New York City Photo: 34th Street, NYC, Empire State Building in Background

New York City Photo: NYC, 34th Street near Penn Station

Ken Rockwell, the popular photography blogger is perhaps best known for his expression that “the camera doesn’t matter.” In essence, what you shoot with is not nearly as important as the creativity you bring to your photography. Well, I think these photos can add some support to that axiom! I shot these photos with a “point and shoot” camera I purchased recently for $100.00 in New York City, a three-year-old Olympus SP-350. I purchased this lightweight, pocketable camera just to always have the ability to shoot at all times. I am constantly in New York City, and do not feel inclined to carry my DSLR (a Nikon D60) all the time. These photos, (and more to come) were all shot handheld with my tiny Olympus SP-350. They were captured handheld, and take advantage of the beautiful light that sundown brings right around the evening rush hour. They are all captured near Penn Station on 34th Street in New York City within the frame of ten minutes just before catching a train home.  I did capture the images using the RAW mode available in this camera to extract the greatest amount of quality and detail (something you will only appreciate in large prints) however, these photos could have easily been captured with any point and shoot camera with similar results. The natural light and composition is what bring these images to life. not the camera!

Technical details: These photos were captured handheld in raw mode at 50 ISO and F:4. I also used a -2/3 stop exposure compensation to create darker shadows and capture all the highlights in the sky. Typically, the camera chose a shutter speed of between 1/30 of a second to 1/50 for these images. Raw images were edited in Adobe Lightroom 3 Beta.

New York City Photos: NYC, Macy's 34th Street, Empire State Building