Skating With Santa 2008

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Little did I know before I started a city daily photo blog, but every year around this time kids can go skating with Santa at Steinberg Ice Rink in Forest Park. I went for the first time last year and got some good shots - see them here. The weather was milder and it was much more crowded this time but I still got a few good ones. What's weird is that when Santa and I got chatting last year we found we had the same last name; his first and last name is the same as my father. He remembered me, calling out, "Hi, Mr. Crowe!" and I replied, "Hi, John!"

My wife and I scour the newspaper for community events I can shoot. So much more going on in this town than I realized.

TOMORROW: all of the other reindeer used to laugh and call him names.

Moonrise on Mississippi

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We had our firm's holiday dinner at a hotel by the river last night. I had to take a detour down to the levee when I saw the full moon rising over the Mississippi. This shot was handheld at ISO 3200 but I need to get up a post this morning. We stayed downtown overnight and got a room with a view of the riverfront.

Did I say something in yesterday's post about the possibility of paralegals behaving badly at the office holiday party? This pair isn't too bad. The woman on the left has been my partner's paralegal for 23 years and her sister for a lot longer than that. The one on the right has been my paralegal for 26 years. Her husband just passed his 20th anniversary as one of the lawyers in our firm. It was an office romance. The story is that when we hired him we gave him a good salary and threw in a woman as a signing bonus. We're just one big family.


TOMORROW: The STL DPB Second Annual...
You'll have to come back to find out.

Loose Associations

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Readers of this blog know that I formerly used the nickname Strangetastes. I also considered Loose Associations. That's a psychological term describing a thought disorder in which a person's statements do not relate to a question asked, or when statements do not logically relate to what was expressed before of after.The phrase has another, more positive sense, in which an individual sees meaningful relations among things that are not obvious, that are subtle or unnoticed by others. To me, the second meaning is a badge of honor.

Yesterday, I wrote about how these HDR pictures remind me of the work of painter Richard Estes. While I was working on this one, another association hit me. It has the feel of the work of another American artist, Edward Hopper (Google Images of his work here). Hopper, who lived from 1882 to 1967, depicted quiet, sometimes lonely landscapes, small towns, big cities and intimate interiors. His most famous painting is Nighthawks, which you can see in the Art Institute of Chicago. He loved oranges and reds in urban settings but skillfully kept them from shouting. Look at some of Hopper's work and tell us if you see a connection.

This picture is in the old commercial area south of the Arch. I was shooting under an elevated section of Interstate highway. The bridge at the upper left carries trains over the Mississippi to Illinois and beyond.

WHAT I'M DONE WITH FOR THE YEAR: no more hearings, no more court appearances. Lots of stuff to do but the big pressure is off for a couple of weeks.

TOMORROW: this could go a couple of ways: 1. More downtown HDR. An insane, four meter tall dancing bunny statue? An oversaturated redbird under lunar influence? Or, 2. Tonight is our little law firm's holiday dinner party. I am both the boss and the house photographer. Perhaps there may be a shot of paralegals behaving badly.

Thursday Arch Series - More HDR

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Another HDR concoction. If I didn't tell you, you might not notice that it's HDR. The more I play with this, the more I appreciate the images you can get with restrained use of the technique. They can be very vivid without being crazed.

A side note: I shot this from the levee, the paving stone slope leading down to the Mississippi. You can see the river level on the right. During the floods last spring and summer, the water level was well above the street behind the short wall on the left.

WHAT NICE AT HOME BETWEEN ME AND MY WIFE: neither of us is a bit sentimental. We've completely blown off Christmas decorations for years. Haven't had a tree since the kids moved out. It's much more important just to have us all here together.

TOMORROW: gasp! More HDR. This time it's in the semi-desolate, old commercial area south of the Arch (one of my favorite parts of town).


There is a new Arch picture
today on GATEWAY.

Almost As Realistic As A Photograph

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Looking north on 6th Street from just south of the downtown core.

My style of HDR photos has vaguely reminded of the work of some painter but I couldn't place it. It finally came to me yesterday: Richard Estes. You can see a large sample of his work through Google Images here. He is a member of the 20th Century school of (mostly) American painting known as Photorealism. Other members of the movement include Ralph Goings and Chuck Close. Close is a personal favorite but his work has gone far beyond approximations of photographs. Again, Google Images provides many examples (click here).

The link I see between some HDR photographs and photorealist paintings is this: they sort of look like conventional photos but not completely. More like paintings of photographs with detail, color and tonality modulated to suit the artist. People often see the images as hyper-real. A photographer with software like Photomatix Pro, which I use (thanks to Minneapolis CDPBer Greg for the tip), doesn't have nearly the range of options of a painter but, still, we can lift a scene like this one to something above the mundane. Plus, it just looks cool. I will now get off my soap box.

WHAT I THOUGHT I WAS GOING TO DO LAST NIGHT BUT DIDN'T: start an introductory yoga class. I'm 58 and have poor physical flexibility and balance - thought it might do me some good. But I left work late and was tired (whah) and didn't want another obligation. So I came home, had a bite and wrote this. And I'm happy.

TOMORROW: more HDR with the Thursday Arch Series, plus a new post on Gateway.

Apocalypse Now

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It looks like the aftermath of an environmental disaster but it's just the industrial area south of the Arch. The big slab in the foreground is a section of the flood wall where graffiti art is permitted. The smokestacks in the background are across the river in Illinois. What makes if look like Mad Max would feel right at home here? HDR image processing, of course. In fact, I think I'll devote the rest of the week to HDR pictures. This ain't highbrow art but it's fun to make and can be quite dramatic.

WHAT ONE OF OUR CDPB COLLEAGUES MAY GET TO DO NEXT SUMMER: spend a month in and around Paris (the individual is not French). Why not me? Why?

TOMORROW: okay, I finally remembered the painter whose style these HDR photos remind me of. Check back Wednesday for another high-volume urban landscape and I'll tell you about him.

There is a new Arch photo
today on GATEWAY.

The name is Crowe. Bob Crowe. I have a license to shoot.

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Okay, okay, this isn't about my city. Boys just wanna have fun. Saturday night was my one annual occasion to wear a tuxedo, the gala fundraiser for the Arthritis Foundation. I do some stuff for them. After feeling silly wearing the tux in a snooty country club where all the guys were wearing tuxedos (except for one man in full formal Scottish kilt regalia), I was feeling sillier. I'm not the country club type. Recall the words of the great early 20th Century philosopher, Groucho Marx, who said, "I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members." Anyway, took some shots in mirrors at home before I chucked the penguin suit. This post violates founder Eric's Prime Directive but I think it's amusing. He can come and get me if he has a problem with it.

WHAT I PICKED UP CHEAP YESTERDAY : a 22 inch / 58 cm LG monitor. Editing photos on my 13 inch / 33 cm MacBook screen is a bit hard on the eyes. The display is fabulous and BestBuy is selling them for peanuts.

TOMORROW: post-apocalyptic St. Louis. Or it could be. Oh, and a new Arch photo on Gateway.