5 Places – A response to strangedavid
somebodystrange asked (oh so long ago): "A young photographer is looking for suggestions of five places to go in Chicagoland to take photos. Where do you send him and why?"
I've really struggled with this question, probably due to over-thinking it.
Photography covers such a broad spectrum...because it covers everything. Pretty tourist scenes to hard-core photojournalism to abstractions. So, my brain started trying to pick a category and from that category,choose 5 locations.
And then I thought perhaps I should tie my answers to my own photography project. Should I pick 5 areas that I've visited and enjoyed? But that is such a specific and narrow focus (a 2 mile radius), would it not be too limiting?
So here's what I've come up with. Chicago is the city of neighborhoods. It's a city built on individual communities all tied together. I want to visit these communities; I want to learn about who lives there, who works there, and what there is to photograph. With that in mind, I would instruct the young photographer thus:
From downtown Chicago, pick an El train line. Ride it for however long you want and then exit. Walk back to the station you started from. Repeat 4 more times choosing a different line each time. What you see depends on how far you want to walk, but what you will gather is a detailed view of what Chicago really /is/. An alternate method to this plan would be to exit the El and walk the neighborhood around that stop for the time it would take to walk back to your point origin.
Oh and one addendum: make sure to travel up and down the lakeshore by way of the bike path. The views are nice.
Random bits for November
1) Yesterday afternoon was spent trying to mulch the leaves that continue to fall on our lawn. Last weekends mulching was cut short due to rain, so this week was a little more difficult. Our mower doesn't do a particularly good job of mulching (due in part, I think, to the fact that the mulching aspect is an add-on, not the default behavior) and so I need multiple passes to take care of things.
Yesterday, however, was something new. Yesterday it started snowing. So there I was, hat and gloves and scarf and winter coat mowing my lawn in a snow shower. It was a...unique...experience to say the least.
2) Speaking of the weather, now that it is cold somewhat consistently I've found that my appetite has grown. I am hungry more often and I crave all the fatty and greasy things that will probably kill me. In fact, right now if I could just wrap a block of lard with a few layers of bacon and then batter and deep-fry the thing, I'd pretty much be in heaven. Maybe throw a couple eggs on the side. Oooh, eggs...scotch eggs...oh man. I'm hungry again...
Sorry, drooling a bit on the keyboard...
3) Speaking of keyboards, I was typing on mine this morning when I noticed some bits of red showing up on a couple of the right-hand keys. "Strange" I thought and discovered that a couple of my fingers had blood on them. "What the...?" was said out loud. There was no cut on my fingers or hand and so, while trying to figure out what part of me was bleeding, I absentmindedly touched my right ear. Sure enough, my fingers came away with fresh blood. A quick check of the mirror showed an inch-long scratch on the front-top part of my earlobe that seems to have appeared out of nowhere. I have no memory of scratching my ear and have no clue how this happened, but there it was, bleeding away.
4) Speaking of fingers, mine are cold. The building that my company leases space in turns off the environmental controls after 7 pm on weekdays and entirely on the weekends. With the holiday, the heat has been off for four days and even now at 3:30 pm, it's not very warm in here. I think it's time for another cup of coffee.
Chicago Photography Project – 2 years
October 26th marked the two year anniversary of my Chicago photography project. As with previous entries I've updated the map detailing all the locations I've been on foot.
I was able to expand to the west and south by riding the El to locations and walking back. Most recently I've spent time walking with fellow flickr user swanksalot in the area west and north of Union Park. Geographically and photographically this has proven to be a great experience.
In my first year of the project I had 4 photos featured on the Chicago Public radio website, but this year has seen 7 (!) more added to that list. I've also added (I believe) 4 more photos to the list featured on GapersBlock.com.
I never did print a mini-book of my images. I had such a difficult time deciding which images to put to page that I bogged myself down with the entire process. helloheather has continued to push me to print my images for display at home. I've printed a few but they sit un-framed on my dresser, or our kitchen table, or counters, or...well, you get the idea.
This year also saw our Canon A80 reach the 30,000 exposure mark, mostly as a result of this very project. Since that time I've added 4,000 more. Sadly, due to the previously mentioned camera problems I will likely need to send it to the recycling center sooner than I had hoped.
I have mixed feelings about this project. While I do keep pushing into new areas, taking the El should be a treat, not a habit. The costs can add up and, while I really do enjoy visiting new areas, I am cheating myself out of some walking/excercise time. So, I'm not sure where this project will be in another year. I'd like to think I will re-invigorate myself with some new idea...at least, I hope I do.
camera update
It turns out the battery door was something of a red herring with my A80's problems. As always, it is slightly more strange. The camera only will turn on again if you let it sit for about 60 seconds. If you push the power button before those 60 seconds are up, the camera will not turn on /and/ you have to wait an additional 60 seconds before it will. It's almost as if there's a timer that's preventing the camera from starting, so perhaps it's a capacitor that needs to discharge?
So while I thought the battery door opening/closing was the fix, actually, I was just doing it in such a way that 60 seconds or so elapsed before I tried to turn it on again. Those times that the battery door trick did not work were when I beat the clock, as it were.
Anyway, I figured that if I just don't turn the camera off, I can use it for a while. So yesterday this is what I ended up doing: when I wasn't taking a photo I put the camera in review mode and moved the zoom back and forth (which just zooms in and out of the last photo shot) in order to keep the camera awake. That way I could flip from review to record and the camera would be ready. That is, until the batteries were exhausted (which didn't happen)
All this means, of course, is that I have a serious and hard-core addiction to both photography and this camera. I think I need help. 
