Poor Decisions Leading To Poor Results
Whilst there are various interpretations and derivatives of the saying “you shouldn’t mix business with pleasure”, I have never thought of it in a photography context until a recent trip to New York. Whilst I don’t undertake my photography as a business venture, I very much invest a lot of time into my work and pursue it to the best of my ability.
The pandemic in 2020 scuppered a previously planned holiday to the Big Apple, so the opportunity to finally return to the city for a 3rd time arose recently. With a list of places to visit and things to do whilst there, I drew up a plan to try and combine the holiday side of the trip alongside capturing some of the city’s great architecture.
When I first visited in 2010, I had migrated to a DSLR by that time and owned Canon 350d and for my second visit in 2016, I had moved on to a Canon 750d. Even though I had owned these 2 DSLRs, I was totally ignorant to the concept of Aperture, ISO and Shutter Speed, the key elements of any image. I was also oblivious the potential of shooting in Raw, therefore everything I captured was in automatic mode and saved as JPEGs. My photography at that time could best be described as mediocre and lacking in any real creative style or interest.
In the last 6 years however, my interest and approach to my photography has changed dramatically and I have invested both in my photography gear and into improving my post processing skills which are now yielding results. I viewed this 3rd trip to New York as an opportunity to continue my photography journey and ultimately add to my collection of images, in particular, by expanding my black and white architectural portfolio whilst combining it with a holiday. That was the plan in my head, the outcome however, was something that fell below my photography expectations.
Looking back over the 4 full days I was there, after analysing aspects of my trip, I concluded that several key factors all combined to deliver a less than productive set of photography results which can be summarised as follows.
Planning Too Rigid
I normally use Google Maps when preplanning for what I would like to capture as this enables me to form location clusters so if one location is scratched for whatever reason such as construction work, then I would simply move on to another architectural subject. For this trip to New York, my plan was to be in certain places for photography based on the holiday itinerary each day as I had various pre-booked activities organised and attempted to work a photography plan around the activity (holiday) plan.
For the first morning, the photography plan was to be at Tudor City Place looking back up 42nd Street for a classic street image at sunrise with the Chrysler building in the distance. I duly made my way there on the first morning, but I did not consider the weather which was a dull overcast day resulting in flat light and low cloud shrouding the tops of the buildings and no golden light at sunrise. As this was the only time I had allotted to be here, I elected to remain in situ and capture what I could, but in hindsight I should have headed to Grand Central Station to capture some internal images of the new part of the station.
The morning of day 2, I made my way to Lexington Avenue near the Rockefeller Centre. Thankfully I did capture one or two images here but again as I headed out pre sunrise, it was very much working with the conditions that I had, which were mostly clear blue skies and very little or no cloud. I was also learning about the challenge of dynamic range in these early morning conditions due to the size and proximity of the skyscrapers in this area creating a significant difference in the natural and reflective light. In hindsight, I was maybe here too early, and it might have been conducive to have been here slightly later but as I was conscious of returning to my hotel to get organised and head out for the day’s activities, I did not have the option to hang about longer.
Another example of the plan being too rigid was on day 2 when the main subject I wanted to capture that day was the Flat Iron building as it was to coincide with other activities planned around the Midtown area. On leaving the subway station at the Flat Iron building it was immediately evident photographing the building was a bust, as it was shrouded in scaffolding. Ordinarily I could have headed towards the Empire State Building to see what I could capture around there, but the day’s itinerary was heading in the opposite direction and although there were a couple of fall-back options in the direction of travel, which I did get to, the time on location did not afford the opportunity to scout for the best composition and await optimum conditions.
Day 3 was where I wanted to be for sunrise which was at Brooklyn Park and the old pier. Although I was here as planned, I did have issues here that morning which resulted in taking the decision to return here for the final morning but that decision cost me one of my most sought-after images which I will discuss momentarily as by the time I got to where I wanted to be, on that final morning, the conditions were not their best for what I had envisaged.
Timing Too Restrictive
When capturing my architectural images, I generally have the luxury of time to work in a location and I will take into account prevailing weather conditions and have some flexibility as to when and where I want to be. In New York, it was the opposite as the main window for opportunity for me was at sunrise, as once the day began in earnest, it was a case of doing the activities I had pre-booked which included the 911 Memorial, going up the Freedom Tower and visiting the Edge at Hudson Yards to stand outside a skyscraper on a cantilever platform at a mere 100 floors up. I also had days at Coney Island and in Central Park planned, so all in all, I set myself up for a fall by thinking I could factor in the time to capture the various buildings I had already identified before my trip.
The reality of the situation is I found myself at the wrong place at the wrong time on a number of occasions, with clear blue skies, scorching temperatures and harsh light adding to the photographic challenges, as my ‘holiday plan’ inhibited my movements to be elsewhere which would have enabled me to adapt to the conditions. On reflection, trying to be at certain places at a certain time of the day was always going to be a challenge, especially in one of the busiest places on earth and affording little or no time to look at compositional options was never going to deliver impactful results. Also trying to strike the balance of doing the holiday side of the trip with photography was a miscalculation very much on my part.
Gear Choices
Before heading to New York, I made some changes to my camera gear to cut down on what I normally carry and to be more conspicuous in my movements. I took with me my 16-35mm, a 24mm Tilt Shift lens and a recently acquired 24-105mm. In hindsight, it may have been better to have taken my 70-200mm instead of the 24-105mm as it could have given me some more options in terms of focal length as I used the 16-35mm more often than the 24-105mm. I didn’t use the 24mm tilt shift much partly due to the locations I had selected were not warranting the shift function and partly due to a poor decision to go out with the 24-105mm on a day where I wanted to be moving about shooting handheld, only to discover, my tilt shift would have been handy to have that day. The 16-35mm might have been a better alternative to the 24-105mm as there was a few images where the 24mm was too tight, but I took it out for its image stabilisation as I tripod free that day. I also left all my lens hoods at home and on this occasion with the harsh light over the course of the 4 days, it may possibly have been beneficial to have had them with me.
I also purchased a travel tripod for this trip as I wanted to carry it inside my camera backpack as my main and much larger Benro tripod and geared head strapped to the outside would have readily identified me as a photographer walking about with camera gear at stupid o’clock in the morning. My concerns were unfounded as each of the four mornings I was out from about 4am, I never felt unsafe and on hindsight a full size tripod chib is much better than a travel tripod chib (bit of Scottish humour there).
As I previously said on the morning of day 3, I travelled to Brooklyn Park to shoot some Manhattan cityscapes. I took a number of images that morning in breezy conditions along the East river and when I got back to the hotel after sunrise, I backed these up to my external Solid State Drive and when I had a quick look at them on my iPad, I felt they weren’t as sharp as they could be and concluded there had been a bit of camera shake due to the wind with the travel tripod not being as sturdy as my Benro. Also making a howling beginners error by not having the 10 second timer set meant I was probably moving the camera slightly when pressing the shutter button and not realising there was no delay set. I only discovered this just after sunrise, so all my nightscape images were unusable from that morning.
Later that day whilst sitting on the beach at Coney Island, I began to think about that morning, and then my frustration kicked in and as a result, I decided to return to Brooklyn Park on the 4th morning to reshoot the same images from the day before as well as intending to be at the Finance District shortly after sunrise. My amended plan was to do what I had to do at Brooklyn Park and then jump on the East River ferry from Brooklyn and cross over to lower Manhattan then head to where I originally intended to be which was the Occulus building with a few stops offs along the way. Whilst I did capture the Manhattan skyline at the second time of asking, the impact of this decision meant by the time I reached the Occulus building which was one of my main photography goals for the whole trip, the sun was now well up and shining unhindered by a lack of clouds so my compositional options were narrowed given the sun’s position directly in my line of sight. As I was in situ later than I had planned, the city was also springing to life even for a Saturday morning and when a maintenance truck duly parked in front of the Occulus and unloaded a cherry picker, that was the moment the white flag of photography surrender was waved.
I did try and salvage the day by heading to the Guggenheim museum before going into Central Park but the blazing sun was still having an impact on my composition and with a number of food stalls now set up outside the museum, another pre-conceived image bit the dust, so the camera was packed away and I took time out to enjoy the sights and sounds that Central Park had to offer for the rest of the day.
On Reflection
Even though the four days did not produce the outcome I was hoping for in terms of my photography goals, I still had a blast in New York as I saw it from new and spectacular locations and came back home with new memories and experiences from my time there.
From a photography perspective, I don’t like to use the term ‘failure’ as I still captured some images. Yes, the bucket list was not ticked off, however the experience has still supported my growth as a photographer. I gained a better understanding of the locations which I plan to return to in the future and the optimum times to be at these locations.
When I do return, it will also be my intention to spend a proportion of my time outside Manhattan to capture a range of views of the city skyline from the likes of Brooklyn, Hoboken and Jersey City as I concluded there are numerous images to be captured from these vantage points. There will still be some images to box off in around the bustling streets (unfinished business as they say) as well as capturing some images from a higher elevation if the conditions are favourable, but I will be more selective in what I ultimately capture.
The time in New York has also convinced me to add the Canon 17mm Tilt Shift lens to my line up as I encountered some locations in New York, as I have in other places over the past few years where a 17mm tilt shift would be beneficial to have as an option.
Trying to capture too many images within a restricted period of time in this instance ended up being counterproductive, resulting in a ratio of diminishing returns. The big takeaway from this trip has taught me to prioritise more those locations I think have the highest value photography wise and protect the time spent there more frugally and concentrate more on quality than quantity. My final determination and thought from this trip was it would have been better to come back home with 5 images that were worthy of inclusion on my website rather than 15 mediocre images that would do well to make my Stories section on Instagram or Facebook.