One Subject, Many Approaches II

The Wall and The Bright Side of the Moon

This past summer I wrote a post called "One Subject, Many Approaches" where I looked back on the results over the years of my efforts to photograph the same subject I'd photographed many times in the past, all the while trying to keep the images fresh enough to avoid the creative dead end of making essentially the same photograph again and again. In this sequel episode I'll be presenting another one of those well worn subjects I keep returning to. It is the crumbling remnants of a concrete break wall that once helped still the waters for revellers at the long defunct Erie Beach Amusement Park. Now if that sounds a bit familiar it's likely because the original One Subject, Many Approaches centred on another ruin, the concrete base of a carnival swing ride, from that very same attraction of yore. It is just a quick jaunt, about 300 metres, from this disintegrating nautical structure that is the focus of today's episode, and it wouldn't be at all unusual for me to come away from a little afternoon stroll with images of both. 

Proximity aside however the number of appearances these two subjects have made in my photographic corpus can be attributed to two simple virtues both posses - I find them interesting, and they are convenient. If I only have an hour to kill, if I'm testing new equipment, if there's interesting weather or lighting conditions that could disappear anytime and I need to find a subject now, I know I can get something if I take the five minute drive to old Erie Beach. Still, it's hard to shake the notion that it's really too easy, an almost guilty sense that another trip out to the wall somehow falls short of doing something photographically worthwhile. In spite of this, I often come away with results that surprise me a little. Maybe it's just the low expectations I have for the results.

Here is one from my early days with the RB67, a time when I was still a bit giddy to finally own such a camera. I was smitten with the works of a host of photographers known for their work with long exposures. Lacking a proper neutral density filter at the time I would set up in the fading light of dawn when, if I timed it right, I might be able to make two or three exposures with shutter speeds of one then two then several minutes before they finally became unworkably long.

My first experimental roll putting 35mm film through the RB67, yielding panoramic sprocket hole images. Obviously I wasn't so careful levelling the camera but tilt the film a bit and it almost looks like I meant to do it that way.

An example of the classic leading off to the horizon composition I see as a metaphor for our ceaseless journey into an unknown future that beacons us to a destiny at once fearful and full of promise. Others have suggested images like this are straight up phallic. Hmpf... Freud.

Here's one from this past October that I could have included a few episodes back in The Cool Colours of Autumn. Not a great success but I was just a tad too late to catch just a brief few seconds when the setting sun burst through the clouds casting the wall in a bright warm glow. Even though I had the F80 set to auto focus aperture priority, by the time I realized what was going on and managed to compose this shot it had all but faded. 

There were days this year when water levels in the lake have been unusually high, the changing water levels at times seeming quasi-tidal.  Here a driftwood log serves as foreground interest as the wall, nearly level with the waves, is barely noticeable. There was a workman from the town at the beach that day who, seeing me pull out the camera informed me that I was too late, that there had been a rainbow out over the water that had faded away only minutes before. Looking at that cloud I can't I've lost that much sleep over not having arrived earlier.

Finally here's one from my most recent roll out of the Bronica S2A. Obviously water levels were much lower this time and I decided to chance a stroll along the wall itself. I had been out exploring new locations but with a bit of time yet to kill made a quick side trip on the way home to blow off the last few frames on the roll. Figuring I would travel light that day I left the tripod at home, an unusual choice for me. Regrettable as I could have used it here. With the short days the late afternoon sun was already beginning to fade on an already bleak day and shooting hand held forced a shutter speed/aperture trade off I just couldn't get the better of and I wound up sacrificing foreground sharpness I would have sooner kept. Negotiating the crumbling sections of the wall is a bit tricky to begin with and doing so with a bag containing prized cameras and lenses always feels like a calculated risk, It looks like I may have to do it again though.

One Subject, Many Approaches

A recent image of this old concrete relic I have photographed so many times before. Though it's really what's left of a
century old amusement park ride, here it seems to take on the feel of a forgotten ancient temple.

You may recall that last week one of the images featured, the crumbling "legs" of a concrete structure along the Lake Erie shore, was yet one more image of a subject I have photographed many times before. It's in fact just one of several features of potential photographic interest along that local stretch of lake shore I've mentioned here so many times before. Useful as it is as a place I know there will be a few images to be made if I'm testing a new lens or camera, or when I just don't have the time to go looking for images further afield, the decision to head down there has long been accompanied by the sense of going for the same old same old, the photographic equivalent of having no better idea than to order takeout pizza again. Yet as often as I have revisited the place and as much as it seems I must have completely exhausted that crumbling heap of concrete as a photographic subject, I find myself surprised again and again when a new way of approaching this humble subject presents itself even when, sure I have all the images that old thing could ever warrant, I'm not really looking for it.

First of all they may be those of you wondering just what this concrete monstrosity is. To get to that though a bit of the history of that whole stretch of beach is in order. Currently known simply as Erie Beach Park, or occasionally as Waverly Beach to Fort Erie locals, the area was from the latter part of the 19th Century to around the start of the Great Depression the Erie Beach Amusement Park. The area included rides, a casino, dance hall, roller skating rink and of course swimming areas, drawing many visitors from the United States via a ferry boat that brought them in from Buffalo NY. It was superseded by the Crystal Beach Amusement park about 10 kilometres further west to which some of the attractions were moved, while what remained was left abandoned. In recent years there has been a restoration of sorts. The crumbling path of the old promenade has been revamped as part of the Friendship Trail project running parallel to the Lake Erie shore linking my home town of Port Colborne Ontario to Fort Erie where I currently live. Included in the revamping are a series of information panels that detail the beach's former glory and go some way to explaining the mysterious concrete remnants that are visible along the shore.

Information panels on the walkway overlooking what remains of the old
amusement park now provide context for the curious on the various ancient
concrete edifices strewn along the shore. 

This brings us to the structure in question. This platform, supported by four outer legs plus a central column is the central support for something I have only ever heard described as "the swing ride". There are several photographs of what this looked like back in its day, perhaps none more telling in terms of what you'll find there today as one of the images from the info panels from the walkway overlooking the beach.

From this image it's clear not only what the function of the structure as it appears today was, but also the original purpose of all the toppled concrete columns that are strewn about the surrounding area.  According to the panel this image was from the 1914 Shredded Wheat annual outing, 101 years ago nearly to the day. It also appears that water levels were dramatically lower in Lake Erie a century ago. The remains of many of the other features in this photograph are still visible today including the foundation of the fun house tower on the left and the old pier walkway in the background.

Though I've lived in Fort Erie for the past 18 years or so, and only grew up just a 20 minute drive up the Lake Erie shore, I really only discovered this structure for myself less than ten years ago. Though I had no idea what it was at the time the photographic possibilities it suggested were obvious enough right from the start, and I'm certainly not the first to think so. Over most of those years I thought of this as a subject I had already covered, no need to return to it again. Somehow I always found a reason to. Ansel famously revisited subjects like Half Dome many times and we are all the richer for it. Apparently he saw value in returning to the same subject time and again. Maybe I should relax a little and see what more I can make of this. It may be difficult to tell by the roughly chronological sequence of images I present below but the structure is crumbling year by year and it may not be long before someone declares it unsafe and it gets pulled down for good. I'd hate to realize then that there were other ways to approach it.

For completeness sake I'll start with one from back in my digital days. All HDR'd
up I remember being quite proud of it at the time. I dialed the colour saturation
back some and made the contrast a bit more realistic to make it presentable here. 

Even in my digital era film was still part of my repertoire. This is image is even
older than the one above, but shot on 35mm Kodak HIE infrared film. I thought
this film was long gone but recently found a roll at the bottom of the freezer.  

In silhouette with the old pier and the Buffalo skyline in the distance.

My favourite image from a long expired roll of Vericolor.

Under a November sky, the clouds of autumn seem somehow different
than at any other time of year.

Taken just this past winter when I was drawn to the beach by some mysterious
looking clouds, here it appears as though transported to a whole other landscape.