29th St. bike path, Lake Calhoun - 07OCT03

Tonight I finally busted my ass and only went online for 30 minutes, but successfully changed my clothes, hauled my bike out, and rode down Bryant Ave. to 29th St. where there happens to be an onramp to the great bike path running through Uptown. I went out to the lake and took a bunch of pictures, pulling over and playing with settings whenever I found a scene that grabbed me. I know most of this is going to look generic or trite: I have not trained to be a photographer at all, ever, I know nothing about photo composition or anything. This is just for my own entertainment, and as it happens I really, really like my own pictures. In this page it's going to seem like my pictures repeat; I want to show how I'm trying to fight through settings and effects. And though it looks like I've uploaded every last crummy picture I took, no, in fact there were a few I deleted because they were bad on top of being redundant.

Click on the picture for a larger, clearer image.


Onramp from 29th St.S. to bike path.

Old wooden gate next to path.

Side of building in industrial yard.

Sun starts to set on the bike trail.

Late traffic wends its way home by Calhoun Parkway.

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Stone grotto through which bike path winds, connecting Lake of the Isles with Lake Calhoun.

Masoned trestle/footpath in
Lake of the Isles.

Pedestrians along Lake Calhoun.

Experimenting with direct sun exposure.

People hanging out on a pier.

Where the bike path divides the trees.

Trying to find the perfect shot to include all the trees and yet capture the truer hue of the leaves.

Here I think I've got the colors better but I just can't frame the shot around the trees.

The playground by the beach (this time in the autumn with live people).

Rollerbladers at rest by the playground; another experiment with sunlight off the lake.

First try at getting the fisherman in his boat: the display I saw in the camera made him look way too small.

Another attempt. There's just nothing for it.

Monument in the median between the biking and pedestrian paths, midway down the east bank of the lake. (Warning: very large picture, very high resolution)

I really, really wanted to get this shot of the sun reflecting off the building, off the lake.

Further east, across the trails, across the frontage road, across the trolley rails, there's a graveyard. (Warning: very large picture, very high resolution)

This is the fence I leaned up against to get the shot, I like the ivy. (Warning: very large picture, very high resolution)

These are the trolley tracks I just mentioned. They are occasionally in use. (Warning: very large picture, very high resolution)

Another shot from the park of the apartments across the lake. I could never afford to live here.

I really like the Minneapolitan skyline, especially these shots of it emerging from the forest.

People running, playing with Zen-like oblivion to the beauty all around them.

An uncharacteristically shaky shot of people playing volleyball. I think my taking a picture upset them.

Moonrise over Lake Calhoun.

An assload of seagulls and ducks parked before another angle of the skyline.

Moon and reflection off the lake. I wish the water were clearer for this one.

Arrrgh, blurry shot of the Calhoun Parkway coming up from the southernmost reaches of the lake.

Same shot, attempting to use low-light exposure.

Another playground (not far from the Strip of Dishonor where I used to drive home).

Blurry shot of joggers and some lake through a grove.

The sun sets rapidly as I snatch this picture of the moon over the rec center.

GAAH!! Blurred shot of the lifeguard station. Really need that tripod.

Autumn descends upon this swingset by the lake, as it does upon all our lives.

The capricious light sources trick you into thinking this is a canoe rack in early afternoon.

I like this one, the moon over the boats at bay, and the beginning of Uptown in the background.

...A crappier low-light shot of the same scene. Damn.

I can't hold the camera still enough to take this shot of the stream that leads to the grotto.

The concrete grotto where bikes race through and lovers take a leisurely stroll. Attempted flash/low-light, that's why you can see a section of the wall by my head on the left.

Only prolonged exposure. Now I think the lovers suspect something amiss.

"Sun off the lake" exposure; the lovers leave, but I get a good shot of a canoe. They come through here all the time.

I'm on the bike trail, taking a shot of the bus stop across the street (Hennepin) from the grand huge bus depot.

Graffiti (I didn't know that was a plural word) I spotted on the way home.

None of it makes any sense to me. Is this someone's turf?

Ignore the overpasses and the offramp - look at that grass in the foreground!

Same shot, same exposure, just ... angled the camera differently or something stupid.

More graffiti in a truckyard north of Bryant and 29th.St. Again, hieroglyphic (I almost said "apocryphal", I didn't know that would've been wrong).

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