Manhattan Snapshots

Manhattan Snapshots

These are a few more pictures from my trip to Manhattan last weekend. Trying to learn the controls and variables of this camera is a little daunting. It wasn’t easy shooting with prime lens in the sea of humanity by Rockefeller Center. It was just a crush of people. Karen wants to go down and see the tree so if we go I am going to try and reshoot some of these. Maybe next week some of the tourists will clear out of town.

Taking a picture of a theater marquee is something that is hard to resist for me. Foot traffic had to come to a halt for a second while this picture of Radio City was snapped. People didn’t really seem to mind but there was literally only seconds to get the shot.

These pictures of tree didn’t come out very well but I thought I would post them anyway. Since it was around 3 o’clock in the afternoon it wasn’t dark but wasn’t twilight either. I am posting these just so you can see kind of what the tree looked like. It was quite beautiful this year.




The fountain shot is next to the ice skating rink. I was quite far away and the few shots that I took with the 70-300mm lens came out ok. It will be really nice to use the lens when the sun is out. The statue of Prometheus was sculpted by Paul Manship in 1934. The quotation in the back reads, “Prometheus, teacher in every art, brought the fire to Earth that hath proven to mortals a means to mighty ends.” The fountain is almost 18 feet tall and weighs 8 tons.


These next two photos were test shots. The photo of my lunch mates in the park was taken with the 60mm. The auto focus on the D700 is amazing. I was holding the camera away from my face and down along the ground. The remarkable thing to me is that this photo was shot in the portrait orientation and was cropped to the landscape format. The cropped picture is almost as big as a D70 photo. The second picture was a snapshot I took in the big hallway that connects Wall and Pine Streets. You can enter the subway inside there too. Well at least you used to be able too, before 9/11. When I took this picture I remember saying to myself there’s no way this will come out since it is dark in here. The camera really surprised me when I got home and it had figured out the exposure pretty well.

Another Rockefeller Christmas Tree Shot

Another Rockefeller Christmas Tree Shot

I noticed the compression and Blogger washed out the colors of the Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree that were previously posted so I wanted to post another picture that showed a little of the color of the lights (still doesn't show much, argh). Just to keep real and to follow along with the title of this blog Digital Flower Pictures dot com I am posting this picture of some cut Mums I saw at the Union Square Christmas Market. These were actually from the Greenmarket, which is what we call here a farmer’s market. It is always fun to see all the interesting stuff they sell at the NYC farmer’s markets. I think if I lived in Manhattan I would do a lot of my shopping there. The Mums were $5.50 a bunch with the tax included. They really had an interesting selection of wreaths but the 50mm lens just wasn't capturing them.



This final picture is of a beautiful child I saw riding a float in a Christmas Parade that I stumbled upon in Chinatown. It was an interesting parade because it had a combination of Little Italy and Chinese themed floats. There were a couple of marching bands and the Boy Scouts in between the floats. I wished I got the picture of when this girl waved at me, it was heart warming but it just came out a little blurry.

I spent most of this morning getting the trucks and car unfrozen and chipping the ice of the sidewalk. We only got a couple of inches of snow, a lot of freezing drizzle and some rain. I am not complaining because it wasn’t as bad as predicted. I don’t like ice storms because of the damage they do in the garden especially to the evergreens. I am bored already and winter doesn’t start until Friday!

Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree

Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree

We decided to cancel our trip to Longwood Gardens since the weather is so bad. We have been having a lot of freezing rain and drizzle. That really stinks as we had so much fun last year when we went. Things are going to be too busy to try and fit going in the next couple of weeks *sigh*. I decided to go to Manhattan and I took the train in yesterday afternoon. I had quite a day. I am nursing two very bruised elbows and a hurt knee from a fall I took in the subway. Not sure what really happened but I almost caught myself but then fell down completely, just glad I didn’t tumble down the stairs also. I fell right on my camera which amazingly enough still worked. The lens didn’t break either which was astounding to me. A couple of nice New Yorkers helped my up and asked if I needed medical attention (dusted me off, too). I had the wind knocked out of me but managed to make it out of the station and after sitting for awhile decided to carry on.


I visited the Rockefeller Christmas Tree and despite the crowds got right up to the fence and was able to get a clear view of the tree. Since I had a nice view people were getting their pictures taken right next to me. That leads to me this next photo. I have been gathering a collection of photos of people that were posing for other photographers. I got about 10 or 12 shots this year. This was such a nice family that I snapped their picture while they posed for someone to take a shot with their camera phone. I ended up taking pictures of about 20 people who asked me to use their cameras. I really don’t mind and I got to check out a lot of different cameras. For some reason I get asked to do this all the time.


The tree was beautiful and even though the area was a total mob scene I enjoyed my visit. I didn’t try and enter from 5th Avenue where you can see the skaters I kind of went around the back. This years tree is a 84-foot tall Norway Spruce from Shelton, Connecticut. According to The Accidental Environmentalist the Rock Center Tree is much more eco-friendly with solar powered LED lights. I read the tree is recycled into 3 tons of mulch nad donated to the Boy Scouts.


In case anyone is interested I shot these photos with my Sigma 17-70mm/2.8-4.5 lens. Hand held at 17mm/2.8. I almost didn't take this lens with me but was glad I did because the 50mm would have never gotten the whole tree in. Also the Sigma seems pretty tough and I was glad it was on the camera when I fell. It is the second major impact it has had and it still works fine.