Good place, great crowd, it was nice meeting everyone.
Thanks Cal for organizing and let me know when you head over to LIC.
Can't wait till the next one.
Cheers,
John
John.
As you imagine, because I have to hibernate and can't shoot in the cold, I'm already planning to arrange some "shoot-outs" when the weather gets mild in the spring.
Likely in May, prepare yourself for a "LIC Death-March" where we will walk and explore the "Bowels of New York."
We will likely group up at the Court Square Dinner, but I will be there early eating breakfast if you want to join me. First stop will be right across Jackson Avenue to 5-Pontz to shoot this doomed landmark that will be replaced by luxury condos. Mucho Graph-eat-tee.
Then we'll cross the "Bridge To Nowhere" (Andre coined this term) into a non residential zone that spans inbetween Queens and Brooklyn following Newtown Creek (America's most polluted waterway) about 4 1'2 miles into Long Island into an industrially zoned area. On a subway map its this vacant area that divides Brooklyn and Queens that also offers no subway service that extends to Masbeth.
Eventually we will take the Grand Avenue Bridge into Bushwick to be able to grab, I believe is the fourth or fifth stop on the L Train. There's is no subway service for good reason, because this area is kinda not inhabited.
Years ago John and I did many foolish things like shooting when the heat index was over 100, and what compounded the term Death-March was that because of the recession there was literally no open stores or a source of water, and several times I could be accused of almost killed my friend John via heat stroke. Its basically hike in and hike out.
Some history. NYC started dumping raw sewage into Newtown Creek in the 1850's; Its been reported that an oil spill three times the size of the Exon Valdez spill has contaminated the water table from accumulated seepage from all the oil refineries; In the summer in some places you can smell the oil; today one third of NYC's garbage is processed on the Greenpoint side of Newtown Creek, and if you love urban decay this is a great-great place to shoot. I consider this area the A-hole of New York, and I know this area extensively because I lived in Greenpoint, Williamsburg, and pretty recently in LIC in Court Square where I lived right next to a terrorist target (the Citigroup skyscraper).
Anyways consider this first exploration a familiarity session, because I want to do extensive night shooting with a tripod, and because Maggie took a look at some of my images she yelled at me that I can't go shooting alone anymore because these areas are so desolate, especially at night. I kinda freaked her out.
If you want some of us can meet early before breakfast and shoot this industrial area just south of the Queensboro Bridge.
Cal