Picture taking in Pittsburgh

Posted on October 16, 2009 by ruthek

I've been admiring these trees at CMU for awhile, but never thought to look closely at them until I saw a student taking this picture. Of course, I had to stop and look, even with the rain and darkness.

Sometimes Pittsburgh is just as beautiful as a garden in Japan.

Looking in the other direction there is a huge construction project to fix the sculpture, Walking to the Sky, which had evidently been threatening to take off. I missed a wonderful picture (another image for my museum of pictures I wish I had taken) last Thursday with all of these cranes and another machine emitting a cloud of steam. My excuse was rain. Here's one I took earlier in the week.

Here are a few more shots from around the 'burgh, because I like their geometry or their weirdness.

There is something surreal about that school bus. It's actually parked at the top of a parking lot, but it took me a while to figure it out.

My second favorite place in Pittsburgh, under the convention center. I've never seen the lights on before.

Photos and Gigapans

Posted on September 29, 2009 by ruthek

I began writing this post on Sunday/ Even though I carefully followed instructions for embedding the Gigapans, I kept getting the wrong one in the post. The instructions didn't quite match the code, the the post kept rewriting the code on its own and I wasn't sure what to do. I've been mulling this over ever since. Tonight I decided to change a colon and a quote sign to an equal sign and voila!

I was able to borrow a Gigapan from my class and have been playing with it for 10 days already. The concept is easy enough: Gigapan and camera are on a tripod; set the upper left and lower right images; let the Gigapan do its thing. It's not that simple in practice. The camera has to be set up in a certain way and the Gigapan and tripod have mechanical problems; everything has to be just so and it has to be done quickly or the camera will shut itself off. (See what it looks like here.) I've shot hundreds of pictures, each Gigapan setup requiring anywhere from 24 to 147 images, with only a few good results.

Here is one of Pittsburgh's latest construction projects:

function FlashProxy() {}
FlashProxy.callJS = function() {}

http://gigapan.org/viewer/GigaPanViewer.swf?url=http://tile33.gigapan.org/gigapans0/33504/tiles/

This was originally the site of a Nabisco factory. Now it's becoming offices, retail and a hotel. The first panorama I wanted was my backyard. I got two bad ones you can see here. I'm not always sure the camera and Gigapan are working together; sometimes the camera isn't responding. The trigger piece on the Gigapan is flimsy, to say the least. I finally got a good one:

function FlashProxy() {}
FlashProxy.callJS = function() {}

http://gigapan.org/viewer/GigaPanViewer.swf?url=http://tile33.gigapan.org/gigapans0/33542/tiles/

Downtown Pittsburgh

Posted on September 27, 2009 by ruthek

Another gray, rainy day in Pittsburgh. It was a beautiful week until yesterday when the rains came. After I did my weekly tutoring stint, postponed from Friday because of the G 20, I went downtown for a walking tour. Fortunately, it was mostly indoors with only short walks between buildings. Downtown Pittsburgh is being restored and reclaimed for residential use. The first building we went to is called Piatt Place. Originally built in 1995 (?) as a Lazarus Department Store, it was empty for years. We were taken to the seventh floor, the uppermost of three floors of apartments newly built on top of the original building, which will house office and retail.

We looked at both the smallest and largest apartments. The view from the largest apartment was unusual; you could see the tops of several nearby churches. I took only a few pictures as I was being rained on.

Looking through the bars around the terrace of the million dollar plus condo, unfortunately the only things in focus, you can see a person lying in the indentation in the church wall, trying to take shelter from the rain.

From Piatt Place we went to Market Square Place and Market at Fifth, rentals this time. We finished with some of the new retail that's come to Market Square. It was interesting and I hope lots of people will make downtown Pittsburgh their home and dispel the ghost town feeling you get nights and weekends now.

The sun just came out–I think I'll go for a walk.

Weekly wrap

Posted on September 20, 2009 by ruthek

I finally bought another printer and spent all yesterday afternoon printing out the Japan book. Now I just have to finish the covers. Looking at the photos again has left me trying to figure out if I can get back there again. I was very tired during my last few days last year. Perhaps, if I didn't stay so long…

I borrowed a Gigapan robot from my class and have been trying, mostly unsuccessfully, to take Gigapan pictures. I think a better camera would be helpful. Part of the requirement for using the robot is to put the camera on manual and lock everything down, including exposure. That's the part I can't seem to get. I'm not sure anything locks down. I'm going to try again this afternoon. I went over the Chatham where there is a view overlooking much of the East End of Pittsburgh, but there were too many trees in the way. If I ever manage to get something, I'll post a link to it.

Back to clothing again: I find I have two navy blue pin striped suits, not the same but ridiculously close. I bought both of these while I was still working and never wore either. I don't know where my head was. I'll probably get some use of one of them; the other is most likely headed out.

This is the second day of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, 5770. A Happy and Healthy New Year to all of you.

Back to school

Posted on September 6, 2009 by ruthek

This was the first week of my new Osher classes. I now belong to two Osher programs: Pitt and CMU. Most of my classes this time are at CMU. I'm taking tai chi with a different instructor; estate planning; Gulliver's Travels; a cooking class; Gigapan photography; and auditing another art history class at Pitt: Women in East Asian art. I volunteered (hah) to give a presentation on Tuesday at the art history class. Keeps me busy.

Originally I signed up for another class: Spanish conversation. I'd really like to learn Spanish. On the morning I was supposed to have the first class I overslept. I took this as a message from my body and dropped the class. Maybe next year. I may drop Gulliver, also. All we seem to be doing is reading aloud to each other. I'll see how the second class goes, but I'd really like something more than that.

Estate planning is good. Not that I have much of an estate, but I found out there are some laws here in Pennsylvania I ought to pay attention to. Gigapan photography is really special. Did you see the amazing picture of the inaugural that you can zoom in on and see peoples faces and all kinds of detail? A robotic device takes pictures on a grid and stitches them together. We'll get an opportunity to borrow the robot and take our own pictures. Should be great fun.

Sometimes Pittsburgh is Awesome

Posted on August 9, 2009 by ruthek

This weekend was the Pittsburgh Visionary Arts Festival. It's a great show, the brainchild of one artist with help from the Sprout Fund. Here's what the City Paper had to say about it:

A few years ago, Alberto Almarza began making a kind of art he (actually his young son) named pok.
Hand-working clay, using hand-mixed glazes and firing his creations
without electricity or gas, he crafted intriguingly primitive works
from tiny pots to evocations of human mummies. He exhibited them partly
through fellow Carnegie Mellon art student Ally Reeves' Mobile Museum
project, bringing art to neighborhoods via bicycle. It's in the spirit
of both projects that Almarza created this weekend's Pittsburgh Visionary Arts Festival.
It's a new open-air showcase for local artists in any medium — whether
self-taught or merely left-of-center — who have an unconventional
approach and a unique aesthetic. It's also for artists whom you
wouldn't just stumble across, unless you were in the habit of haunting
cutting-edge galleries. With help from the Sprout Fund, Almarza
corralled dozens of artists for a three-day stint in Schenley Plaza.
Familiar names like Mike Budai, Lowry Burgess, Vanessa German, Mr.
Imagination and Laura Jean McLaughlin are joined by such folks as Curt
Sell, whose religiously infused work is created with discarded glass
melted by focused sunlight. Other contributors include art collectives
Encyclopedia Destructica and Unicorn Mountain and noted local "outsider
art" curator Pat McArdle. There are also nightly performances by the
large-scale experimental sound collective HiTEC. Plus, you can meet the
artists at their booths, some of which will host demonstrations or
activities like "scribbler" Connie Cantor's "yoga scribbling,"
featuring actual yoga instructors wielding pencils. Even Almarza, for
his part, doesn't know everything that will happen. "I've told the
artists to surprise me with their ideas," he says. "I think a lot of
them have been keeping the information from me!" Bill O'Driscoll Noon-9 p.m. daily, Fri., Aug. 7-Sun., Aug. 9. Schenley Plaza, Oakland. Free. www.pghvisionaryartsfestival.com

I am enormously impressed with the art, and even more impressed with the fact that one person could accomplish this in Pittsburgh. I doubt there are many "Sprout Funds" in other locales. You can learn more about it here. Be sure to check out Almazara's other blogs–good stuff!

I didn't take any photos of the art, but here are a few photos from the festival.

The youngest vendor

Recycled bird–from found objects

Making art with yoga postures

For sale on eBay

Posted on May 13, 2009 by ruthek

Five of my old photographs, from 1975, are for sale on eBay. I don't remember who bought them from me (or who I gave them to). Not surprising, they have lost value: I sold them for $25 each, unframed and that's probably what they will go for now, if they sell at all. They are photos taken on or around the elevated and subway trains in Chicago.

I worked briefly, for a city planner with offices next to the elevated tracks. During my lunch hours I walked around and photographed under the tracks going around the downtown area of the city. After they fired me laid me off, I continued my city walks and systematically rode each of the trains, photographing old stations and city views from the trains. Eventually, I had a show of 65 of the photos at the Chicago Cultural Center, one of the highlights of my career as a photographer.

I'm tempted to buy the photos myself; I have almost nothing left from the show. I'm fairly certain these were not prints that were in the show, but some extras I sold at art fairs. It doesn't sound like they are in good condition.

Walking around New York is

Posted on April 9, 2009 by ruthek

my favorite occupation. Renee is cooking for tomorrow night's Seder and most of my friends had other things to do. I took the subway down to Bowling Green, at the bottom of Manhattan, and went to the Museum of the American Indian. It's one of my favorite places, second only to the Met. They had two exhibits I hadn't seen: wonderful native women's dresses and some of the work of Fritz Scholder. The women's dresses were the best; each unique and a work of art.

I walked from the museum to Chinatown to meet Julia for dim sum. Broadway abounded with tourists taking photos of I don't know what. Then again, perhaps my photography mystifies other people. I walked past the famous bull, past Wall St, past a new red sculpture that looks almost like the construction machines working at the ground zero site. I'll post pictures next week when I return home.

After we finished dim sum, Julia and I walked around Chinatown. We came upon a wonderful scene on Eldridge Street: several large cherry-picker type machines being used to install red silk Chinese lanterns. This will become a movie site next week for some kind of Disney movie. This is the block that houses the Eldridge Street Synagogue, now museum, next to a Buddhist Temple.

I walked down Canal Street after I left Julia, but there was nothing as exciting as that movie set.

Need help putting photos into blog

Posted on January 18, 2009 by ruthek

I've spent most of these freezing days continuing to work on my China book. While I make the book using Adobe InDesign I am also proofreading and adding photos to my original posts. You can see them up to and including October 18. I am appalled at some of the errors I found and even more appalled by the problems I've been having putting multiple photos into that WordPress.com blog. There is something called a "Gallery" that I don't fully understand and can't find adequate documentation for.

I was planning to use WordPress when I teach the blogging class, but I'm having second thoughts. I can't teach something I don't fully understand. I don't seem to be able to use individual pictures and a gallery in the same post; the individual pictures show up in the gallery, also. I have so many photos I want to use just a few large ones and smaller ones for the rest. I'm sure I can put in each picture, large or small, one at a time. There is a feature allowing uploading of many pictures at one time. But I can't figure out how to get them in the post without putting the entire gallery in. Can anyone help me with this?

One of the things I like about this Typepad blog is the ability to create photo albums. I will probably take advantage of it to post my garden pictures from Japan. You've only seen a few of them.

Ponderings

Posted on September 4, 2008 by ruthek

Darcy and I went to Mellon Park for her walk this morning. There was lots of activity as they are getting ready for the Fair in the Park. As we left we passed three kids who were waiting to direct the artists as they arrive. One of them admired Darcy, petted her and asked, "What's his name?" My reply, "her" pause, "her name is Darcy." I thought about that as I walked away. Why was it so important I identify Darcy as a her. It certainly makes no difference to the dog, and none that I could figure out to the young man who asked. It was all my own bit of foolishness. What makes gender so important, anyway? Aren't we all created equal?

I love the photo Bob Brady posted today, but I found out it's been Photoshopped. You can see the original here.

I've been living in Robin's house since I returned from New York. It's a huge house and I could have two rooms and my own bathroom if I went up to the third floor. But I don't want to go up there–I'm having some trouble with stairs–and she doesn't want me up there–too hot, and we'd have to use extra air conditioning. So I'm in the guest bedroom on the second floor–enough stairs–and sharing the bathroom with Charna. And my computer gets a place on Steve's desk. None of this is a problem for me. I hope it's not for them.

Food is something of a problem. Robin keeps kosher. I've had to learn how to do things in her kitchen. She's also more of a vegetarian than I am. She and Charna eat lots of veggies and lots of cottage cheese. I like the veggies. Cottage cheese is one of the few foods I avoid at all times. I spent a lot of time in Trader Joes last week trying to figure out what I could bring back here. At the time it seemed like a huge problem, but it has all worked out. I'm trying to be a contributing member of the household, thus the dog walking and some minor cleaning.

100 Books Before I Die

Ruthe Karlin

Category Archives: Photographs