San Francisco – Page 10

Golden Gate and Bay in the Rain

2014-Apr-30 adohertyh1 Comment

I sometimes sift through the RAW files I took long in the past, searching for meaning in images I captured long ago. In the case of this particular photograph, there’s more to the image than just my favorite Bay Area gradient of differing environments (e.g. Oakland and San Francisco and Alcatraz and two different enormous bridges and so on): there’s also a feeling of place and moment. The dramatic clouds and the grasses and the hint of the Golden Gate’s span are all spectacular, but the optics of a raindrop spattered across the lens add just as much to the image. You can practically smell the petrichor in the air.

Old Modern Shapes

2014-Apr-09 adohertyh2 Comments

At the dawn of the twentieth century, all was hopeful and “excellent.” When the Bay Bridge opened in 1936, human ingenuity could solve any problem, bridges replaced ferries, cars replaced horses, aircraft would soon replace trains. Now we’re orphans of the future, living in a world when “modernity” is in the past, and epic symbols of the era and its architecture are quickly becoming relics. Though I have no nostalgia for much of the social/cultural mores of the time period, I do find it fascinating to look upon the structures built “for the future” from the standpoint of that future. Perhaps it makes me wonder, just a bit, what we build for our own future now.

Secret Francisco Path

2014-Mar-21 adohertyhLeave a comment

That the hills of San Francisco are so steep that sidewalks become stairs is fantastic. (In literal sense of being fantastical.) Traversing the city feels less like plotting out positions on a grid than navigating a mountain labyrinth. Climbing Telegraph Hill to Coit Tower in the light of the setting sun only serves to amplify the sense of strange magic that San Francisco offers.

Transamerica Gradient

2014-Mar-12 adohertyh10 Comments

San Francisco at the end of Saturday: to paraphrase the Hold Steady, the lines of the city are awash in hot, soft light. I’ve rambled in the past on the gradient between nature and dense urbanization, and the special anomaly that the San Francisco Bay Area represents in its gentle juxtaposition of wood and concrete (buildings). This particular photograph from Telegraph Hill tells the story: the towering, mythical shape of the Transamerica Pyramid and a hill of grasses, with less than a half-a-mile walk separating them.

Across Russian Hill

2013-Nov-13 adohertyh1 Comment

Like Manhattan, San Francisco is largely trapped by water. Like Manhattan, the city has preserved large swaths of “natural” space (e.g. Central Park, Golden Gate Park) in that hyperdense urban mass. The Mediterranean climate, youth, and topographical preposterousness of San Francisco give it a unique (pardon the neologism) architexture. Looking west from the trees of Telegraph Hill, over Russian Hill and on to the Presidio and the Golden Gate Bridge, the cross-section of environments complement each other. My mind still struggles to see the towers of Russian Hill in the same image as the inhospitable rocks of Marin.

Terminal Aquatic

2013-Aug-30 adohertyh1 Comment

From San Francisco’s Embarcadero, looking south a sunset, the water provides a gentle palette. (At least compared with the jagged edges of the office buildings against the smooth gradient of the almost-night sky.) My only regret is that the water could not have been a flawless, glassy mirror. Perhaps next time, I’ll settle for a longer exposure.

San Francisco’s Red Towers

2013-Aug-05 adohertyh1 Comment

The eternally-damp shoreline of the San Francisco Bay is the fascinating meeting of quaint docks and maritime randomness with the aggressive mass of a full-scale city. Charming piers abut the grandiosity of the Financial District, and the result is a surreal and unique setting. Amid this hubbub, the Coit Tower and the Embarcadero stand out as red beacons.

High Rises

2013-Jul-18 emceehammrLeave a comment

It’s quite pretty awe-inspiring to gaze up at the top floors of sky scrapers.

Street lit

2013-Jul-11 emceehammrLeave a comment

At dusk San Francisco seems most like a “big city.”

Cup ‘o’ Joe

2013-May-17 adohertyh2 Comments

The enchanting lights and old quasi-industrial look of SOMA under the Bay Bridge capture the feel of San Francisco to me: the relationship with the bay, the sense of history-but-not-quite, and the constant crush of traffic just beneath it.

Lit Bridge

2013-May-14 emceehammrLeave a comment

It’s no Golden Gate Bridge, but the bay bridge lit up at night is a pretty spectacular sight with the water lit up beneath it.

Around Coit Tower

2013-Apr-12 adohertyh1 Comment

As shot from Pier 14, Coit Tower stands atop Telegraph Hill. Its white surface, in conjunction with colored lights, make it absolutely stunning to see at night. Such surreal objects can lack a suitable sense of scale when photographed. This photograph satisfies me so in large part because the homes clustering the hill provide that scale, and a sense of the familiar to match the alien.

Relativity Heights

2013-Mar-06 adohertyhLeave a comment

Orange and blue may be the most overdone color combination for movie posters, but I’m more tolerant of the hues when when they spring natively from the night sky and the sodium lamps of a city. Something about the stone textures of big buildings really appeals to me.

(And if you look carefully, you can see Brendan, my fellow photographer, in the bottom of the picture.)

Blast Off!

2013-Mar-052013-Aug-16 emceehammrLeave a comment

There’s something really off about this rocket ship you can find on the SF waterfront. It looks like a strange cross between the 1950’s concept of a futuristic spacecraft and an abandoned nuclear weapon. The shininess and corrosion create a strange dissonance. Works well with the futuristic pier located nearby.

Anyone else reminded of the bomb in Megaton in Fallout 3?

San Francisco Arc

2013-Feb-272013-Feb-27 adohertyh2 Comments

Climbing Telegraph Hill on foot means stairs. Lots and lots of stairs.

Climbing Telegraph Hill by car means loops. Lots and lots of loops.

(Though I’m sure my memory is exaggerating.) On that winding road through the trees and stones, under the watchful eyes of the wild parrots, are occasional glimpses of the Golden Gate Bridge. With the last wisps of sunlight landing on the hill, the craggily texture of the tarmac and the rocks and trees contrast so perfectly the with the far-off Platonic idealism of that bridge.