Capturing Old New York

Offering another look at the vanishing, old, rustic look of New York City, Dave Itzoff writes about the popularity of filming in New York City because of film tax credits, incentives and the variety of locations. Later on in the article, he talks about location scouts that look around the city for amazing location possibilities. He ends the article with this:

While they juggle the needs of their shows with the demands of residents, many producers say they are also scrambling to capture the rustic and unglamorous portions of the city, which are gradually being trampled beneath the march of gentrification.

The old New York Shipyard in Red Hook, once a go-to spot for shows that needed a hardscrabble, industrial edge, recently became the home of an Ikea furniture store.

“Often,” said Mr. Ross of “Law & Order: Criminal Intent,” “I’ll send a scout out to someplace and I’ll say, ‘It’s a really great old warehouse. My guy will go out there and they’re like, ‘Nothing’s there any more. It’s gone.’ ”

Protecting the Palestinians

In this Reuters article about Israeli settler violence against the Palestinians, Nahla Makhlouf, a Palestinian residing in the West Bank, was given a video camera by the Israeli Rights Group B'Tselem to record vigilante settler violence. During an encounter, the camera lens broke, but the audio kept recording.

Yoav Gross of B'Tselem said the settlers can be heard giving the army a one-minute ultimatum to act against the Palestinians or they would do the job themselves.

"They started counting one, two, three...," he said. "They were giving orders to the soldiers, not the other way around."

One Israeli human rights lawyer, Michael Sfard, says most soldiers do not realize they have not only the right but also the duty, as the occupying power, to defend Palestinians.

It's sad that the IDF doesn't realize what they're supposed to do as soldiers.

Eid & Rosh Hashanah

Photo by Rina Castelnuovo from the New York Times.

The Islamic Eid and Jewish Rosh Hashanah both fall within the same week this year: Rosh Hashanah is tonight and I believe Eid is either Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on the moon. Ethan Bronner takes a look at the overlapping religious holidays and how it comes into play in Jerusalem this year. There is something lacking within the article itself. Bronner is, in my opinion, focusing too much on the Jewish side of it, with only one quote from a Palestinian Muslim. However, the feature photo is amazing.

The Nugget

Happy Birthday, Nugget!

Missing Him in the Cemetery

From a photography session at Mount Lebanon Cemetery in Queens with Kevin for an upcoming photo essay in the Brooklyn Rail.

Mangled Car

At a gas station/tow-truck place in New Jersey.

Sunset at the Village Community Boathouse

Late summer.

Rowing Under the Manhattan Bridge

During our Dumbo Cove rowing sessions, the next and final row is next Sunday at Brooklyn Bridge Park, south of the Manhattan Bridge.

Flags of Jones Beach

Cohoes Falls

Frog Hunting in Five Rivers

Summer at McCarren Park

[These pictures relate to this Get to the 'Point from the Greenpoint Gazette.]

East River Park

Vinyl Vs. Books

At the Writing, Literature & Publishing Orientation today (which was mostly boring, and which I mostly cut), during the faculty introductions, Gian Lombardo asked, "Who here still listens to vinyl records?" A couple students raised their hands.

Lombardo then asked, "Who here still reads books in paper form?" Everyone raised their hands.

"Think about that," he said, and walked away from the podium.

Vogue India, Pushing Fashion for the Unfortunate, Right?

Fashion editorials are usually stupid and unbelievable. Right, you're going to wear a $4,000 plain dress while hiking through the mountains of Patagonia, because it just makes so much sense. Vogue India takes that even further: putting $10,000 designer bags and $200 designer umbrellas in the hands of India's people. No, not models Vogue India dressed up to look Indian, but instead, the true people of India--the workers whose clothes are covered in dirt, the women missing teeth, etc.

The Vogue India editor, Priya Tanna, had this to say about the editorial (from the New York Times):

“Lighten up,” she said in a telephone interview. Vogue is about realizing the “power of fashion” she said, and the shoot was saying that “fashion is no longer a rich man’s privilege. Anyone can carry it off and make it look beautiful,” she said.

“You have to remember with fashion, you can’t take it that seriously,” Ms. Tanna said. “We weren’t trying to make a political statement or save the world,” she said.

Riiiiiight.

(Thanks, Ekyjot, for pointing out the article to me.)

Boston, Massachusetts

While walking around my new neighborhood yesterday, I overheard various snippets of conversation that basically sounded like the following:

"I hate September 1st--all those college kids moving in and everything."

Granted, Katie and I are college kids (graduate college kids, which make us better, I would hope), but our neighbors across the street and in our building aren't college students.

Just had to point that out.