Some new photos from Fort Wayne

oftheherd said:
Great photos Chris. The commentary adds as well. Thanks for sharing.
Click to expand...




Thanks :)

I didn't add much for the last month. I've been busy doing some web design work. Now that those projects are done, I am back to trying to work through my huge backlog of photos that need edited.

Here's a new one I shot last month:



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This chair has a one-eyed emoji face on its backrest.

It sits in front of the Fort Wayne Fire Department's Station #10 at the corner of Anthony Boulevard and Crescent Avenue on the northeast side of Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The chair has had an interesting history. I photographed it the first time back in 2010, when it had a happy face painted on it. One of the firemen who worked there at the time told me that one of the men had painted the face on the yellow chair.

In 2011, the chair was painted over with a dull flat brown paint, with no face. It stayed that way until fall of 2017, when it went back to yellow, with a frowning face wearing glasses! Since then, it has periodically changed, each time with a different Emoji face.

You can see all of the photos that I have made on it on my website --> Firehouse Emoji Chair
 
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This blue house is on Delaware Avenue, west of Crescent Avenue, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It is one of many large old houses in that part of Fort Wayne that have been subdivided into apartments.
 
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This vacant storefront building is on Main Street (State Road 105) in the small town of Andrews, Indiana. A Coca-Cola sign and a "For Lease" sign hang in the front window.

It is one of several small storefront buildings on the town's Main Street.
 
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I made these photographs of the sky at dawn on the morning of May 21, 2019. I had been up all night working, and was getting ready to finally get some sleep when I noticed the beautiful color gradations in the clear sky over my house in Fort Wayne, Indiana.


These kind of abstract images made from the sky are a project that I have been working on for several years. You can see more of them here:

http://chriscrawfordphoto.com/abstraction.php
 
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This storefront is on the north end of the Welker Block, a century old brick building on the southeast corner of Wells Street and Fourth Street in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

When I was young, this part of the building was a rough bar called the Happen Inn. After the bar closed, the furniture store next door, Linda Lou's, expanded into the former bar's space. Linda Lou's didn't change the facade, which retained the octagonal tavern windows from the Happen Inn.

Linda Lou's went out of business in October, 2017. In early 2019, the building was extensively renovated and the old tavern storefront was removed and replaced with large modern windows.

I made this photograph in 2018, before the renovations began.
 
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This house with a giant American flag painted on the side is on Delaware Avenue, west of Crescent Avenue, in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It is one of many large old houses in that part of Fort Wayne that have been subdivided into apartments.

The house's owner, Andy Ankenbruck, told me that he painted the flag when he was repainting the house in early 2019. This house is next to the blue house with a chair on the porch that I posted a photo of a couple weeks ago.
 
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Last night, my son and I went to see the Fourth of July fireworks in downtown Fort Wayne. The top of the Lincoln Tower, Indiana's oldest skyscraper, were illuminated in red, white, and blue light.
 
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This ragged-looking pine tree grows in my next-door neighbor's back yard.
I photographed it at dawn on the Fourth of July. The tree is to the west of my house, so the sun was rising behind me, which is why the sky has not yet brightened up.
 
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I just learned that Sam Hyde died yesterday. Sam was the owner of Hyde Brothers Books, an incredible used book store in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I've been buying books from Sam since I was young, and probably half of the 2000+ books that I own came from Hyde Brothers.

Sam was one of the kindest and most generous people I knew. When I was a young artist, struggling to make enough money to live, he often gave me books that he thought I would like. He also loved Cats, and always had one or two of them living in the store at all times.

This is so sad. I made this photograph of Sam behind his counter 12 years ago. Notice the ball of fur curled up in front of him!

You can see more of my photos of the store on my website:

Hyde Brothers Books
 
Chris,



Sorry for your loss...and the loss of an independent bookstore owner who is a friend is a loss. I patronized a store in my small city for 30 years owned and operated by a couple who had started their careers as English teachers in high schools. They became friends of my wife and me. When they retired at 70 and closed the shop, it was a loss, even though they had active retirement plans and are having a ball. By the closing date they had survived many independent local stores and at least three chain competitors that came and went by having great taste, knowing their customers' individual book preferences and watching their inventory like hawks and clearing it out, if it wasn't moving. I hope that your store doesn't close.


Chip
 
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There's a lone Yucca plant growing in one of my overgrown flower beds, and it is flowering. My grandparents planted it when I was a kid, back when this was their house.
 
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Last week was the annual Three Rivers Festival in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I spent a few days there photographing, and will post the photos I made over the next few days.

This is a ride called Atmos-Fear. It drops riders seated on a platform down a steel tower. At night, strobe lights flash during the descent, giving a stop-motion, multi-exposure effect if photographed with a long exposure. I think this was around 1/8 of a second.
 
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Another photograph of the Atmos-Fear ride at the Three Rivers Festival. I used a shorter exposure with this one, to get fewer 'repetitions' of the strobe-light effect. I think this was about 1/15 of a second.
 
I wanted to comment when I read the post about Sam Hyde but I didn't. I think I will now. Chris I know you were/are quite fond of that bookstore (used book stores are huge for me...always have been) and Sam and the cats. I would like to ask you what do all those bookstore photos mean to you now?
 
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