November 30, 2009

ahoy, San Francisco


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photo by Donald Kinney

Years ago when they were excavating for the foundations of the Transamerica Pyramid they found a whole row of buried wind-schooners, parked at their destination and used as land-fill for the new downtown area.



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photo by Donald Kinney

This is aboard the Balcutha at the Hyde Street Pier, one of five old ships they let people spook and snoop around on for a small admission fee.



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photo by Donald Kinney

The Balcutha was a wind-powered square-rigger with sturdy steel sides, built in 1886 in Glasgow, Scotland.   She hauled freight "around the horn" using only the wind -- steam engines were available when she was built but some shippers continued to use wind-power because it was a cheaper form of transport.



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San Francisco and the Sea   (((copied from the Hyde Street Pier brochure)))
While native peoped paddled the bay in reed canoes, European explorers charted the coastline.   In 1776 the Spanish settled at the site of present-day San Francisco.   Soon afterward ships came in search of seal and sea otter furs.   In the 1820's whalers arrived, and Boston merchant ships began trading for California cowhides.

In 1849, after the discovery of gold in the Sierra Nevada foothills, the world rushed in.   That year over 750 ships arrived in San Francisco.   Some fortune seekers came on sleek, American-built clipper ships, but most sailed in on just about anything that could float.   They often abandoned their vessels in the shallows.

The Gold Rush brought merchants, laborers, and craftspeople from around the world.

By the 1870's California;s burgeoning grain trade lured big European sailing ships like the Balcutha.   Fleets of schooners like C.A. Thayer arrived with Douglas fir from Puget Sound.   Flat-bottomed scow schooners like Alma sailed up the Delta into California's Central Valley.   They delivered plows, and seed, sewing machines and cloth, coal and oil.   And they returned stacked with jute bags of hard white wheat, well suited for long-distance shipping.   On San Francisco's docks the bags were hand-loaded into the holds of sailing ships bound for Europe.

After the grain trade diminished and railroads reached the lumber mills and valleys, many sailing vessels were abandoned or scrapped.   The lucky ones were refitted for other careers.   Balcutha and C.A. Thayer went on to supply Alaska fisheries in the late 1800's and early 1900's.   American inter-coastal steamer traffic exploded after the Panama Canal opened in 1914.   West Coast shipyards opened to meet the demands of World Wars 1 and 2.

For a time, a dazzling array of vessels crowded the San Francisco waterfront:   great sailing ships, coastal passenger steamers, military craft, and the local working boats.

One by one, these ships became obsolete but nonetheless treasured for their beauty and for the stories they told.


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November 29, 2009

dazzled by the sea


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photo by Donald Kinney

Travelers, and those of us who live on one coast or another know about the hypnotic effect of crashing waves -- they can be very therapeutic.



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photo by Donald Kinney

That peninsula is the Bolinas area where free-thinkers, old hippies, and creative-types eek out simple lives while following their individual paths towards enlightenment, so I've been told.   I have a cat...



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Stinson Beach is a popular weekend destination, and other times it throws a spur-of-the-moment light show, like this golden water performance.


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November 28, 2009

life goes on in San Francisco


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photo by Donald Kinney

Gramps and Grandma with little Bambino the other day on a pre-Thanksgiving stroll along the Embarcadero.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Ah yes, a camera...   The perfect license to snoop...




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Lunch being over, people filter back inside these buildings to do whatever it is that they do.   Don't worry -- the catchup and pigeons will be waiting.


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November 27, 2009

San Francisco designs


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photo by Donald Kinney

I was showing this image to my photo-buddy back in Ohio.   He said he probably needed a little bit of L.S.D. to fully appreciate it.   Maybe I should keep trying...



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I suppose one of the main architectural goals in downtown San Francisco was to keep it looking interesting.   Maybe a few of the architects were sampling L.S.D. -- I just don't know...   Ah, probably not.



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I don't know who came up with the sketchy idea of hanging bare live electrical wires down the narrow streets of San Francisco for the trolleys, but the antiquated system seems to work fairly well -- adding a bit of design to the sky in the process.


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November 26, 2009

a million stories in the Naked City


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photo by Donald Kinney

I was looking all over the base of the Mother and Child statue for a signature or title but couldn't find anything besides a sea of sea-creatures -- so by supposition I'm going to say that Mother and Child are waiting for their sea-faring man to return (((with a sack full of fish for dinner))).



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Jesus Christ!   Getting to and from work is probably difficult enough for this fellow without having to ponder the deep deep meanings of giant oversized Christmas tree ornaments.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Prices aren't low, but I suppose if I worked in the Financial District I would make the occasional lunch-time dash over to the Ferry Building to grab something tasty.   I suppose I would have to wear pants without holes in the knees.


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November 25, 2009

it's getting a bit greener


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photo by Donald Kinney

In the past couple weeks we've had a couple mild rain-storms pass over -- a bit unusual for a usually dry, dry, dry California.

And darn-it...   I'm going to have to go back and re-shoot this with my camera on the tripod so I can stop the lens down for some increased depth-of-field -- I usually like the soft look, but I think this shot would benefit from more sharply focused detail.



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The moss and lichen and ferns and other greenery -- all enjoying the moisture.



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This spectacular nature show is along the Fairfax-To-Bolinas Road.   I get to see it often on my little trips up on Mt. Tamalpais.



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The ferns have perked up -- they are indeed very much alive...
(((as Hyacinth Bucket would say; "They are a very ancient civilization".)))


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November 24, 2009

goings on on Mt. Tamalpais


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photo by Donald Kinney

On Sunday I noticed a few clouds floating over, so I thought the best thing to do would be to go up on the ridge of Mt. Tamalpais and see if anything interesting was going on.



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Everything just about normal -- our little storm has passed.   The fog can flow freely again.



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And if you look closely you can see a bit of green, waiting, just waiting...


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November 23, 2009

motoring up on Mount Tamalpais


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photo by Donald Kinney

Well, if you were in Fairfax and wanted to get over to Bolinas on the coast, you would take a scenic little two lane road named the Fairfax-To-Bolinas Road.   Generally, in Bolinas the road is called Bolinas-To-Fairfax Road.



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This is the appropriately named "Ridgecrest Boulevard" where a lot of car commercials have been filmed over the years.   There's probably a good chance that you saw Lance Armstrong chugging up this road in an advertisement for the Postal Service and the Olympic Bicycling Team.



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And back to my little foggy grove of Redwoods.   All of this within about five miles of where Kitty and I live.



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Redwoods; and I would have liked to pose a pretty red-head next to one of those redwoods, but I'm going to have to use my red car as a stand-in.   You'll just have to use your imagination...


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November 22, 2009

foggy redwoods on Mt. Tamalpais


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photo by Donald Kinney

In the late 1800's and early 1900's San Francisco had an insatiable need for lumber, and the plentiful supply of tall redwoods over in Marin County filled the requirements perfectly.   Fortunately, redwood trees are able to regenerate from the roots of their toppled or cut trunks.

NOTE:   Bigger is better?   Well, let me know if this new larger size works for you or not -- it might be doing all sorts of strange things on your browser and monitor combination -- how's it working for you?



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This is a low spot on the ridge where it's typically more moist than other parts of Mt. Tamalpais.   Fog often comes roaring through this spot like a freight-train.



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Pretty, isn't it?


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November 21, 2009

deYoung Museum -- snooping around


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photo by Donald Kinney

It takes a very clever person to make one big George out of a whole lot of little Georges.   This is the work of Ray Beldner, folded and sewn U.S. currency, titled E Pluribus Unum.



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This lady keeps a pretty constant eye on that rainbow in the background.   I couldn't find a label for her statue but the rainbow painting is Rainy Season in the Tropics, 1866, by Frederic Edwin Church (1826 - 1900).



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photo by Donald Kinney

This is the trippy and far-out work of the fabulous Georgia O'Keefe, titled Petunias, 1925.   Oil on hardboard.



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And this bright ceramic fruit makes quite a splash.   But then, there is no indication of how big the pieces of fruit are.   (((they're a foot or two tall)))   Next time I'll try to include something (((like the head of a security guard))) so size can be judged.



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And if this mountain looks familiar, yes, that's Mount Tamalpais, the beloved centerpiece of Marin County.   This was painted in 1870 by William Keith (1838 - 1911) and is titled;   A Broadside of Mount Tamalpais, oil on canvas.

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November 20, 2009

the far-out deYoung Museum


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photo by Donald Kinney

The skin of the deYoung Museum in San Francisco looks like a giant half-tone screen, like a printer doing photo-lithography would use.

It's just odd-ball enough to have enraged a lot of people years ago when the design of the building was going through the review and approval process.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Combine an angular building with some colorful leaves and you've got something rather arty, I think...



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photo by Donald Kinney

The oddest thing about the deYoung is that the odd nine story tower is filled with offices and not a whole lot of art, but they probably do have the world's fastest elevator.   A bookstore, t-shirt and coffee-mug store, and a grand view of the City awaits.



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Well, I should go back and re-Photoshop this image.   I inadvertently squashed the sphere while skewing the right side of the photo.



And this photo has more faults than just a squashed sphere -- it has the dreaded blown-out whites.   The sunlight on that concrete ball was glaring, but it's the job of the photographer to get some detail into the high-values and not just let them go blank.

Had I checked the Histogram I would have seen what was coming, but actually there's not too much any Photoshopper can do to rescue an image blown-out this badly.   I could fiddle with the Curve, or go heavy on the Recovery slider in CameraRAW, but probably the best thing is to go back and re-shoot the scene on an overcast day.

Continuing your Histogram lesson:   Notice how on the left-side of the scale the image values don't reach all the way to the left-edge.   This shows there are no pure blacks in the image, which is o.k. for an image like this.   Had I wanted some rich blacks I would just slide that little triangle over to the right, and in so doing I would be fitting the Scene Brightness Range to the 256 brightness steps in Photoshop.



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I can't help seeing a giant aircraft or spaceship in this image.
Ready for take-off.   Please put your tray tables up!...


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November 19, 2009

legalize it


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photo by Donald Kinney

Far out.   Yeah, legalize it...   Sounds like a trippy idea to me...



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photo by Donald Kinney

Lava Lamps were big in the '60's, and are still around today.
They make good pets.



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photo by Donald Kinney

At night they close the security gate.
Here's an old photo of this sign really held over.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Haight Street is an eclectic mix of modern with the old and funky.   This is one of the more upscale places -- a hair cutting place on Haight.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Taking a photo of a piercing parlor sign is about as close as I ever want to get to one.   Spare me the agony...


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November 18, 2009

doing Dogpatch and Pier70 with Troy Holden


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photo by Donald Kinney

Foist of all folks, I've fixed this first photo -- yesterday it had a yucky blue sky and was kind of dark overall.   Other than the yucky sky, I trusted everything to the image's "Histogram" forgetting to look at the image subjectively with my eye to judge the brightness.   Fortunately I've caught and corrected my mistake.

This was shot on an adventurous trek through the Pier70 area with best photo buddy (bpb) Troy Holden, formerly known as Plug1.



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photo by Donald Kinney

Here's Troy Holden, one of the key members of CALIBER GROUP, and that character in the background is one of 81 "Girafas" Troy has tracked down throughout the City.



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Boo...   And it can get kind of spooky, spooking around all those old warehouses and abandoned shipyards.   Pretty good odds that someone was inside this van sleeping.



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photo by Donald Kinney

And it was a pleasant morning -- traces of rain from a few days before were opening up photo-ops here and there.

Along the way Troy asked me how adventurous I was feeling -- if I wanted to slip under a fence and tip-toe along a slippery shore to make our way into an old dry-docks building, and we tried, but someone had reinforced the fence and plugged up some holes -- we were thwarted in getting way out to where we were really not supposed to be.



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Besides walking very gingerly through the parking lot of the local Hell's Angels clubhouse, another highlight of my photo-walk with Troy was getting to take a look at a 1946 Muni bus that is going to be restored by Muni shop personnel.

There is no shortage of friction between the "workers in the trenches" at the bus repair shop and the "big-wigs" at the higher echelons of Muni and City Hall.

Besides starting the restoration work at a time when workers are being laid-off and bus fares are going up, restoring the bus will take an estimated $800,000 in materials and man-hours, plus it will pull mechanics away from the type of work they are supposed to be doing (((like fixing busses))).

Personally, I think the City and Muni should enlist the aid of the Hell's Angels to do the restoration work on the old bus.   Seems like they would enjoy working with metal and making the bus look all pretty -- they hang out nearby, so it's right up their street, so to speak.   It could be one of those community projects where they would stop slamming speed-balls long enough to help out their poor beleaguered Municipal Transit System.   Would boost their image...

CLICK to see Troy's great interior shot of the old bus.


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