Chicago Board of Trade Building - HDR 2010

Chicago Board of Trade Building - HDR 2010

View Large: View On Black

9 exposures, 3 vertical shots combined (each bracketed and made into separate hdrs) - downtown Chicago loop.

Coin Validator - Acceptor

Coin Validator - Acceptor

The sketch and the pictures I posted are of a simple mechanical

Coin validator - acceptor.

It works on the principle that once you insert a coin through a crack that is made according to the exact size of a specific coin.

The coin rolls down and fills a slot then by pulling the handle the safety hinge slides over the coin, making it possible to pull the handle all the way back and trigger the timer or any other device connected, once you release the handle the mechanism returns to it's original position.

This coin Validator is based on similar one I found in a Mexican Football machine

Easy Rider as establishment propaganda

Easy Rider as establishment propaganda

It had been 20 years since I had seen "Easy Rider", and my viewing of it recently made me question some long-held assumptions that I, and most others have had.

First, lemme say that it is still a great movie--a classic road tale and best-buddy tale, with incredible scenary and music and some of the best lines ever (all by Jack Nicholson).

Everyone seems to plug "Easy Rider" as a "counter-culture" classic; a Google search showed that High Times magazine readers voted it the top "drug movie" of all time. But... the best type of propaganda is that whose surface details are directly opposite the generative, underlying message, and I am wondering if that is not true with this movie. I have no idea what Hopper, Fonda, and Southern's underlying motives or intents were... but let's re-examine the assumption that Easy Rider is anti-establishment.

A story's underlying moral imperative can be implied by its characters' narrative arches. In this case, our two anti-heros, Wyatt and Billy, seek to buck the culture, but end up dead. Jack Nicholson's character George, is an insuferrable drunk who has survived--until he hooks up with Wyatt and Billy, and then he get's killed by a machete. Cool. The anti-heroes are not doing something morally but alternatively attractive; no, they got money from selling cocaine and are using it to go to New Orleans to party. The film is sold as being "pro-drug", but wait... The drug users in the film end up dead (or as prostitutes); they spend their LSD-trip in a graveyard; and Wyatt's giggling and stumbling around is so over-the-top it borders on absurd. Wow, looks fun to me!

The commune is not portrayed very positively, to say the least.... the leader is for-all-intents polygamous... their "bath" consists of a face-full of water from a bucket, and a quick splash to their (clothed) underarms... they get to sleep with a goat in the house (wouldn't the snoring already be bad enough, you wanna add a goat?)... they get to throw seeds on top of dust--this is not inspired, this is stupid... they sing silly old folk songs that everyone hates and have to live with a mime troupe (could you imagine a worse fate!). I'm sorry, but how exactly is this attractive? And in the end, they pick on Wyatt, showing that even they are as narrow-minded as the latter attackers.

Yes, the attackers are portayed as "narrow-minded hicks"... but they're also "cool" enough to admire the bikers' wheels, and in the end, do they get caught or punished? No...

One could say that the story line itself is secondary to the music soundtrack. In college, I heard the soundtrack long before I saw the movie, and it is a great collection of songs. But that just brings us back to movie-as-selling-products...

Establishment propaganda or not? View with open eyes...

Vivitar Ultra Wide and Slim with Kodak Elitechrome EBX 35mm ISO100 slide film cross-processed as a color negative. No other effects added. Development by Tempe Camera. Eleventh shot posted from roll. (Explore)

Red Shirt - City Square

Red Shirt - City Square

Does anyone know ANYTHING about this gut...err guy?

I just want to say

I just want to say.

Tried working with an idea for a change.

Nouvelle Vague - In a manner of speaking

In a Manner of speaking

I just want to say

That I could never forget the way

You told me everything

By saying nothing

In a manner of speaking

I don't understand

How love in silence becomes reprimand

But the way that i feel about you

Is beyond words

Oh give me the words

Give me the words

That tell me nothing

Ohohohoh give me the words

Give me the words

That tell me everything

In a manner of speaking

Semantics won't do

In this life that we live we only make do

And the way that we feel

Might have to be sacrificed

So in a manner of speaking

I just want to say

That just like you I should find a way

To tell you everything

By saying nothing.

Oh give me the words

Give me the words

That tell me nothing

Ohohoho give me the words

Give me the words

That tell me everything

~30. April 2009

He's watching you! - [explored]

He's watching you! - [explored]

Puppy of my girlfriend was born 3 weeks ago. He's called Baro Tunder Tobias :)

This is my first photo on Explore! Hurray...! Thanks to everyone and special thanks to Tobi and his mom Szutyi! :)

Aug 9, 2009 #56 Explore

Entardecer na campanha

Entardecer na campanha

“Metade de um sol vermelho

Listrando o ceu na planura,

Agachando-se matreiro

Que nem sorro em noite escura,

E tarde, e o caminheiro

Que vai chegando a pousada,

Tem mate e churrrasco quente

Pra seguir na madrugada...”

Trecho de “Um canto para o dia”, de Ernani Amaro de Oliveira

Pelotas, Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil