4 manual focus lens looks to really need to be taken apart and cleaned internally. I wanted to see if it could still give me some good quality images in the mean time until I get the money for that. I looked around in the backyard for something to test it out on and saw this....<br /> <br /> (Well while re-editing this shot on my computer I noticed a pair of mini water droplets on the middle of the stem of the closest leaf. I guess that answered my question on if this ol' nikkor still had it.)
  • By the time I got back from Bermuda the leaves had fallen in mass around my house, and my backyard furniture was covered in a sea of orange foliage. I brushed the leaves off the seats and tables, but before I could get rid of them, I spotted this cat one afternoon out of my kitchen window. It's one of the many cats in the neighborhood that just love my backyard. The thick sliding glass door was really dirty on the outside, and if I went out to clean it first (another item on my "TO DO" list) the cat would have jumped away, so the shot is possibly a tick less sharp than I would have liked, despite using a tripod. But that's what I get for not keeping a spotless house!
  • Taken with my old manual focus 85mm f2 lens, I had to make a trip over to Stapleton, about 15 minutes from my house when I spotted this scene and grabbed this shot on a whim.
  • So which winter storm of 09' was this? Does it matter? They were ALL this bad. But for the curious, it was the one that hit a week before Christmas. I came out from the back way, early in the morning and grabbed my camera to photograph this pristine scene of my house just before I took a shovel to it.<br /> <br /> Noel from now on this will be your fate too.
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