Tuesday on the Web

This week's edition of On the Web brings you a final image (from this trip) of NYC street scenes.  I'm very intrigued by the classic night-time street photography of greats like Cartier-Bresson but find my own equipment mostly lacking.  When I upgrade to full-frame, I'm excited about the low-light possibilities.  If I jack up the ISO to get the image, the grain is unbearable.  Below, the valet stand at the Hilton.

On the Web

Non-Newtonian Fluid on a Speaker Cone If you're a regular visitor here, you'll remember the kids running across a pool of muddy water and not sinking in.  Well now we have the same stuff (tons of cornstarch and very little water) atop a speaker.  It does really freaky things - freakier things than you think a puddle of cornstarch water is capable of - growing fingers, jumping around, neat stuff.  Too bad I'm a couple days late for Halloween but you can always get a head start on next year! Are you searching for a unicorn? I was going to save this link for my Sex at Dawn book review, but I think I'll share it now.  The lady's basic jist is that your husband cannot be everything for you.  Your ideal man may be attractive, kind, level-headed, a good cook and a great lover with an even temper, zest for life and great sense of humor.  But likely, your man is a bit off the mark, which is absolutely as it should be. And if sometimes you can't get what you need from your husband, well, that's pretty normal.  That's why we have friends and family and professionals. Mint Data for DC Mint is a website that helps you dynamically track your spending.  You give it access (and it claims to be totally zipped-up, security-wise) to your bank account and credit card transaction information and it aggregates the information to show you your spending patterns.  Well here we've got aggregated data for all users, which makes for some very interesting statistical analysis, one of my favorite things!  The link here will take you straight to data for Washington, DC but you can click around to lots of other cities/categories. How Brains are Boosted by Love and Sex Quoting a quote: "Daydreaming about your sweetheart may boost inventiveness and help you come up with creative ideas, while sexual thoughts could help you solve an analytical puzzle.”  What do you know! Kayak Explore This is a pretty sweet travel tool that I very recently discovered.  You go here, put in where you're traveling from and some other criteria like average temperature (!) and how much you want to spend, and it shows you where you can go.  Neat!
Hilton Manhattan NYC valet stand, b&w

New York City

Even though I've spent very little time there, I love New York.  I think it's the most dynamic, vibrant, exciting place in America.  It's got the best food and the worst traffic.  Every nationality on earth calls the place home and you can find any product you're looking for somewhere among the city's hundreds of ethnic markets.  Because of this constant influx of immigrants, the city maintains a diversity - not just in the color of peoples skin, but in the cultural traditions that make a place so interesting - unparalleled in this country. I love that in New York, you can be and do whatever you want and there is a place for you.  I would love to live there some day, despite the snow and cold and wind and dirt and high rents and bed bugs.  It's a fascinating place I feel it would take me a lifetime to understand. But the light there is very, very different than in DC.  I've learned this now on my third or fourth attempt to capture some of the "street" images I am fond of shooting in Washington.  I try to shoot the streets of New York like those of DC and it really doesn't work.  I think part of this must be the height of the buildings and width of the streets - in DC things are spaced a bit further apart and the buildings are shorter, letting in more light.  Lesson learned on this trip: stop down, ISO up.  You really do need a high shutter speed to capture street scenes - people move fast. I'll be back in two weekends and I'll put some of this education to the test, as long as it doesn't rain!  And now, my Saturday in the city: George and I made a little visit to the very interesting and well-done Museum of Sex on 5th Avenue.  The lovely ticket-taker lady behind the counter let me just reference their coupon on the website and then gave us the student discount, which made my frugal heart flutter with joy.  This is a family-friendly blog and all, so no racy pics, but here's me inside this cool neverending light thing. Museum of Sex, Manhattan, NY self-portrait The first thing we did that day, however, was visit St. Patrick's Cathedral, which carries some accolade about being the most X Gothic-style cathedral in Y geographical area.  I don't remember, but it's the most something, and I do enjoy seeing "most" things, as I believe I discussed earlier. St. Patrick's Cathedral - New York City St. Patrick's Cathedral - New York City St. Patrick's Cathedral - New York City Look for more New York City from me in two weeks!