A wonderful year of street snapping.

Click the picture to view a video commentary on some of the favorites among the 365 pictures I posted to my companion site, Snap!, during 2011. The video is just over 11 minutes long, so give it a while to download – a minute on a 10mb/s broadband connection.

Click the picture for the video.

I turn 60 today. Not since 1971-77 have I had a year of snapping to compare, which leads to the inevitable conclusion that either my critical faculties are shot, or I am senile.

The author at 60. Snapped by my son, Winston, on the iPhone 4S in Carmel, CA.
At The Grill on Ocean Avenue. One of the rare occasions where I was not the one pressing the button.

An impressive undertaking.

Vogue has scanned and archived its US issues since 1892, some 120 years of the magazine. The scans include advertising, which is an essential part of understanding changing fashion.

What a resource!

Click the picture for details.

Click the picture for details.

The funny picture is by Arthur Elgort, one of Vogue’s finest, whose interest in ballet is clearly visible. You can see more at his web site. The model is Linda Evangelista.

At the loading dock.

G3, kit lens @34mm, 1/2500, f/5/5, ISO320.

While the most useful focal length for street snaps is 35mm (on full frame – that’s 17mm with an MFT sensor or 24mm with APS-C) sometimes you don’t have the time to get in close, meaning you need something longer. Such was the case here where zooming in to 68mm allowed proper framing. The subject was gone two seconds later, obscured by a delivery truck.

The old Leica rangefinder film days’ outfit, sufficient to take you around the world and miss no more than 1% of picture opportunities, was comprised of three lenses – 35mm, 50mm and 90mm. Today all of that can be had in inexpensive kit zooms with their lack of speed more than compensated by excellent, sensitive sensors, and there’s no time wasted or lenses dropped from incessant changing of the optic on the camera’s body.

Here are the lens statistics from my Lightoom database for my use of the Panasonic G1 and G3 – these are post cull, but it’s reasonable to assume that cull rates are much the same across optics:

Combining the first two (the disastrous Panny 20mm was returned after one outing) gives 80% on kit lenses, with 8% and 12% on long and very wide ones, respectively. Even though their light weight means it’s no big deal to carry all three, I generally carry the kit lens only.

Gone to a happy home. Maybe.

My first thought was that senility had kicked in prematurely. That I had simply forgotten where I left it.

Returning to my appointed municipally-provided bike rack, courtesy of no less than the City of San Francisco, even the least observant would have remarked that BikeCamâ„¢ was not in its appointed place.

Nah!, thought I. Must be on the wrong block. But, no, Market and Fremont. I’m sure that’s where I left it. Then I looked closer. And this is all that was left of BikeCamâ„¢:

The remains of BikeCam

Yes, my bike had been pinched. A pro with wire cutters had done his thing on my admittedly limp locking cable and made off with it, leaving me with a long trek to the Caltrain station and another from my destination to home on the Peninsula.

Now the rational reaction would be four letter words in abundance, a red face, and general street performance. But all you could see on my face was a smile of joy. You see, BikeCamâ„¢ had delivered me to the location of no more than 2,000+ ‘keepers’ over the past two years in the City, and at that rate with its all in cost of $100, I reckoned that 5 cents a snap was a really good deal. Kodachrome and TriX cost more back in the day. I had truly realized value. Anger would have been the meanest expression of ingratitude and, let’s face it, the bike had gone to a needier home.

Still, by the time I had made the trek back to the Caltrain on Shanks’s Pony and then added a like trek at the other end, I was feeling a tad less forgiving. Then I loaded up today’s ‘roll’ into Lightroom and all was sweetness and light.

All snapped on the Panasonic G3 with the kit lens.

So, Mr. Thief With Wire Cutters, enjoy my bike and I hope you take some good pictures using it.

But the former owner of BikeCam is prepared. (For the lawyers reading this, bikes are like bearer bonds. Ownership and possession are synonymous). Like with most things, he has a back up, and BikeCamâ„¢.BAK will be in service soon. The cobwebs are coming off, new tires are on order, a gel saddle to soothe the nether regions, and BikeCam will soon be in business.

And I’m just on my fourth. That model for all us bicycling street snappers, Bill Cunningham, is on Number 27 ….

I managed to order two new smooth road tires using the iPhone on my (bikeless) trip home and just installed these on the back-up bike, and old Giant made in Korea. I recycled the knobblies which are awfully unstable on roads and sidewalks, waste energy owing to high rolling resistance and are noisy to boot. I bought this bike well used from a cycle tour operator in San Diego some 13 years ago and now it will see action again. A gel saddle is on order and all should be sweetness and light soon.

The massive lock visible on the downtube came with it and I even found the key! This one has a steel frame rather than the alloy one on the Raleigh predecessor, which experts assure me absorbs shocks better at the expense of added weight, and has no front shocks meaning less energy wasted. Or so I tell myself. And it even has a CatEye cyclometer so I can record the miles ridden up to the point it’s stolen.

You can’t keep us cyclists off the bike for long!

BikeCamâ„¢ is back.