Tag Archives: Paris

Cameras, Color, Medium Format Cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – part 18 – Stained Glass at Ste Chapelle

November 28, 2013 dcphotoartist Leave a comment

Sainte Chapelle is the royal chapel on the Ile de la Cité built in the 13th century as part of the then-royal palace. It was conceived and designed to house King Louis’ collection of Christian relics, including the purported spear of Longinus and the Crown of Thorns. Over the centuries, especially during the French Revolution, it suffered depredations, including the destruction and/or removal for sale of chunks of its stained-glass windows. In the later 19th century, the windows were restored. Today, a major, 10-year project to clean, stabilize and protect the windows is nearing completion. You can see some of the scaffolding in the chapel in my photos.

Today, you enter the chapel through the lower level, which houses a few video exhibits and the gift shop. Even on the lower level, the stained glass windows are beautiful:

To enter the main chapel on the second level, you ascend a dark, narrow spiral stair, and then emerge into a room bursting with light and color. Directly above and behind you is the rose window.

To your front is the main altar:

Another view of the windows and vault above the altar:

Windows, Ceiling Vaults, Ste. Chapelle Altar

On the side walls there are statues of saints:

I realize I’ve got two pictures of the same saint statue. I was trying to capture the different looks of the statue as the light changes when you move around him. Can you imagine the effect of seeing a place like this in the 13th century, when even today to our glitz-and-glamour-jaded points of view it is breathtaking? This would have outshone the contemporary Saint Peter’s in Rome! (today’s Saint Peter’s Basilica of course makes this look paltry, but that is a Renaissance/Baroque confection re-imagined by some of the greatest artists and architects the world has ever seen. This is a late-Medieval Gothic chapel).

Looking up at the ceiling vaults and the side windows presents this view:

Again, all these were taken with my trusty Rolleiflex, and hand-held. The film is Kodak Portra 800 – until I tried some of this recent version of Portra 800, I never would have thought an 800 speed film would be this sharp and grainless, or the colors so vivid. In the past, films above 400 speed, even in medium format, had obvious grain and lacked the same contrast, sharpness and vivid color of their slower speed counterparts. Kodak has banished these shortcomings in Portra 800. Even though it’s pricey (about $10/roll), this is one of the reasons I hope Kodak manages to stay in the color film manufacturing business for many years to come.

Cameras, Color, Lenses, Medium Format Cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – part 17 – My neighborhood in Paris

November 28, 2013 dcphotoartist Leave a comment

Some street scenes from my neighborhood. In reflection, I wish I had taken an afternoon and just photographed up and down the street. There were so many charming little restaurants and shops along the Rue St. Louis en L’Ile, you could easily make a photo study of just that one street.

The Cure Gourmande candy shop was ALWAYS busy. Probably as much to do with the bright, cheery interior as it does with the candies and biscuits they sell. Who wouldn’t want to go in and browse, and maybe try a sample or two?

Cure Gorumande sweet shop, Rue St. Louis en L'Ile — Cure Gorumande sweet shop, Rue St. Louis en L’Ile

Please give me your feedback on these two – which do you like better? I’m on the fence as to which one works best.

Patrick Allain Florist, Rue St. Louis en L'Ile — Patrick Allain Florist, Rue St. Louis en L’Ile

This was one of the few opportunities I had to break out my Rolleinar close-up filter sets and take a picture of something small. Given the size and weight of them, even though I only used them maybe twice on the whole trip, I don’t regret bringing them, especially when you compare them to a dedicated macro lens for an SLR system. I was drawn to the different textures and colors of the wood of the door, the rusty iron of the lion head, and the painted metal of the snake. And believe it or not, this was hand-held!

In closing, here’s another restaurant/wine bar in the neighborhood, this one on the Quai de Bourbon, facing the Pont Marie. It really shows the age of the building, as nothing on it is really square or level.

Cameras, Color, Medium Format Cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – part 16 – My home away from Home

November 26, 2013 dcphotoartist 1 Comment

Here are some photos I took of the apartment where we stayed. The apartment was at Number 6, Rue St. Louis en L’Ile. This was an outstanding choice of location and of apartment. It had charm, convenience, and comfort. The bedrooms were a touch petite, but it was never a problem. I would stay there again in a heartbeat. Our landlady, Francoise, was super charming and met us the day we arrived with a bottle of wine and a plate of cheeses she bought down the street at the fromagerie.

I was utterly charmed by the arrangement of this little velvet-covered chair in the dining room, next to the Chinese style sideboard.

The living room featured a chaise lounge by Le Corbusier. I suspect it is an original, based on the wear on the cowhide cover.

Looking out the living room window, this is the view when you look straight out.

Window, Number 6, Rue St Louis en L'Ile — Window, Number 6, Rue St Louis en L’Ile

Looking up the street on a sunny day:

And on a rainy day:

The Rue St. Louis is very busy with pedestrians all day, although it may not look as such down at my end of the street. A block further up is where the shops, art galleries, restaurants and food sellers begin.

This archway was directly across the street from our apartment, where the Rue St. Louis took a right turn to go out to the quay.

Even though it was raining, I stepped out on the balcony and looked down, to see this scene of the woman with red pants crossing the street:

Woman Crossing Rue St. Louis in the Rain

Here is the Eglise St. Louis en L’Ile with its clock, up close, which you can see in the background of the sunny and rainy shots of the Rue St. Louis:

The église St. Louis has a gorgeous baroque interior replete with dark wood paneling, stained glass, and surprisingly enough magnificent altarpieces that somehow managed to survive the upheaval of the French Revolution. They regularly have concerts there as well as services, and it is well worth popping in if you’re passing by.

Cameras, Color, Medium Format Cameras, Night-time, Photography, Travel

October in Paris – part 15 – A few more night photos

November 25, 2013 dcphotoartist Leave a comment

The Ilot Vache restaurant is on the corner of the Rue St.Louis en l’Ile and the Rue des Deux Ponts, which more or less bisects the Ile St. Louis into east and west halves. The Ile St. Louis was once actually two separate islands, one of which was the Ilot Vache (little cow island) because it was used as pastureland for Parisian cows. With the rapid growth of the city’s population in the 15th century, there was such a demand for more prime real estate that the two islands were merged into one and developed as residential space. Thus the name of the restaurant. The Rue des Deux Ponts roughly demarcates where the two islands were split. My dad and I ate dinner at L’Ilot Vache one night, and the food was quite good, even if the dining room was a bit crowded.

L'Ilot Vache Restaurant — L’Ilot Vache Restaurant

I managed to catch a pair of diners in the window of the restaurant.

Diners, L'Ilot Vache, Night — Diners, L’Ilot Vache, Night

This is one case where I broke my normal rule of shooting night photos with Portra 160 – these two were done on Ektar 100. I suspect that I had just a couple frames left on the roll of Ektar that was loaded in the camera when I set out to do my night shots, so I finished them off and then switched over to Portra for the rest of the evening.

Cameras, Color, Medium Format Cameras, Night-time, Photography, Travel

October in Paris – part 14 – Paris by Night

November 25, 2013 dcphotoartist 2 Comments

Ok, it’s far from a comprehensive survey of the city by night, but whaddya want, I only had a single night for night shooting, so I confined myself to where I could walk to from my apartment.

One of the great things about where we (my father and I) stayed was the fact we were in walking distance of just about everything, from the subway to all the historical buildings and neighborhoods. Notre Dame was a stone’s throw away, across the bridge. Here is the rear view from the approach I took over the Pont St. Louis.

The front facade is fully illuminated at night, and they have built a set of large risers in the plaza in front that if nothing else serve as a great camera platform for photographing the towers. The night I was out shooting was the night of the full moon, so I got lucky and was able to get this shot of the tower and the moon.

Another view of the towers, from a side street. It had been raining that evening, so the streets were wet giving them that Hollywood movie look.

Another shot of the full moon, over a grand Hotel (Hotel in the Parisian sense of grand city residence/townhouse as opposed to place-where-you-rent-a-room-by-the-night) on the Ile de la Cite.

The Pont St. Louis, slick with rain. This is the bridge that connects the Ile St. Louis with the Ile de la Cite.

A view of the Hotel de Ville (Paris’ City Hall) from across the Seine. The white line at the river level is created by the lights of a passing river tour boat that has flood lights on the roof to illuminate the buildings on the quays as it passes. I don’t envy the people whose apartments face the river because of that, even if the boat tours do stop sometime between 9 and 10 pm.

Another view of the bridges across the Seine. In the background on the left you can see a rather castle-like building which is La Monnaie, the old French Mint where they used to make coins.

The last bridge of today’s program is the Pont Louis Phillippe, which connects the end of the Ile St. Louis to the north bank of the Seine. The bridge I used every day to get to and from the subway was the Pont Marie, which abuts the middle of the Ile St. Louis. I wanted to get a view of the bridges from water level, so I went down a set of steps on the quayside of the Ile de la Cite and set up my tripod at the very bottom – you can see from the facing set of steps they descend all the way into the water (I did not test how far down they go, as I had no desire to get wet, especially at this time of year).

The St. Regis cafe has a view of the Pont St. Louis. Notre Dame itself is hidden by the buildings across the bridge. On my excursion, I saw people sitting outside the cafe all evening – I returned home at nearly midnight and there were people still outside the cafe as it was closing up.

Here’s a look into the courtyard of one of the hotels on the Rue St. Louis en l’Ile, at number 51. I looked through the doorway, which had always been closed when I walked by in the daytime, and saw the light on in the library window on the second floor, and I just had to take that picture. I love libraries (I’m sitting in one as I type this, my modest personal library of 2000 or so books), so seeing in to one had a rather Proustian effect on me.

Hotel Courtyard, 51 Rue St. Louis en L'Ile, Night — Hotel Courtyard, 51 Rue St. Louis en L’Ile, Night

I shot all these on Kodak Portra 160 because I like how it responds to nighttime color better than Ektar. It has a less contrasty look which is good for night because night scenes are inherently contrastier than daytime scenes, and it handles overexposure better than Ektar.

Cameras, Digital cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – part 12 – The Full Moon

November 14, 2013 dcphotoartist Leave a comment

A few shots of the streets of Paris by the light of the full moon.

Off the Place de L’Opera:

The Hotel de Ville (City Hall):

On the Ile St. Louis:

Cameras, Digital cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – Part 11 – more Trains

November 14, 2013 dcphotoartist Leave a comment

Some more transportation photos. In France, they have the national rail network, which has two grades of TGV-class trains: the long-distance, high speed trains (the one that goes from Paris to Marseilles in 3 hours) and the not-so-fast trains that stop more places. They also have regional trains that connect the smaller cities and larger towns, and then around Paris there are the RER trains that run on a separate set of tracks from the Metro, but it interfaces with and extends the Metro network.

You’ve already seen my TGV photos. Here is one of the regional trains at the station in Chalon, on the Burgundy province network.

Wouldn’t it be cool to commute on a train like that every day?

Here’s another view of that train, from the platform at Chalon. You can see the name of the station on the sign under the awning over the platform.

Although not specifically depicting trains, I had to include this shot here, as it was in plain view from the platform of the Dijon rail station. If you watched tv in the US between the 1970s to 1990s, this will probably tickle your funny bone.

Finally, two more transportation images that have nothing whatsoever to do with trains, but instead are bicycle related. France is bike-infatuated, after all it is the home of the Tour De France. Will this be the new look on next year’s Tour?

Some would say cycling shorts can’t go away fast enough as a fashion piece; I think they should stay, as they prevent both chafing and blindness.

A very different take on bike-based transportation is this, spotted at the plaza in front of Notre Dame:

A very different, less aerodynamic sense of fashion dominates this cyclists ensemble. Equal risk of putting out someone’s eye, but from a totally different cause.

Cameras, Color, Medium Format Cameras, Photography, Travel

Notre Dame Cathedral, Night

November 13, 2013 dcphotoartist Leave a comment

There is now a viewing platform in the square in front of Notre Dame which makes for a great venue to watch the fire spinners and other street performers, and a nice vantage point to view the facade, but it does present an unique challenge for photographing the entire building – you can’t get far enough back to get the whole facade including the towers in one frame without using an extreme wide-angle lens and introducing lots of distortion. So second-best option was this – shoot in two frames and line them up. It ALMOST worked, but you still get some keystoning from having to shoot up to get the towers.

About Art, Black and White, Cameras, Medium Format Cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – part 10 – Art

November 12, 2013 dcphotoartist 2 Comments

We’ll start with the Louvre museum. Here are some photos of the building itself. The Pyramid, the glass entrance structure that opens to the underground entrance lobby, is fascinating in itself for the geometry it creates and the possibilities for abstraction, and for the clash of modernity against 18th and 19th century architectural sensibilities that hallmark the rest of the building.

Under the pyramid there is a vast entrance plaza with a huge spiral stairs. In the center of the spiral stairs is the accessibility elevator, a cylinder that rises and falls to transport people to and from the plaza above, and looks like it should be a stage set from 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The contrast, a Napoleonic-era entrance ramp and doors (see the N’s in the frieze above the windows and doors). This is empty because the courtyard is closed to the public and filled with construction equipment.

As you can see, the Louvre is a VERY busy museum. I don’t know if it is the most visited art museum in the world or not (I think it is), but it also has to be one of the largest if not the largest. I really only saw parts of one wing of the museum (there are three), and you could easily spend a half a day in there every day for a month and still not see everything.

The grand gallery is where the Italian Renaissance masterworks are held – the three non-Mona Lisa DaVincis are here, along with the Caravaggios – highlights of the collection that most interested me.

In the section with the 19th century French paintings, there was a painter with his easel set up, copying the famous painting of the cavalryman in the bearskin hat. I couldn’t resist taking this shot as much because of the “no photography” sign he had on his easel. I’ll justify it by saying that I think it had more to do with not wanting to be disturbed by flashes popping than anything else.

The Louvre has perhaps the very best collection of Michelangelo’s sculpture outside of Italy. Two of the Medici tomb sculptures are in the sculpture gallery, and are of intense interest to me because they are part of the “unfinished” pieces in style. There is still significant debate as to whether the “unfinished” pieces are in fact unfinished or if their appearance is exactly what Michelangelo intended. They are called “unfinished” because they have coarse textures in parts and tool marks are prominent over significant portions of the pieces, to the point that some portions of the pieces are in fact only roughed-in forms without complete features.

Michelangelo, "Unfinished" figure — Michelangelo, “Unfinished” figure

Finally, we have some other sculptural pieces from the Louvre. The Cupid with Butterfly is actually in a side gallery where touching is allowed.

Black and White, Cameras, Medium Format Cameras, Photography, Travel

Paris in October – part 8 – Versailles in black and white

November 10, 2013 dcphotoartist 1 Comment

Here are my takes on the palace of Versailles, in black-and-white. There are actually quieter spaces within the building where you can take photos without a gazillion tourists blocking your view and making appreciation of the space impossible, unlike the state apartments. I’m dividing this post into two sections – architecture and sculpture.

ARCHITECTURE

Here’s a side staircase. Not the grand stairs that led to the queen’s apartments, but nonetheless, a magnificent entry.

This hall is behind and beneath the state apartments, looking out to the gardens to the west.

This doorway is the central door leading out from the hall above to the gardens.

These three are from one of the side buildings outside the palace proper, where the gift shop and ticket office are located today. Anywhere else they would be special, but at Versailles, they are relegated to the service space.

SCULPTURE

Sculpture is everywhere at Versailles, from the entrance gates to the halls in the basement.

This grotesque is on the back side of one of the heroic female “virtues” at the entrance gates to the palace. Seeing this, it’s not hard to see how the peasant classes who were starving would see it as emblematic of how the nobles viewed them and took umbrage accordingly.

This Satyr is in one of the halls of the ground floor of the palace, relegated to a corner where few tourists venture. I suspect his fig-leaf is a Victorian-era excess, as it appears to be glued on much after the fact.

I’m not sure who/what this statue represents, but it appears to be some kind of hermit/mystic, judging from his attire and the smoking pot at his feet.

Here is a water fountain outside the palace in the main forecourt.

These last two were found in the town of Versailles in the outdoor courtyard of an architectural antiques dealer. A different take and a contrast to the exquisite statuary in the palace, they nonetheless have their own beauty and dignity.

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