King David Cemetery, Putnam Valley, New York

March 4, 2014 by Howard Dale Posted in Places Tagged gallery Leave a comment

Looking across King David Cemetery towards the hills on the other side of Peekskill Hollow Road.

King David Cemetery is at the intersection of Peekskill Hollow Road and Mill Street. With so much snow around my options for walking the dog are limited. Cemetery’s are usually interesting places to walk in and they usually clear the snow from the roads. I’ve often taken the dog to Sleepy Hollow Cemetery so I thought I’d try this one. The cemeteries I usually go to are old and often have interesting sculpture, gravestones etc. This one seems to be much more recent and the gravestones are of he less embellished, more modern type. The location of the cemetery is interesting and the views across Peekskill Hollow Road are impressive. Unlike many of the other cemeteries I’ve visited this one seems to be multi-denominational. I noticed Christian areas; Jewish areas; and also a Muslim area.

The cemetery seems to combine with the Beverly Hills cemetery and spread across Mill street. I’ll have to go and take a look on the other side.

All pictures taken with a Sony Nex 5n and Minolta MD-Rokkor-X 45mm f2.

Trees

Beautiful gravestone in the Muslim Section of the cemetery

Not something you see every day: “American Cuban Chinese Benevolent Association Inc.”

Silver birch branch

Wreath. This is arguably the sharpest picture I’ve taken. Even viewed at 100% magnification it’s extremely sharp. I wish I could remember the settings (I know it was taken at 100 ISO and 1/200 second, but I since I was using a manual focus lens I don’t know the aperture).

Is he seeing the first sign of Spring?

March 3, 2014 by Howard Dale Posted in Things Tagged gallery Leave a comment

We still have over a foot of snow on the ground, but it’s gradually disappearing and this little cherub has just re-emerged from a large pile. Five to eight inches of snow was expected last night and we got….nothing. I think the storm went south of us. In the mornings I hear more birds. Can it be that they know something that I don’t? So is he seeing the first sign of Spring? I certainly hope so, but I’m not holding my breath.

Finally found something at the thrift store

February 28, 2014 by Howard Dale Posted in Camera Collection, Olympus Stylus Epic Tagged gallery Leave a comment

There are three Goodwill stores in the vicinity. From time to time I visit them. I’ve only once bought a camera: a Yashica FX2 with, as it turns out, a lens stuck wide open and non functioning 1/1000 speed. I’ve described the story behind this in an earlier post. Usually they have a selection of cheap, plasticky point and shoot cameras often with obvious damage. The selection never seems to change. This time, however, it was different. The usual suspects had all disappeared and the shelf was empty apart from one camera. I walked over to take a look and lo and behold there was a black Olympus Stylus Epic in pretty good condition price less than $10.00. I couldn’t resist even though I already have the silver version (quartz date), I had always wanted the black. Cosmetically it’s in better condition than the silver one, but would it work? I took it home and put in a battery. Everything seemed to be working fine, but of course I wouldn’t really know until I put a roll through.

It’s a bit disturbing to have a camera that gives you no feedback other than a green light to tell you that it’s found focus. No sense of shutter speed. No idea what aperture has been selected and, of course, no digital image to show you how you did. You just get the film processed and wait to see the results.

The conditions were not ideal. It was late in the afternoon and getting dark very quickly. Most of the pictures had snow in them making exposure difficult and a number of them were backlit. Some of the pictures came out blurred. I noticed that these were all towards the end of the roll and taken when it was getting dark. I imagine the camera selected a long shutter speed. My hands are not too steady at the best of times so it wouldn’t take a very long speed before camera shake set in. Some of the backlit pictures didn’t come out too well. I would probably had done better if I’d use the spot mode.

All things considered I’m very pleased with my new acquisition. Can’t wait to try it when the light is better.

One of Putnam Valley’s mysterious stone chambers

View from the house (with deer footprints – they walk across the frozen lake) – early evening

Kent and Fishkills Baptist Church (I think)

Graveyard – Kent and Fishkills Baptist Church

Interior – late afternoon

Pine cones

From the New York Times “Lens”: Sebastião Salgado: Migrant in a World of Migrants

February 27, 2014 by Howard Dale Posted in Photographers Leave a comment

Interesting article and slideshow on Salgado

Before he was known as a photographer, Sebastião Salgado was something even more essential to his identity: an émigré. His left-leaning politics and commitment to social justice had led him to flee Brazil in 1969 to study economics in France. There, he found countless other exiles — the lucky ones — who had managed to escape the murderous grip of Latin America’s Operation Condor.

via Sebastião Salgado: Migrant in a World of Migrants.

Mysterious stone chambers of Putnam County

February 26, 2014 by Howard Dale Posted in Places, Things Tagged gallery Leave a comment

My wife and I belong to the local garden club. They have monthly meetings, usually and not surprisingly on topics related to gardening. From time to time, however, they organize presentations on other topics. This time Tom O’Reilly gave a talk on “Stone Chambers of Putnam County”.

Tom O’Reilly

Apparently there are a large number of these strange stone chambers all over Putnam County. Most people don’t even know they are there. Some are very close to roads and people drive past them without ever noticing. Their origins are in dispute. Many believe that they are colonial period root cellars. Others, including Tom, believe that they are much older and date back to the same period as the megaliths (think Stonehenge) of Europe. I’m not sure yet what I believe (I haven’t done enough reading). One thing is certain: wherever they come from they are an interesting part of the history of Putnam County and are worth preserving. At the moment they are disappearing through land development, vandalism etc. – a situation which needs to change.

For more information: the York Times, April 22 2001 had and article on “Putnam’s Mysterious Chambers of Stone“. If you don’t mind investing a little more time this article on “Stone Chambers of Kent” provides a wealth of information (of course “Kent” refers to the town of Kent in Putnam County, not the County in the United Kingdom).