Category Archives: Featured Photo

Featured Photo
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Featured Photo

holding onto fall by NCinDC

It’s that time of year again, DC.  By now you’ve probably shut down your a/c, cleared the cobwebs out of your furnace, and added an extra blanket or two to your bed.  There may be a few precious nights of leaving your windows open, but soon it will be too cold, especially if you’re of the female variety who gets chilly in July.  You know who you are.  It’s a great time to take a road trip out to Maryland or Virginia to check out the fall colors because soon a gust of wind will come along and poof – they’ll all be gone.

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Essential DC, Featured Photo
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Featured Photo

The Pillars @ The National Arboretum by citron_smurf.

When I traveled to Rome a few years ago, I was awestruck by the ancient ruins that are scattered throughout the modern city.  “Oh look, there’s a quaint little restaurant, a place to rent scooters, aaaand some excavated pillars that date back to several hundred years before Christ?”  Neato.

You don’t see that much, if at all, here in the United States.  It’s more like, “Oh look, there’s a California Pizza Kitchen, a Starbucks, aaaand a big hole in the ground where an office building from the 1970’s used to be.”  Lame.

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Featured Photo, The Daily Feed
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The star is aligned for you

Photo courtesy of mosley.brian

Washington Monument – West View – 7-15-08, courtesy of mosley.brian

Shooter Brian, talking about the photo above, proves himself to be his own worst critic when he says “This could have turned out better, but that setting sun was really strong. ” I think it’s a great shot, but if one of the things he’d like to change about the photo is the alignment of the sun along the reflecting pool, this is the time to do it. Capitol Weather points out that during the weeks surrounding the equinoxes (ie, now) the eastern sun is aligned with the reflecting pool.

So if you or Brian want to get out and get some shots on the Mall from the Lincoln, you could line the sun up nicely with the Washington Momument. Or Brian could re-create his shot with a morning over the Capital building, though they don’t open till 9am.

added for clarity – it’s the Washington Monument, from which the above photo was shot, that doesn’t open till 9am. Whether or not the Capital is being used is a slightly less consistent schedule…

Featured Photo, Life in the Capital, Sports Fix, The District
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Featured Photo

Nation’s Triathlon by Noah Devereaux

Last week our fine city hosted the annual Nation’s Triathlon where competitors are challenged to swim 1.5K through the murky Potomac, bike 40K, and run 10K.  It’s a feat so easy that even our very own Mayor Fenty can do it.  I’m kidding of course.  The only way I could compete in this race is if it were a 51.5K bike ride.

This amazing shot by Noah Devereaux takes the sweaty, strenuous, and sometimes painful event and strips away the grit, replacing it with grace and beauty.  The perfect lane lines and tree-lined street capture your eye and lead it toward the majestic Capitol at the end of Pennsylvania Avenue.  The warm morning sun glimmers off the newly paved road and creates a shadow for the runner to compete against.  It takes months of dedicated preparation to compete in a race like this, but this photo makes it look like a mere jog through the park.

Featured Photo, Life in the Capital, The District
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FotoWeek DC: Deadline Is Near!

Attention all photographers!  If you haven’t entered your photos in the FotoWeek DC Photography Competition, you’re running out of time.  The deadline for submissions is next Monday, September 22nd but you can submit your photos until September 29th for an additional fee (no one likes additional fees).

For those of you out of the loop, FotoWeek DC is a brand new photography showcase event for professionals, ameteurs, and students alike.  And now even the little (K-12) kiddies can participate!  For more about this event, allow me to quote from their website:

The week of November 15-22, 2008 will mark the launch of FotoWeek DC, the first annual gathering of a diverse and wide-ranging photography community in the nation’s capital, including photographers, museums, universities and all those involved in the profession across the metro D.C. area, including Virginia and Maryland. Unique among American cities, Washington, D.C. is a nexus of artistic, business, political and public sector energy, in which photography plays an integral role. FotoWeek DC seeks to bring together all photographers and imaging professionals from every discipline to join with the public in celebration of the medium.

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Essential DC, Featured Photo, History, Life in the Capital, The District
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Richard Avedon: Portraits of Power

The Generals of the Daughters of the American Revolution, DAR Convention,
Mayflower Hotel, Washington, D.C., October 15, 1963,
© 2008 The Richard Avedon Foundation

There really isn’t a just way to describe how incredible and important Richard Avedon’s photographs are, at least in words that haven’t already been written or spoken.  He’s been called “America’s pre-eminent editorial portrait and fashion photographer” which is accurate, but he, like all master photographers, is also a great historian.  Richard Avedon: Portraits of Power, a new exhibit set to open this Saturday at the Corcoran Gallery of Art, has brought together more than 200 of his photos that cover over 50 years of his career and of American history, some of them having never been on exhibit or published.

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Featured Photo, Getaways
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Featured Photo

A River Runs Through It by Brian Knight

Fact: I love DC.

Fact: I love this photo that was taken in Harpers Ferry.

Fact: Harper’s Ferry is in West Virginia, not in DC.

Can’t we all just get along?

I’ve been to Harpers Ferry a few times since I moved to DC a few years ago.  It’s only about an hour drive outside of the city, and a scenic one at that.  You pass fields of wildflowers, quaint little towns, and pumpkin patches along the way, as well as a bunch of Taco Bells which is an added bonus. Continue reading →

Arlington, Featured Photo
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Yep, it’s Autumn, or might as well be

Cucumber from my Garden IMGP1602 copy

I know the season has not quite changed yet, but to me it’s already autumn. The garden has stopped producing, and it was a bum crop anyway this year. Pretty much all I got were some freaky cucumbers (another example here) and a handful of tomatoes that started to grow and then got stolen by some animals who apparently loved my garden as much as I had hoped to.

On the bright side, I was able to get some rosemary well entrenched in place of a dead shrub and with luck my grapes will really take off next year. They say the third year is the magic one, so I hope to have a better report then. The roses did very well in their first year and should winter well in our mild climate.

It’s about time to slow down, pour a glass of wine and make a toast to the passing of summer and the coming of autumn. Who knows – next year at this time we may be celebrating a bumper crop of whatever I plant and snacking on grapes, whose perfume will waft gently on the cool evening air with the promise of a late, delicious harvest.

What culinary delights are you still enjoying from your garden?

Featured Photo, Life in the Capital, Sports Fix, The District
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Featured Photo

this jersey says it all by dharmabumx

As August comes to a close, we should all be thankful for the amazing weather we’ve had this summer in DC. Sure, there were a few weeks with temperatures in the high 90’s and Vietnam-like humidity, but for the most part we’ve had many reasonable days in the 80’s – perfect weather for baseball and beer. Well, pretty much perfect weather for anything and beer, but when I look at this photo I want to Metro over to the Nationals stadium, buy a ticket, gorge myself with a halfsmoke from Ben’s, and wash it down with a really expensive cup of beer, all the while knowing that our team is destined to find a way to lose.

With only a month left of baseball for the Nats, why not go drink some beer in our new stadium? Might as well get as much out of your tax dollars as you can. They host the Dodgers tonight through Thursday followed by a series against the Braves through the weekend. Be sure to memorize the lyrics to Sweet Caroline for an extra good time.

Featured Photo, Special Events
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Nerd Prom East is bigger than ever

Photo courtesy of megadem

DSCF2744, courtesy of megadem

I figure if Warren Ellis can call Comicon “Nerd Prom” then it’s only fair to call the annual Otakon in Baltimore Nerd Prom East. It’s not 125,000+ in attendance but the announced 26,000+ for this year is nothing to sneeze at either.

As I wrote last year, no matter how little interest you might have in animation or sf/fantasy, the pictures from Otakon and the costumes people put together are simply amazing. If you search for everything on Flickr with the word otakon with a date after Aug 1, 2008 (so you get this year’s shots) you end up with just shy of 6,000 shots. Fire up PicLens – thanks for turning me onto this program, Max! – and rather than spending that hour working like you should have, you can think “wow!” and “I bet that’s heavy,” “why is Jesus there?” and “are you old enough to be walking around in public in your underwear?”

Some of my favorite pics from this year after the jump. Continue reading →

Featured Photo, Life in the Capital, The District
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Featured Photo

20080713L1000014 by furcafe

‘Tis the season for barbecuing, the time to gather up your friends and family, fire up the coals, and throw down some of your favorite meats and vegetables. It’s also a great opportunity to toss back a few cans of beer or your favorite blueberry drink of choice. But be careful, DC. When you mix an open fire pit with alcohol consumption, you may very well set the neighborhood on fire.

This brings up a good question. Last year it was discovered that at least 25% of DC’s fire hydrants were out of order. So what state are our hydrants in now? Have they all been fixed? Are we down to 5%? I know the hydrant across the street from my house still has an “out of service” collar on it which is not exactly a comforting feeling. I have to say, from the Georgetown Library fire to the recent one in Mount Pleasant, DC should also be known as the “fire capital” of the United States.

Photographer Chris Chen (furcafe), an omnipresent “man on the scene”, did a great job of capturing the spirit of a backyard barbecue in this shot. While you’ll normally see him with a film camera strapped around his neck (and please note that I have never seen Chris without a camera), this photo was captured using his digital Leica M8.

Featured Photo, Talkin' Transit, Technology, The Daily Feed
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Plane Trails on DC Cam

I’m a big fan of the National Park Service’s webcams, especially the Washington DC cam viewing the Mall area from the Netherlands Carillon on the GW Parkway. Having a windowless inside office I like to keep this cam (among other outdoor DC cams) open in a separate browser window to provide an outside view through the course of the work day. I’ve also used it for at least one time lapse video.

Checking the cam tonight brought an especially cool treat: a long exposure shot catching a plane making the River Visual approach to landing at National:

Webcam captures plane

Webcam captures plane

(Here’s how that approach looks from a pilot’s perspective aboard a small plane in daylight. More here.)

Update: Oh nice, check out brianmka’s incidental capture of a landing plane at night from right near the same webcam.

Featured Photo, The Great Outdoors
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Check out those bugs

Photo courtesy of Me

Yesterday’s WaPo article on bees was serendipitous for me. I’d recently seen a bee smaller than any other bee I had ever seen by far – much smaller than a pea – and it made me wonder how many varieties of bees there were. Growing up in Miami I’d only noticed one kind of bee, and it wasn’t till I moved up here that I saw my first bumblebee. I didn’t even realize it was a bee at first – the big fat thing that looked like a black and yellow flying jellybean did not resemble the bees I was used to in shape, size, color, or behavior. I can’t speak for anyone else, but their lollygagging pace makes me feel far more comfortable around them than other bees. It’s almost impossible to imagine those Orson Welles of the bee world attacking you.

Now, if you’re more insect-educated than I am – and it’s easy to imagine that – you scoffed when I said I’d only ever seen one type of bee. After all, there’s over 3,500 species of indigenous bees, a fact that Adrian Higgens’ article introduced me to, so the chances that I only ever saw one kind is unlikely. Since facts are, for me, like potato chips – you can’t consume just one – I looked up a few of the resources that Higgens provided, including the mention of the Xerces Society and the publication Farming for Bees, which can be downloaded in PDF form from that link. While I had better luck finding bee-attracting plants in the appendix of the UGA document “Bee Conservation in the Southeast,” I did find some other information about our area in the F4B document.

On page 19 is a case study of how Pepco has handled the land under some of their transmission lines. There’s more information on Pepco’s right of way program here but for my money  you can’t beat a writeup about a power company program called the Butterfly Enhancement Project. I’m still trying to figure out where the devil that 5 acre stretch is, though I get the sense that it may not be accessible to the general public.

Until I figure that out and can take some shots there, why not content yourself with the collection of Flickr pictures tagged with ‘bee’ in our immediate area? And if you happen to know what that other bug is in my shot, sing out, would you? I’ve never seen a black and yellow beetle before.

Bug harmony, courtesy of Me

Featured Photo
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Norton Hears Union Station Fools

union station hearing

From left: David Ball, USRC; Bryant Chambers, Jones Lang LaSalle, Inc., and Daniel Levy, Ashkenazy Acquisition Corporation, as captured by Erin M

Some days our elected yet non-voting Representative does me proud. Yesterday, Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) took on Union Station’s non-policy on photography with a good grilling of David Ball, President of USRC, Daniel Levy of Ashkenazy Acquisition, and Bryan Chambers of Jones Lang LaSalle. (Norton’s meeting recap.)

Before you get confused, Union Station Redevelopment Corporation (USRC)is the federally chartered nonprofit that is redeveloping Union Station, which leases the non-Amtrack portion of the station to Ashkenazy Acquisition, which subleases retail areas (and maybe security) to Jones Lang LaSalle.

Why do these fools matter? Because the security guards are harassing photographers in Union Station despite it being a public space – in action and maybe still in legal parlance. And as DC area photographers know from Free Our Streets, photography is a First Amendment right in public space, even if its leased to a private corporation.

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Featured Photo, Life in the Capital, Special Events, Sports Fix, The District
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Washington Kastles Stop ‘Big Mac’

Mashona Washington

Mashona Washington by Max Cook

In a dramatic come-from-behind victory, the Washington Kastles showed John McEnroe and the New York Sportimes that they are not to be messed with on their home court. What started out looking like an easy New York win, the match became a slug fest that came down to a women’s doubles “Supertiebreaker”. Mashona Washington and Sacha Jones out dueled Milagros Sequera and Hana Sromova, beating them 7 to 5 and giving the Kastles an 18-17 win.

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Adventures, Downtown, Featured Photo, The District, The Mall
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Will They Ever Learn?


A watchful eye
Originally uploaded by afagen

I’m downtown DC this evening photographing some buildings as the sun sets. It’s a great night to shoot reflections on windows, something I enjoy in photographing buildings. And I’m making my way towards L’Enfant Plaza to begin heading home and there’s a perfect shot of the Dept. of Transportation building’s windows being intersected by its neighbor. A great mirroring image. So I stop, fiddle with my settings, set my stance, and begin photographing.

Well, it’s a long story but I’ll keep it short. Basically, one of the DoT security guys tells me in broken English that I cannot photograph the building unless I have a permit. I explain I’m on public property and can take pictures at will. I explained – repeatedly – that I’m an amateur photographer and take architectural photos. He says I can’t take the pictures. I ask to see where such a policy is written. He calls the supervisor.

Now, the supervisor was a nice guy. He seemed a bit confused as well, but I patiently explained that I didn’t need a permit to photograph. His counter? “Well, you know, terrorists walk around, taking pictures, plotting stuff. You could be one. So we can’t let you do that.”

Um, yeah, ok. Not. (I hardly look like a terrorist, people.) I explained the whole public property deal, told him I appreciated him doing his job – but that he was misinformed about photographing public buildings. There’s no permit required, nor do I need “permission.” Going inside? Different story. So we exchanged info – yeah, I cooperated because there’s no need to be a tool here – and then I went on my merry way after we shook hands. It certainly wasn’t a Union Station experience.

Unfortunately, the sun set and I lost the light. Oh well. At least someone got an education tonight.

Ain’t DC grand?

Featured Photo, Life in the Capital, The District, The Mall
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Featured Photo

Presidential Helicopter Passing the Washington Monument by realkevin

Talk about being in the right place at the right time. This perfectly framed shot of what could be Marine One flying in front of the Washington Monument makes me wonder what George was up to. Was he coming back from Andrews AFB? Was he on his way to Camp David? Was he giving some Saudis a tour of the city or just out for a joy ride? We’ll never know.

According to my trusty sources on The Google:

As a security measure, Marine One always flies in groups with identical helicopters, sometimes as many as five. One helicopter carries the president, while the others serve as decoys for would-be assassins on the ground. Upon take-off these helicopters begin to shift in formation (sometimes referred to as a Presidential shell game) regularly to keep the location of the President secure. Also, Marine One reportedly is equipped with standard military anti-missile countermeasures such as flares to counter heat-seaking missiles and chaff to counter radar-guided missiles. To add to the security of Marine One, every member of HMX-1 is required to pass a Yankee White background check before touching any of the helicopters used for presidential travel. Marine One is always transported (as is the president’s limousine) wherever the president travels, within the U.S. as well as overseas.

I find anything and everything to do with the presidency fascinating. For example, “Air Force One is the call sign for any fixed-wing aircraft that the President of the United States may happen to be in at any given time. Should the aircraft happen to be a rotary-wing aircraft, it is referred to as ‘Marine One’.” Also, “A Marine Corps aircraft carrying the Vice President is designated ‘Marine Two’.” Who came up with these call signs? Why not call them ‘Big Bird’ and ‘Little Bird’? Or ‘Dumb’ and ‘Dumber’? I guess there’s a reason they didn’t consult with me on this decision.

I haven’t been lucky enough to be near the Mall or the White House with my camera when one of these choppers is flying around, but I know that no matter the occasion, one of our talented photographers will be on the scene.

Adventures, Downtown, Featured Photo, Monumental, The Daily Feed, The Mall
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Shooting the Monuments


Abstract Jungle
Originally uploaded by Ghost_Bear

Coming up this Saturday, July 12, the Washington Photo Safari is having their next Monuments and Memorials event. Led by architectural photographer E. David Luria, it’s a great way to spend the morning shooting various landmarks in the city and learning some great photo tips and techniques along the way.

I’ve been on some of these and they’re fantastic. Mr. Luria is extremely personable and a great photo guide; he’s quite capable of enhancing your photography skills, regardless of whether you use a simple point-and-shoot or a complex SLR digital camera. It’s well worth the money spent. (Transportation for this one is provided and covered by the fee.)

There’s a lot of events by the WPS; check out their calendar for other possible ideas. And maybe I’ll see you there!

Featured Photo, Technology, The Daily Feed, We Love Arts
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Aerial Photography Demo in Columbia Heights

If you see something funny in the sky over Columbia Heights on Saturday afternoon, smile and say cheese. HacDC, a new hacker collective, is hosting an aerial photography demonstration by Curt Westergard of Air Photos Live.

Curt will be flying a tethered aerostat balloon (weather permitting) and taking aerial photos of HacDC and the Columbia Heights neighborhood near St. Stephen and the Incarnation Church. He’ll talk about what he does with balloons, show off the system he’s developed for deploying them, and generally have a good time.

If you’re interested, stop by the church parking lot (at 16th and Newton in Columbia Heights View Larger Map) around 3 PM.