Category: architecture

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a foggy morning

It was a foggy morning in Queenstown yesterday, so I wandered the town taking photos whilst Suzanne took the standard poodles for an early morning walk around the Queen River where it flowed beside near the Queenstown golf course. This was a space away from other dogs and they could be off the lead. So they could roam freely.

The early morning light in the town was soft, due to the fog:

Empire Hotel, Queenstown

I was looking/scoping for possible subjects for using the 5×4 Linhof in foggy conditions. What would the buildings or street views look like? How would they photograph? Would the fog transform the mundane into something interesting? Would the something interesting be meaningfully significant?

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Gormanston landscape

The rains have come and gone in Queenstown. Today we are back to the bright sunshine with a bit of cloud cover. Yesterday was passing showers and misty conditions. The showers meant that I stayed close to the car when photographing so that I could sit them out.

In the morning I wandered around Gormanston. There are lots of ‘For Sale” signs–for blocks and houses— but there are few buyers. This is surprising, for Gormanston is just down the road from Lake Burbury. Why aren’t the fishermen buying the old houses for their fishing shacks?

Dreams die hard in this old mining village:

Gormanston, Tasmania
Tasmania, Gormanston, house, abandoned, digital, Olympus, phototrip

The brick walls were being built around the old tin wall. These were mostly completed and then everything stopped before the roof was put on. That’s what happens to old mining towns. They become ghosts towns.

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architectural photography

The insurance company has come good with the money to replace my stolen digital Sony DSC R1. Soon I will have another digital camera, either a Sony Nex-7 or a Fuji X-Pro1. I have chosen these two cameras because they have adaptors that allow me to use my Leica M lenses with them. It’s a stop gap until I can afford a Leica M9. Whenever that is.

It is unlikely that either of the above digital cameras will arrive in Adelaide before I leave for a phototrip to Tasmania in early March. So I will be shooting film only on that trip. But I cannot wait to start using digital again. I miss the convenience of digital and I’m not really enthused with scanning negatives.

Hawke Building, Uni SA

This picture was taken on a photowalk one Sunday afternoon through the grounds of the University of South Australia’s City West campus. This is the southern or Fenn Place end of the Hawk Building.

This is one of the more interesting contemporary buildings in Adelaide. It was designed by John Wardle Architects (in association with Hassell Architects) and the southern end is an explosion of different forms that include sky bridges.

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isolation

My exploratory wanderings in the CBD of Adelaide with a small digital camera are currently on hold, due to both the hot summer weather and not having replaced my stolen digital camera. This makes me uneasey in the sense of being disquiet—I should be walking the streets exploring, not stuck in front of a computer screen.

The picture below was snapped on a daily walk without the poodles at the beginning of summer in 2011:

Hyde St, Adelaide

I’m struck by how isolating the new apartments are. Each is contained within itself, so any contact or connecting with others comes digitally: with the mobile phone or email using mobile broadband. In this world of networked mobility people now walk the city streets looking at the pulsating screens of their smart phone, and they are only vaguely aware of what is around them. It appears that the virtual world is more important than the real world.

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give way

Urban renewal in Adelaide grounded to a halt with the global financial crisis in 2008. The money from the banks dried up and the commercial and apartment building boom just collapsed. In the language of the real estate industry the property market–residential and commercial– was subdued. This stasis lasted several years–apart from new car parks being built everywhere.

give way

The urban renewal situation has slowly improved. Most of the buildings currently being built in the CBD are primarily high rise apartments. This building is an exception –it is a specially designed building for the Australian Tax Office.

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urban texture + pathos

Just before the Xmas break I wandered the streets of the CBD with a medium format camera–the Rolleiflex 6006 and a wide angle lens. It was a dull and grey Sunday morning and I was looking for urban architectural texture with a slightly grungy feel.

French St, Adelaide CBD

I was searching for urban subject matter that would be suitable for a 5×7 shoot; one that referred back to the pictures of shop fronts in Rundle Street in Adelaide that were taken by the nineteenth century urban photographers. These early pictures (1860s-1870s) were known as carte de visite views due to their small size and they functioned like today’s business cards.

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in the studio

My time since Xmas Day has been spent cleaning up, and reorganizing, in Encounter Studio and doing some photography around Victor Harbor early in the morning.The cleanup has also involved me starting to go through the archive of the black and negatives from the days when I used to have a darkroom and I processed my own film. I’m beginning to scan them.

I stumbled across this negative of Bowden in a box of old black and white 5×7 contact sheets. I would have tray developed the film. It was a pleasant surprise to see that the negative was in good condition and was properly exposed. I would have had other 8×10 negatives but I cannot locate them.

The picture below of the boatsheds at Second Valley, near Yankalilla in the Fleurieu Peninsula is in keeping with history, memories and archive as these no longer exist. They were pulled down around 2009.

boatsheds, Second Valley, Fleurieu Peninsula

They were a favourite subject of local photographers and much photographed:—I even think that there was some kind of photographic wake or meet just before they were pulled down.There is an in memoriam Flickr group.

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Xmas day

Whilst Suzanne was walking the dogs along the cliff tops this morning I did a quick photoshoot with the 8×10 Cambo of the pier or causeway to Granite Island near Victor Harbor. As there was cloud cover with little wind it was an opportunity not to be missed.

Granite Island causeway

I had an old and very basic Kodak Easyshare point and shoot digital camera with me to take a few digital snaps. It is 5 megapixels has a tendency to fire the flash at any opportunity and runs on a couple of AA batteries. A digital version of Kodak’s old box brownie?

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high rise living

Whilst taking photos of the city from the rootops of car park roofs or through hotel windows I’ve stumbled on high rise flats as well as offices.

The former often convey oppressive urban density with the washing drying on the balcony or glimpses of people moving around in their living room. Once–in the 1960s– tower blocks were the answer to a housing crisis but many people came to hate them. The blocks were poorly designed, had drug dealers and lifts dripping with urine, unsupervised kids, and kids running wild.

High Rise, Adelaide

The postwar modernist concrete cladding tower blocks were seen to be ghettos but they are now making a comeback.They have great views of the city and work for the young. The new towers benefit from the introduction of colour and texture.

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an early morning urban shoot

I was out photographing the Adelaide skyline between 6 -7am this morning. This is normally the time I am working out at the gym, but I allow myself to take a break from the gym on Wednesdays so that I can do the early morning shoots. In summer this must be done before 7am.

The picture below was taken around 7pm with a handheld digital camera from the top floor of a 24 hour car park on the corner of Rundle and Pultney Streets. I was on a scoping excursion. This time I wanted to I see what the skyline looked like in the early morning light. Would it look as dramatic?

looking west from Pultney/Rundle

I was also checking out to see whether I could use a tripod in the carpark and still be able to get the camera lens through the grill on the side of the building. It was possible to do this with a medium format camera. Would it be possible with a large format camera? Maybe. Next time I go back with the 5×7 Cambo monorail.

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