ANGELA B. PAN

One of the benefits of living in the DC area is being able to do quick little weekend getaways to New York. It’s only 4 hours away but a totally different atmosphere and vibe than living in the Capital City.

A few weeks ago, Andrew and I spent a nice weekend in New York City. It was one weekend where we didn’t have any plans and just wanted to spend some time to ourselves. It was so great. But this trip was no different than any other place we go to. Meaning, I planned all our activities while Andrew planned all the food we eat.

Since neither one of us had ever been to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I figured this was the perfect time to go. We don’t go to museums often as a couple so since I was the person planning, we were going to go to an art museum 🙂

We spent a good 3 hours in the museum, taking our time to go through all the exhibits. It was beautiful, a little overwhelming and kind of confusing. The museum is huge! And to get from one wing to the other, there can be a lot of backtracking. Or at least we had to. Maybe we just weren’t doing it right. But we both agreed that our favorite exhibit was the Egyptian ones. It was so cool seeing the hieroglyphics in real life. I mean you learn about them in school all the time, but it’s just so much more impressive when you actually see it carved in these massive temples and coffins.

My camera settings for this image are F2.2 at 1/500th sec and ISO 320 with my Sony A7II and 35mm prime lens.

Taken at the same time as this image, these two scenes were taking place just a few steps away from each. Luckily, I was across the street and I didn’t have to take those steps. All I had to do was shift my body a little bit and I saw these lovely ladies getting their hair done. Obviously, hair appointments don’t stop when it’s raining out.

I think my favorite part about this image are all the tones that are going on. It’s such an everyday scene (at least for women) but everything seems to be matching. For example the blues. The overall image is very blue, but blues can be found in the woman’s shirt that’s closest to the left, then in the hair towel and apron on the women in the center and then the apron on the woman on the very right. Those blue tones match the neon lights that you see reflecting in the mirror along with some orange tones. The orange tones go along the woman who has her hair in a bun, then the orange apron, and a little bit of orange in the store sign to the very left. Oh and I forgot to mention there’s even a little orange in the sign hanging on the wall on the very right. To be honest, I didn’t notice how everything matched so well when I captured the image, but now that I see the scene, I just like it so much more.

My camera settings for this image are F4 at 1/200th sec and ISO 1000 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm.

Another rainy, moody image from our trip to New York.

This image was taken after we finished our meal. Andrew and I started walking back to our car when we ducked into this little alleyway because the wind had really started to pick up and blowing the rain everywhere. We were getting soaked. So we stood under a doorway of a closed store to wait it out a little bit. Luckily, there were some other people hanging out in this alley because they were all in line for Sunday morning Dim Sum.

Rain or shine, Dim Sum is always a great Sunday morning treat! What caught my attention about this person and his umbrella was the puddle that was building up on the umbrella. I don’t know, I keep on looking at that and decided that I needed to capture it. The added bonus was all the reflections from where he was standing. The rain made everything glow.

Now I sort of wish that it will rain every time I go on a trip. LOL.

My camera settings for this image are F4 at 1/100th sec and ISO 1000 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm.

So for the most part, we had beautiful weather on our trip to New York. It was pleasantly Autumn while we were there with cool weather temps but not cold enough for heavy jackets. Andrew and I couldn’t stop talking about how ideal it was because every other time we’re there it’s FREEZING.

But the day we left the city was POURING rain. As soon as I woke up in the morning, I could hear the rain pounding on our hotel room window. Good thing I was prepared with a long, heavy-ish jacket that kept me warm. Don’t get me wrong, I still got wet but it was better than having nothing at all.

So for our last meal in New York, Andrew and I went down to Chinatown for some soup dumplings. What’s better on a cold, rainy day? We made the decision that I would drive and I’d drop Andrew off in front of the restaurant so that he could put our name down in case there was a wait. That allowed me to drive around, find parking and along the way, I could stop and take some super moody images of the city with the rain. Turns out, Chinatown is PERFECT for rainy shots. I loved the mood this part of city created and it seemed like there were still so many people out with umbrellas. As soon as I saw a whole bunch of umbrellas lined up in a corner of the street waiting to cross, I knew we were in the right place.

This is probably my favorite image I captured the whole weekend we were in New York. I just love the bright red punch buggy with all the red in the signs plus the out of focus pedestrians. I don’t know it definitely brings me back to that rainy, windy Sunday.

My camera settings for this image are F4 at 1/250th sec and ISO 1000 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens.

When we booked our hotel I knew the rooftop views were going to be epic, but I didn’t know how good they would be. Here was the view when you walked straight out onto the patio. As soon as we walked out there, my jaw dropped. I loved being able to see so much for the skyline but then I turned to the side and saw this. So cool right? A birds eye view of the Manhattan bridge.

After our first trip to the rooftop, Andrew and I decided to just walk around the city and get some food to eat and run a few errands. We found ourselves all the way up midtown and was shocked by how many people we saw. Somehow we ended up really close to Rockefeller center and literally stood in the same spot for like 10 minutes because there were just so many people. There was no flow of traffic and we were just stuck. Even with police there, no one was moving. It was kind of insane but the best part was this guy in front of me who screamed “ok, who just slapped my ass”. LOL.

Needless to say once we got back to the hotel, we were tired. But I wanted to go back up to the rooftop one more time. I really didn’t want to. The bed was calling my name, but I knew that it was the only opportunity I was going to get.

It was a little awkward walking back to the rooftop. By that time, it was basically a club with everyone all dressed up. I was still in my sneakers and winter coat. Oh well. Anything for the shot, right?

My camera settings for this image is F6.3 at 0.8 sec at ISO 1250 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide angle.

Taken around the same time as this image. I really love those moody, rainstorm clouds. I remember it had been raining on and off all day that day. This happened to be during one of those off periods. What had actually inspired me to take this image was that cartoon you see on the right hand side. In particular that one with the green background and cute little bunny screaming on it. I recognized those characters from our trip to Japan 2 years ago. I believe the cartoon is called ‘Line Town’ and I thought they were so kawaii. They even had their own store near Harajuku and I believe Andrew and I bought a couple of tshirts there for our nieces and nephews. I was so excited to see Line Town come to America that I had to take a cool reflection shot of it. Duhhh! I didn’t make it into the Times Square store but at least I’ll have more opportunities to go than I did when it was only in Japan.

So I started to set up my shot but then that guy who’s covering it saw me trying to look for my composition. I know I was taking taking my time but it may have been too long. Because when I first saw this scene, there was no one there! But that’s New York for you, there are people EVERYWHERE and at any given moment, one of them could walk right into you composition. Right when I was ready to click, there he was, in front of the green bunny. I could have waited to see if he would move but there were more people behind me on their way. Oh well. I still think it turned out pretty cool.

My settings for this image is F8 at 1/50th of a second at ISO 400 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide angle lens. At first I was surprised that the shutter speed was so fast at ISO 400 on such a gloomy day, but then I realized it’s times square. It’s always so bright there so you really don’t need a high ISO to shoot fast. LOL.