Downtown Panorama: View from Bay Village

As neighborhoods go, Boston's Bay Village is an incredibly well kept secret. Nestled between the Boston Public Gardens and I-90, the streets of Bay Village offer the quaintness and old-world feel of Beacon Hill and the North End, minus the foot-traffic of meandering tourists.

The real jewel of Bay Village however is found on its buildings' roofs, not outside their front doors. My friends Pete and Sarah are two Bay Village residents who experience this on almost a daily basis. Yesterday morning I got out on their roof deck to capture the view they enjoy.

The photo above was taken at about 10:30am. Though it was an overcast morning, I was quite happy with the results. Please click on the image and larger version will open up in a new tab. The detail is really remarkable.

If you have a great view from your home/apartment in Boston and want it photographed, send me an email.

Demum Veris: A goodbye to winter

Saturday marked the first day of spring... and though I am excited for the return of warm weather, later night falls, and navigable sidewalks, I'm most excited that my camera will be coming out of hibernation. If you haven't totally tuned out from visiting The Viewfinder, you've undoubtedly noticed that there has been about a two-month lapse during which no new posts have been shared.

Though I regret this, I must admit that the lack of activity was due to a lack of creative inspiration and most importantly, a two-month catalog of new images that I just did not really believe in. Thus, I've decided to put behind me my photography drought, and share only a few images from the last few months as a way of saying goodbye to winter.



Beacon Hill after Boston's first full night of snow.


One of my favorite parts of this winter was visiting my childhood hometown of Lititz, Pennsylvania in January. It's funny how the combination of distance and time can make one nostalgic, but for me a visit to Lititz is like chicken soup. The above photo is the famed Wilbur Chocolate factory, out of which wafts a daily aroma of melted chocolate. In these moments Lititz becomes a Rockwellian setting in which you walk the streets fully expecting to run into George Bailey himself.

Pittsburgh served as another brief destination this winter. After witnessing the inauguration, we worked our way across Pennsylvania for a quick visit with my parents, and later to Pittsburgh to visit our good friend Matt Desjardins (blogging shout out). Matt recently left Boston for a masters program in international espionage at the University of Pittsburgh... no joke! If the photograph above is any indication, we hung out in Pittsburgh on probably the coldest weekend of the year. The following weekend, inspired by our visit, the Pittsburgh Steelers won the Super Bowl.


Dear The Viewfinder Blog, please stop blogging about Barack Obama. Yours truly, The Internet.

Okay, I promise to expand the scope of topics on my blog in the coming months, but I would be remiss if I neglected to follow up on my coverage of the inauguration. Beyond the already told stories of massive crowds, history-making speeches, Aretha Franklin's hat, and a botch-job by Justice Roberts, the real story of the inauguration for me was the monumental, yet nearly noiseless catharsis felt while huddling shoulder to shoulder with millions of my fellow citizens as we bared witness to history. Now I am well aware that due to my age and my ancestral background, I am someone who cannot fully and personally appreciate the total importance of Barack Obama's election. Thus, the catharsis I speak about is one born from a lifetime of presidents who, to me, have placed reelection before the country, and in the process have bargained our security and prosperity for poll numbers and personal gain. More simply, I've only seen politicians, not statesmen become president.

Obama is only 63 days into his presidency, and though the impact of his policy shifts are still months and years away, the tenacity and urgency with which his administration has addressed our pressing issues confirm to me that Obama is more statesman than politican. And the photo above, my literal place in the history of Obama's election... reminds me that I played a part in arguably the most important political seachange in the history of our country. It does feel like we are coming out of the winter.

Boston 2007-present (Catching You Up: 8 of 11)

After I completed grad school, I moved to Boston in the summer of 2007. I was looking for a new scene to call home for a little bit and Boston seemed like a great stop. Despite the unfairly long winters, and various run-ins with some New Englanders' whose general outlooks on life match the icy temperatures, I'd have to say it's been a great place to be.


From a photography perspective, Boston has quite a bit to offer. Simultaneously a 200 year old city and a fully functioning modern metropolis, Bostons' architecture offers a unique melting pot of the old and the new, while remaining uniquely American.


The above photo is an apartment building in Boston's historic Beacon Hill. This image is actually a series of about 13 close-up images of the building stitched together. If you look closely, you can see some imperfections in the stitch job, but when pieced together, I thought they created a really strong visual effect and mood.

On one of my first weekends in Boston, and as a surprise, my sister and brother-in-law drove me to a spot where you can photograph the Zakim Bridge from underneath. For those not familiar with Boston, this is a pretty incredible vantage point considering that only about 50 feet above you a span of six-lane highway is holding up thousands of speeding cars. My awareness of this, coupled with the intimate access we had to the bridge, created a real adrenaline rush that made for an exciting couple hours.


One of Boston's greatest assets besides the Sox and the Bruins, is its close proximity to some of the East Coast's most beautiful coastline. Only about a two hour drive to Maine, lies the Portland Head Lighthouse on Cape Elizabeth (pictured above).

In August of 2008, my family vacationed in Wellfleet, Cape Cod. It was my first time on the Cape, and almost every landscape could have been an impressionist painting.