Garris

Exactly. This applies mostly to digital SLR's. Non-SLR cameras (the consumer digital cameras that most people have) to not have the threads to allow for this. Some outstanding non-SLR's though, such as the type of camera I used previously, do support propietary "lens extensions," and I think some of those are filters. - Garris

Fixed it, thanks for pointing it out! You know what, I don't exactly remember where I took that from as that image is about a year old. I think I took it from the Arcade Parking Garage. One nice thing about having my new PBase powered website is that it supports comments for the images, something that my old self-programmed site couldn't without enormous effort. This will allow my new site to serve as a bit of a photo diary for me, reminding me of things I might otherwise forget, like where I took the photos from . - Garris

Thanks to everyone for the compliments on the photos and website. Here are some other new ones: I have no idea why I forgot to post this ages ago. Here is the detailing on the "Superman" building. Does this say everything about the optimism and power of Providence when built or what? The great detailing of the Davol Square building with great sunset lighting... East Sides steeples as seen from Downcity... Rhode Island Hospital from East Providence... And while not Providence, here is a shot from New Haven (the top of a parking garage on Long Wharf) of part of the skyline (the interesting part) at sunset. The "skyline" of Yale, including Harkness Tower, Phelps Gate, and other buildings is seen low and in the background from left to right. That's all for now! - Garris PS: To help people find the new photos on my webpage, I've added a "NEW Photos" area from the main gallery page so you don't need to search through galleries. Also note that you can subscribe to my webpage via an RSS feed XML button on the bottom of the main homepage.

Hey everyone, Here are three new photos, all fairly recent. This was an opportunistic photo! While waiting for my workday to start, I looked out my office window and saw this amazing view as the sun was trying to burn through the early morning haze. Providence doesn't often have these hazy, layered, LA-esque views, and I wanted to catch this one. I literally ran out to my car and grabbed my camera. The odd color is provided by the filtering effect of the room's window. This view is from Smith Hill. Also, I think this photo would also be far less interesting without all of the cranes and buliding skeletons going up. Same morning, this one of the Capitol, which I think looks quite lonely against College Hill: And after two years, at least, I finally have taken a photo of Thayer Street that I'm happy with. I think this shot captures the flavor and vitality of the street. This photo was almost by accident. An interesting story with the Thayer shot. As I was taking it, a very young woman with a statuesque figure that could stop traffic, dressed in an outfit that left nearly nothing to the imagination, stepped out of a VW Cabriolet about 10 feet away from me and charged over, saying, "Are you photographing me? Are you photographing me? I can't be seen here like this..." I reassured her I wasn't, that the camera wasn't aimed anywhere near her car, and I showed her the images on the camera. Tears welling up in her eyes and her voice cracking, she said, "No, you really, really don't understand! I really can't be seen or known looking like this..." and then she retreated back to her car. I couldn't help but wonder what that could be... A new college student out for a night on the town not wanting the folks back home to know? Something even less wholesome than that? Either way, hope she's OK... 2 or 3 more images to come later or tomorrow. - Garris These images are all also on my newly redesigned website, a PBase powered site which really has everything much better organized, is faster, and has slideshow capabilities. I'm still looking for input on it. Thanks!

I like Pawtuxet Village (my photos of it here). Traffic might not be bad at all depending upon what time you go into work. It's also a great place for Kayakers to live. I know several hard core paddlers who live in Pawtuxet Village for just that reason.

As was pointed out, the pedestrian critical mass isn't there. But it's a chicken and egg thing... Why walk when nothing serves you? This kind of development won't happen until the city zones to force it to happen. Want to open a new Shaws in Providence? You've got to play by the following rules... That's why the upcoming zoning revisions will be so important... - Garris

When were you there? I was walking around Prospect the other day as well. Thankfully, it looks like Waterplace will block the views of G-Tech . I was trying to figure out where E@B will be, and my guess is it'll maybe peek up over Citizen's from that perspective. Maybe not. Any future Hilton addition will probably be blocked by Westin II. 110 will be beautiful from that view however. All the changes will be interesting to see! - Garris

Great shots. When the projects are done, Capitol Center will have a skyline worthy of any good sized small city all by itself, without any of the rest of downtown! Boy, that's G-Tech's worst angle, BTW. Once the newness wears off, I fear that perspective won't age well... - Garris

Not this time, no . If all goes well, I'll be sticking around here, actually! - Garris

Just returned from several days of travels. While away, I snapped a few photos of Philadelphia which are here on my work-in-progress new webpage. I'd post them here directly, but my laptop just died (three months after the warranty runs out, right on schedule) and I don't have great web access right now. - Garris PS: I'm open to feedback on the new website organization, dynamics, etc. E-mail me at [email protected] if you have any suggestions!

Hum, interesting replies. I actually have streets like Washington, Weybosset, etc separated out, so perhaps it'll just be the "Other Downcity" gallery. Thanks everyone. - Garris

Stupid question for everyone. I'm rearranging my photos on my website according to the part of town they are in, and I was wondering: What part of downtown would everyone say the Biltmore, Union Station, Burnside Park, the Convention Center, and KP are in? In my opinion, they're not quite Downcity, not quite the CBD, and not quite Capitol Center... Right now, I'm leaning towards making a "Miscellanous Downtown" photo gallery and putting them there. Ideas? - Garris

Whoa! Planet Jewelry District! How did you do that? - Garris

Odd, I'm not having any trouble with any of my browsers. Is anyone else not able to see the photos? In case you're still having problems, I'm experimenting with the pbase online gallery system, and I put all of the photos above there (as well as the recent Manchester photos). Here is the site I'm experimenting with: http://www.pbase.com/garrisphoto - Garris PS: If anyone wants to look at what I'm experimenting with on pbase and wishes to give me feedback, I'd appreciate it. It's potentially much easier to maintain than my built-from-scratch website, and offers me the ability to offer features (slideshows, voting, thumbnail management, multiple images sizes, feedback options, etc) that are harder to do with my current site.

Hi everyone, I thought I'd post some recent photos from here in Providence. I've been working on trying to take some photos outside of my comfort zone of urban streetscapes, photos of scenes that are more targeted and perhaps more intimate (with mixed success thus far). This effort is reflected more in the Brown photos below than in the first two I've posted. So, to start, I was driving down Dean Street and noticed an interesting view. While I doubt I'll add it to my list of favorite shots, here is a sunset shot of a skyline perspective we don't often see. This is the view from the West part of Washington Street. At the same time, the cathedral at sunset: The courthouse with the setting sun: One of my co-workers was looking for good photographs of Brown University, and couldn't find many he liked, including from Brown's media department. He asked me if I had any and I realized that, despite living blocks away, I have virtually none. So this is the beginning of an effort to shoot Brown. One flaw is that I don't know the undergraduate/graduate campus experience at all, so I'm just looking for interesting scenes and guessing at which buildings or views would trigger waves of nostalgia from alums. Any guidance here would be appreciated! The Brown Clock Tower at sunset: Buildings on the College Green at sunset: A window through a window as seen on the Wriston Quadrangle: An entrance to a Brown building I didn't catch the name of at dusk: Brown dorms: A church window on the Brown campus at dusk: There's something I both dislike but also really like about this shot, as the Brown Science Library at sunset towers over the shorterer, older, shadowed rooftops of the campus: And finally, a black and white of University Hall: Enjoy! - Garris

Yup, many of the gallery sites, though, give you the option to turn off that option, so I'm very glad she left it on so we can learn! Yup, it seems to be (along with fotopic.net) one of the premiere gallery sites out there, although none of them are great, in my mind. I've been looking to move my gallery over to one of these "canned" sites now, just because more of the functions are automated (I myself even hate looking by my own site needing to open the separate imageshack.us window to display individual images). I've been playing around with fotopic.net for a week and haven't been impressed... I'll try pbase next. Do you have any experiences with gallery sites you've liked? - Garris

For the photo enthusiasts here, I want to quickly point out a fanatastic photo collection by a woman who seems to be college aged and formally photo trained in Boston named Della Huff. Her stuff (mostly of Boston and its local environment) is absolutely fantastic, and many of us (myself certainly included) could learn from her photography. Thankfully, she has included lens types, ISO's, shutter speeds, etc so we can see "how she did it." It appears she is doing quite a bit of digital (and possibly real world) darkroom work. She seems to like applying the "glamour shot" glow-lighting effect to many of her shots, but to her credit, it works. She's also doing some interesting darkroom color work which gives her shots a real artistic sheen. Impressive stuff, easily the best Boston photos I've ever seen (a city that, stereotype aside, I don't think photos all that well). Her gallery is here. - Garris

Ok, here are the rest of the Manchester photos... More great Elm Street retail signage in Manchester: I really loved the contrast between the old and new City Halls: I like this old, character filled alley with the antique utility wires sitting next to a brand spanking new satellite dish: Far from my favorite photo (terrible, harsh afternoon light and poor composition, with the signs and traffic lights), this is the only shot I could achieve to include more than one skyscraper in the same photo. This is the maximally urban Manchester scene: And to end the Manchester photos, here is yet another old-new contrast: Sorry I didn't take any photos of the ballpark, but there are other good ones of it here on the UP boards and the lighting was just so, so bright that I knew it wouldn't work, so I just kicked back and enjoyed the game . - Garris PS: I'll probably be looking to sell some of my current equipment in the next several months (digital SLR body, tripod, maybe a lens or two). If anyone here might be interested, PM me...

Yes, I believe so. It gave me new appreciation for the Westin here in Providence, as the architect of the new City Hall was clearly aiming for the same visual impact as the Westin. Post-modern, contextual materials, aiming for a "new classic" look, but it doesn't quite pull it off and lacks the urban sensibilities that the Westin here has in spades. The materials come off as somewhat cheap and the base has a suburban office building feel even more generic than the BCBS' entrance here. - Garris

The angry man and his mom/wife pose in front of city hall. They are the only crazy people photographed . - Garris

Hi everyone, Here are some of the photos from Manchester, NH. Again, the light was harsh in mid-afternoon, so it was tough to photograph. This is the best I could do. First, the skyline from highway 293. Too bad about the power lines there...: The river with lining mills, also as seen from 293: The Eastern facade along Elm Street: Another photo of the facade: Yet another, this from a side street off of Elm: The Hampshire Plaza skyscraper: The lights lining the building's unfortunately designed, large plaza: Great Manchester retail signage lining Elm Street: Old facades against a newer (relative) skyscraper: The old City Hall: The old City Hall and the new City Hall: The old City Hall framed against the new City Hall: Profile of the old City Hall from Hanover Street: Elm St. sidewalk dining: Another view of Elm Street signage: Hanover St street scene and signage: More of Hanover St with the Palace facade: Another of the Palace facade: The brick facade of Hanover St: That's about all for now. Perhaps a few more later! - Garris

[Warning, long post... My Manchester, NH review!] Hi everyone, While attending a wedding in Northern New England this weekend, I thought I'd briefly stop by Manchester, NH for the first time on the way back. Unfortunately, I was there during the mid-afternoon, a terrible time to take photos (there's a harsh, unflattering light). I did, however, snap 3 or 4 shots of possible worth and I'll post them later. I should note that any opinions here are solely my own, and, since I was only there for about three hours at most (about half of which was spent at the ballpark), any observations are cursory at best. I certainly invite any corrections to errors I might introduce below. The Drive-by: Driving through Manchester on highway 293, the city visually makes an impact similar to that driving North through Providence on I-95. There is a West side with quaint mills, residential structures, and church steeples, and an East side where the river runs along with the highway and skyscrapers poke up dramatically behind beautifully preserved mill buildings hugging the water. At the city's Southern end, a brand new minor league ballpark borders the river as well and it, along with the skyline beyond, beg travelers to flee the highway and explore. It's quite dramatic. Overall feel: I have to say Manchester isn't quite what I expected. Given its size, skyline appearance, and importance in Northern New England, I expected its downtown to have a urban feel similar to a Hartford or even a New Haven. Surprisingly, it reminded me a lot more of small city USA, much like a slightly bigger Middletown, CT and is a near twin of that city in overall feel and layout. Both cities downtown cores seem to center around one long, very wide road (in Manchester's case, seemingly Elm St) that function as "Main Streets" with various offshoots from it. Both cities have 2-3 buildings of height that actually aren't very close to one another on the street grid and resultingly have less of an impact on the overall urban experience than one might think by looking at the skylines (unlike cities like Hartford or Providence, whose few building of height are tightly packed, giving them a bigger city/canyon feel than you'd otherwise expect for their size. Also like Middletown, their buildings of height regrettably seem to date from either the 60's (featuring that decade's obsession with streetscape-killing pedestrian retail plazas) or the 80's (with its uber-suburban office building style). The Northern stretch of Elm on the West side of the street is littered with such buildings, serving as a kind of suburban office building "neutral zone" making one not wish to venture down to the mills on the river (more on them later). These trends combat mightily the otherwise very urban, very vibrant, sidewalk-fronting retail that defines the East side of Elm St more than the West. Overall, these trends, along with the area's apparent demographics, gave Manchester a working-class "big small-town" feel for me, very much like Middletown, and quite different than I expected. The Mills: I can't talk about Manchester without talking about its Mill District on the water. It's quite impressive. The renovated mills are in tremendous condition and they look and feel fantastic. A true treasure. They also house everything from companies to museums to restaurants and all of it taken together has the feel of a neighborhood revitalized. Good work! The only downside to this (that Providence too will have to deal with in places like the Jewelry District and Valley) is that the mills tend to be surrounded by seas of asphalt surface parking that isn't very pedestrian friendly. Sure, there are sidewalks and signs, but it doesn't feel inviting. Looking at the area, I'd much rather drive there and park, frankly, which is really too bad. I'm sure this district must nicely attract folks from the suburbs who pop off the highway, park at the mills, and then stay for dining or entertainment. When done, though, they probably drive back to the highway home and never walk up the hill two blocks to Elm St. Which is, again, too bad... But I very honestly don't know how to avoid this phenomenon, in part because all of this black space surrounding mills is actually quite authentic. That space was there when they were built, and it's there now. Providence will have to ask itself what it wants to do with all of its surface space around its mills in the JD, for example. Keep them intact or try to infill around them? Tough issue. Good Trends: There are lots of nice trends in Manchester that I saw. The new ballpark (where I watched a game for a while) is a gem and an urban sports amenity to be proud of. While the attached hotel is more bland looking in person than in photos, the overall effect is sophisticated and dramatic. The main Elm St drag (at least downtown, before it turns into strip plaza hells heading North and South) is, on the whole, quite interesting from a retail perspective. A huge variety of stores seem to get along there (if not thrive). The retail diversity is one that downtown Providence has yet to achieve. Cafes and restaurants of all varieties coexist with music schools, trophy stores, pastry shops, variety stores, shoe repair shops, gyms, law offices, sex shops, clothes stores, and antique dealers. And that mix may just be present in two blocks. The difference in retail footage (Providence's two big retail spaces per block vs Manchester's fitting as many as 5-10 shops on one side of a city block alone) seems to be one big factor in this difference. It's a quite vibrant and impressive public retail space in which local concerns and chains appear to easily co-exist. There are also some nice public spaces in Manchester. The Veterans Memorial Park is a nice, centrally located space, and I saw one or two large parks located one or two blocks East of Elm. For a small city, there seem to be many amenities as well. A performance hall complete with orchestra. Also an Art Institute/Museum. The aforementioned ballpark and a very modern Civic Center. There seemed to be a good mix of restaurants, both in price and cuisine (with a decent ethnic range readily apparent). Overall, the mill area and the Elm street area tended to be very clean and well cared for. Vibrant banners line the street and Manchester seems to have better maintained roads, sidewalks, and, especially, signs than is the norm for Providence. Hanover Street was very impressive as well. That Elm/Hanover crossing is very nice and full of potential. Bad Trends: Regrettably, there were some bad trends I saw as well. First, where was everyone? It's a gorgeous weekend day, the ballgame just let out, and downtown's just dead. In the trendy (and very good) Bridge St Cafe, I was the only one there except for two young men, who were seemingly there to talk to (and, well, mostly look at) the alluring young woman working behind the counter (and I have to say I couldn't blame them ). The only folks wandering around the downtown seemed to be of the "slightly sketchy" variety I know and love well from my days in New Haven. You know, upstanding folks who, on closer inspection, seem just a touch inebriated, just a touch loitering, and just altogether a bit too interested in what you're doing. In that vein, two men, seemingly normal appearing cyclists chatting on the street who would otherwise be very image of a vibrant urban downtown, briefly paused conversation as I photographed nearby and then went on to complete a drug deal right in front of me, quite open and in broad daylight, under the awning of the music store/school on Elm as some kids and adults ate ice cream about 40 feet away at outdoor chairs in front of Ben and Jerry's. Similarly, I browsed three local newspapers while in the cafe (one mainstream, two alternative) and all three had headline articles about violent crime. Is this a big problem there? On the city planning front, like Providence, the city's highway "gateways" aren't that impressive. Exit 6 (the main downtown exit) greets visitors with a sketchy looking motel with an attached Hooters and some kind of power transformer plant. Like many New England cities, the various styles inflicted on downtown Manchester (from historic merchantile to suburban office building to pedestrian plaza) seem to have taken their toll on overall urban cohesiveness. It's tough to pin down the city's feel from block to block and the whole ends up feeling less than the sum of its parts, regrettably. Like in Providence, some of this is due to the predominence of parking garages and surface lots. I couldn't tell (really wasn't looking that hard) to see which were private and which were municipal. Whatever the situation, there are too many in key locations. The new Civic Center, while nice, is very poorly integrated into the city and, like many such convention centers, feels like it was dropped into the block from outer-space. Also, are there a lot of housing projects nearby? One or two streets East of Elm, residential dwellings seem to get very scary, very fast. One man on a bike, who seemed kind of discheveled and kind of pupilarily constricted, came by me on a bike (lots of bikes!) and said, "Hey, you from around here?" Me: "No." Him: "Ah, OK, I wouldn't recommend you walk that much further in this direction, if you know what I mean. I'd head back to Elm if I were you." Me: "Okey dokey! Thanks!" On a personal level, Manchester now takes the prize from New Haven as the "City I've been Most Harrassed in While Taking Photos." Everyone from teens with skateboards, to homeless men, to elderly women with walkers, to drunk men without shirts, to young women in too tight tops, to demented old men wandering aimlessly around seemed to have an insult, gesture, or smart-alecky comment to aim my way. All in an hour and a half!! And I thought the teens from Cranston with the slicked back hair on Federal Hill were bad... Here's but one example, an aggressive, kinda high guy and his profanity spewing mother in a motorized wheelchair (maybe wife? I didn't ask...) who, um, "asked" me to take their photo in front of City Hall "or else I'll make sure you'll be f*****' sorry!!!" Picture was taken... I'll put it here shortly... This of course only attracted the attention of two nearby guitar toting, loitering teen boys, who next came over with their own set of insults/demands (these I didn't give into...). Also, I was hit up for money by more folks while walking Manchester in 90 minutes than in all of my time living in Providence for 2 and 1/2 years. While not a fair direct comparison, it is nevertheless interesting. Summary: So, that's it! The good, back, and the scary. Obviously, this is a city in transition, with lots of potential. One newspaper article mentioned that, like Providence, a master plan for the city is in the process of being crafted (or just recently was, the tone wasn't clear). I'd love to see it either way. When travelling to and from Northern New England, I'd love to stop in again to sample some of the great looking restaurants I saw. Hopefully, the angry man and his mother/wife will have long forgotten that I never sent them the photo... - Garris PS: I'll upload the photos later...

Jim, fantastic idea. I'm actually not the biggest Flickr fan in the world for image hosting (it doesn't automatically generate thumbnails, amongst other problems), but it is undeniably a great tool to use for an idea such as yours. I'll purposefully teach myself to use it for this purpose. Perhaps we should put additional tags (the names of the 25 neighborhoods or wards, for example) to delineate where these things are for when the charettes get down to the neighborhood, rather than city, level. - Garris

I'm not sure 100% yet on what they want us to photograph that directly relates to planning. While I'd love to take a photograph of crumbling sidewalks, for example, I doubt that's helpful to them. I'm assuming they want good, bad, and ugly: - Buildings - Public spaces - Street patterns? - Signage Any ideas? - Garris

The city planning department gets a ton of credit for running a great event yesterday. The turnout was rather inspirational. They had people put a small round sticker representing where they live on an enormous satellite view of the city, and that map showed that the crowd genuinely represented almost every neighborhood in the city, with an impressive representation from the Southern and Western parts of the city, which I think is what they were really hoping for. I think the choice of Roger Williams as a central, democratizing venue was an inspirational one given the range of turnout. I'm usually, to be honest, a believer that huge feedback activities and forums like they had really are, well, fairly useless, and more PR than anything else. But I was thrilled to be proven wrong in this case, as clear trends and guidelines for the city really did emerge. The similarities in what people desired and felt could be improved upon were fairly consistent no matter the age, gender, or ethnicity of the people involved. Almost everyone there, for the most part, wants the same things as everyone who posts here: A safe, dense, walkable, vibrant, upkept city with robust transit options. Of course, I think a lot of people would disagree on the definition of such things, but that's what the charettes are for, to hammer out the details. Again, congrats to the city for a first rate event. - Garris PS: Nice to see familar faces like Cotuit and Jimmygreaves there and nice to meet runawayjim and his fiance. PS2: A reminder to anyone who didn't make it that the city made a point that you could always send a letter or e-mail them any feelings or suggestions you have...