Tuesday, May 19, 2015

From the Gates of the Dry Dock



PHOTOGRAPHER’S JOURNAL: For me, part of the fascination of a place like this comes from understanding what it did and how it worked, and the essential photographic challenge is how to make it all clear in a single shot, not merely the crane as it is now, slackened, spiritless, resting on wood blocks. Can it be seen in its stilt-walking glory, overseen by the crane operator in his matchstick tower, yanking and poking at levers and pedals to rotate the wheel that swung the boom that lifted steel plates onto and off of waiting barges where welders made repairs? The age of mules and wooden barges was gone; in 1917 motorized steel barges sought to make the Erie Canal competitive with the railroads, and dry docks like this kept commercial barges afloat on the  Erie Canal for another half century.



4 comments:

Ginnie Hart said...

This is exactly why I do collages, Ted, for the posterity of my own blog. I need the forest and I need the trees. Technically, it's better to have them all in separate images as you have here on your blog, and which I love, I might add. However, if I did that, my blog would wrap around the earth and back every single post. (sigh)

Emery Roth said...

I once read that if one wants to shoot better photographs, begin by showing fewer. I've always tried to follow that advice. If yours were all singletons, however, I'd miss your beautiful montages.

Ginnie said...

That's why I have two blogs, Ted. My In Soul is for the record. Hart & Soul (Shutterchance) is for the "better photographs." In fact, I'm surprised you don't follow me there instead of at In Soul, to be honest. I'll use the SC URL for this comment.

Emery Roth said...

I guess you just started me out in In Soul, and I never migrated. If you send me Hart and Soul instead, I'll comment on that = would love to see your singleton efforts.