Simon's World » Photography

Trees in Wichita

Simon — Thu, 17 May 2012 02:28:29 +0000

When I first saw these, I thought they looked hilarious. Thinking about it in retrospect, Wichita is one of the few places where I’ve seen trees neatly trimmed away from power lines rather than simply cut down to stumps. Kinda nice, really. The pictures are from Thanksgiving last year – I just came across them now and thought they made a good triptych.

Colorize it!

Simon — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 05:47:11 +0000

Wanted to see the collages from the previous posts divided into their components, so got the ones in the first row. Then I combined the original images with the color blocks, which ended up looking more or less like the second row (there was an intermediate iteration, but I think this one is better).

What I saw on my way to work this morning

Simon — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 00:48:40 +0000

The funny thing is they congregated on one stretch of the wires, and ten feet in either direction there wasn’t a single one.

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Self-portraits

Simon — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 04:29:56 +0000

A couple of experiments:

Mostly done for a chuckle at my own expense. Then again, the black-and-white tonal-reverse drop-out thing has been with me for a while. Kinda goes with these.

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Regenstein Library at the University of Chicago by Walter Netsch

Simon — Sun, 28 Aug 2011 16:04:43 +0000

Not as hard-core as the UIC buildings I’ve covered in the past (also here, here and here), the Regenstein Library’s main architectural moves are the concrete elevation and the two staircases – the main one serving all floors and another serving the second and third floor reading rooms. Unusually for Netsch, the building sports quite a few windows, though considering the depth of the plan, they’re not exactly a dominant feature.

I want to thank the library staff for allowing me to peek in without undue bureaucratic obstacles (it is generally a limited-access facility).

Pritty pitcher

Simon — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 05:29:45 +0000

Saw this and couldn’t resist it. Enjoy.

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Animato

Simon — Fri, 12 Aug 2011 21:04:03 +0000

Done in GIMP. Bon apetit.

Behind the facade, first distillation

Simon — Fri, 08 Jul 2011 03:14:33 +0000

I started playing around with the images I shot yesterday, in an attempt to reach for the gist of what has been attracting me to these spaces. The first thing that came to mind is to distill them by dropping all color information, including tone. I lost some of them in the process, but I think the ones that survived are starting to reveal forms and relationships that weren’t very apparent in the originals. Here are the results:

Behind the facade, more West Loop

Simon — Thu, 07 Jul 2011 13:29:57 +0000

As usual, here’s a map of the day’s walk.

Here are the pictures – I’ve been thinking about the categories I mentioned as I shot these, so hopefully this will begin to focus the project somewhat soon.

Project categories

Simon — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 16:46:03 +0000

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m thinking of continuing the alley project by analyzing various aspects of what makes the alleys so fascinating. I’ve been thinking of a number of possibilities. Here’s the initial list:

Platforms (decks, porches, balconies, etc.)
Barriers (fences, warning signs)
Cul de sacs (spaces between buildings, cubby holes of various types)
Materiality
Signs of life (toys, abandoned objects, sports equipment, stuff for outdoor living)

I’m going to continue thinking about these categories as I push the project forward, but for now they seem like a good start to focus my work.

The second issue is how to take this from being a purely photographic project and to start working on the architectural possibilities it suggests. I’m thinking I’ll start by analyzing the graphic relationships in the pictures themselves, then possibly going on to looking at the spaces more objectively (maybe using satellite photos for reference).

Any suggestions would be most helpful.