Orange & Mission Inn Avenue, Riverside

A fabulous and large hotel some lucky people stayed in during my second NSA convention in Riverside, California. I stayed at the functional but non-spectacular and much less expensive Holiday Inn which was under construction at the time!  My first convention I went to before I was actually a member of the NSA also in Riverside was in 1976 I believe.  I think this was taken with twin Mamiya C330 cameras. Fuji Velvia 50

Ghost Bike for Justine Charland-St-Amour

A30 - Ghost Bike for Justine Charland-St-Amour

This Ghost Bike commemorates Justine Charland-St-Amour who was 24 when she was killed August 22nd, 2016 when hit by a truck at the intersection of d’Iberville Street and Rosemount Boulevard in Montreal. I was moved to create this series when she became the fourth cyclist struck the same week in Montreal. I included a Ghost Bike for each of 20013, 2014, 2015 and 2016  in the series, but 2017 continues to be a very deadly for cyclists in Montreal despite measures taken. Sorry about the dust mark in the right film chip.

Ghost Bike for Bernard Carignan

A30 - Ghost Bike for Bernard Carignan

This Ghost Bike commemorates Bernard Carignan who was killed on August 22nd, 2015  on St-Denis Street in Montreal when his bicycle struck the door of a parked car that had swung open in front of him. I included this series of Ghost Bikes as I bicycle to work and am cut off by a car on average once per day. Original slide taken with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 100F exposed at 1/4 at F22.

Ghost Bike for Matilde Blais

A30 - Ghost Bike for Matilde Blais

This Ghost Bike commemorates Matilde Blais who was 33 when she was crushed by the rear wheels of a crane truck on April 28th, 2014 while riding a Bixi shared bike through the St-Denis Street underpass in Montreal. The coroner’s inquest found she was not at all at fault and that side guards on the truck may have saved her life. The inquest led to some improvements being made to try to improve the safety of cyclists at underpasses, but much remains to be done. Original slide taken with a tripod-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 100F exposed at 1 second at f25.

Ghost Bike for Suzanne Iswari

A30 - Ghost Bike for Suzanne Iswari

Suzanne Iswari was struck and killed by a bus on July 18th, 2013 while attempting to avoid a car door opened in front of her on Parc Avenue at St-Viateur Street in Montreal. Ghost Bikes are created to commemorate killed cyclists. Original slide taken with a trip-mounted Heidoscop using Provia 100F exposed at 1/30 at F22. Sorry for the blown highlights but the white bicycle in the sun against the black car in shadows is a greater dynamic range than the film can handle.

Dragon Spine Plaza Blanca New Mexico

DP2M0107_small2

Plaza Blanca is about one hour north of Santa Fe New Mexico by car, the last couple of miles is a dirt road. Spectacular rock formations can be found only a few hundred yards from the parking lot. I’d just started walking again after all the foot surgeries. This was taken with a paired Merrill Dp2 rig, on a sliding bar with about 8 inch stereo base. Then the image was transferred to Provia 100F by photographing a 4K screen.  (I describe the process in more detail in A28 folio notes). The developer was nearly exhausted and resulted in thick image with excessive contrast. I plan to send my film to Colorado lab in the future. There are lots of lovely digital images taken with this Foveon sensor camera (thanks to Boris Starosta for turning me on to the Merrill, he uses Merrills in his clear building series). The Foveon sensor records all RGB at each site in a ‘stack’ of sensors, so each color plane has all the full resolution, without interpolation since there is no Bayer filter.  I plan to upgrade to a 10 bit calibrated 4K screen, and eventually to an 8K screen for future digital to film experiments. I’ll also do some head-to-head tests going back to photograph the original subjects with digital and film (TL-120 and paired Mamiya 220 85 and 55 mm). I’m quite please with the Merrill sensor and lens, have the DP3 now too. Merrills are like using slower film cameras (usually want ASA at 100, tripod or good light for routine use), the slowness comes from the ‘thickness’ of the sensor, as light has to make it into the depths of the chip to provide the color information. But this lens is amazingly sharp.

The Pillars, Plaza Blanca New Mexico

The Pillars, Plaza Blanca

The Pillars, Plaza Blanca

Plaza Blanca is about one hour north of Santa Fe New Mexico by car, the last couple of miles is a dirt road. Spectacular rock formations can be found only a few hundred yards from the parking lot. The process used was the same as described for my image “Dragon Spine, Plaza Blanca”. This is one of the most beautiful sites in New Mexico for these odd eroded columns. These are a bit like the Tent Rocks (those are found an hour south of Santa Fe)…featuring a capstone protecting a column of softer material. Once the capstone is gone, the column will erode much faster. The area has changed in 10 years due to this process. If we ever have an NSA meeting in Santa Fe, this is one place to check out.