HL fotoeins

Freistaat Bayern, The Free State of Bavaria

Bavaria: 100 years of statehood (2018)

Featured image: The blue and white diamonds (fusils) are a familiar Bavarian symbol, adopted in the late 13th-century by the Wittelsbach family who ruled Bavaria from 1180 to 1918.

As a product of the coastal and mountainous Canadian Southwest, I always feel the pull exerted by the Bavarian Alps regardless of where I am in Germany; it’s been this way over the past 18 years. But there’s more to Bavaria than fairytale castles, Oktoberfest, and BMW, although they’re spot on for the Wurst (sausage). And frankly, there’s a ton more to Germany than Bavaria, but that’s one of many reasons for this entire blogsite after all.

Located in southeast Germany, Bavaria includes more than a half-dozen World Heritage Sites, the pre-Easter Fasching/Fastnacht festival, the sight of Audis on the Autobahn, over one thousand years of wine-making in Franconia, and violin-making since the late 17th-century, among many things to explore, eat, and experience.

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17 for 17, Fotoeins Fotograms of 2017, fotoeins.com

17 for 17: Fotoeins Fotograms of 2017 (IG)

Featured: At the Germany-Austria border, from Fellhorn mountain near Oberstdorf: 8 March.

Another year gone, another 34-thousand images made^* …

As the image above shows, I also spent a lot of time this year at the Austrian-German frontier, much of it at altitude.

Below I look back at the year 2017 with a selection of 17 images. Each picture is a direct clickable link to the corresponding post on Instagram.

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The Spheres, Amazon Spheres, 6th and Lenora, Amazon, Denny Regrade, Denny Triangle, Seattle, Washington, fotoeins.com

Seattle: curious glowing Amazon Spheres

Above: (A) The Spheres, northeast from 6th Avenue and Lenora Street (HL).

Glowing glass forms appear around the corner as if they’ve risen suddenly from the ground, eliciting odd looks and interested inquiries from passersby.

On Amazon’s urban campus at the feet of towers Day One and Doppler, The Spheres are located in downtown Seattle on Lenora Street between 6th Avenue and 7th Avenue. The futuristic structures provide a highly visible centre of attention for the electronic-commerce and -computing company. Three intersecting glass and steel half-spheres will contain a botanic garden to include exotic plants, waterfalls, and treehouses, and workspaces to further cultivate creativity by and collaboration among Amazon employees. The grand opening is scheduled for 18 January 2018.

The construction development projects are part of the joint efforts by NBBJ and Amazon to regenerate the Denny Regrade area with ample office space for the world headquarters of Amazon, and additional space for retail and public facilities.

The Spheres, Amazon Spheres, 7th and Lenora, Amazon, Denny Regrade, Denny Triangle, Seattle, Washington, fotoeins.com

(B) The Spheres, northwest from 7th and Lenora (HL).

(C) Seattle Municipal Archives, item no. 4011.

Denny Hill was regraded and removed in multiple phases between 1898 and 1931. In the 1930 picture above (C), the 2017 Spheres in image (B) would be located to the right of the utility pole between the two cars in the foreground and the digging excavator in the background.

I made photos (A) and (B) above on 10 December 2017. This post appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins.com as https://wp.me/p1BIdT-aVe.

Morning fog, autumn fog, Seattle P-I globe, West Thomas St Overpass, Myrtle Edwards Park, Seattle, WA, USA, fotoeins.com

Seattle: the Sound and the Silence

“Fog”, definition: “a thick cloud of tiny water droplets suspended in the atmosphere at or near the earth’s surface that obscures or restricts visibility (to a greater extent than mist; strictly, reducing visibility to below 1 kilometre).”

Fog isn’t atypical for autumn or winter in the city of Seattle or in the Puget Sound region. While less effective than snow, the damping by fog on light and sound can still provide a modest visual and auditory sensation of silence. That is, until headlights and foghorns pierce the temporary cloak and illusion.

740am, West Thomas Street Overpass (20171211).

751am, West Thomas Street Overpass (20171211).

830am northwest, into Sound fog (20171211).

840am southeast, as the sun burns through (20171211).

I made the photos above on 6 January 2015 on board the WSDOT Ferry MV Kaleetan from Bremerton to Seattle, and on 11 December 2017 near Myrtle Edwards Park. This post appears on Fotoeins Fotopress at fotoeins.com as https://wp.me/p1BIdT-aYc.

Mengenlehreuhr, set theory clock, Berliner Uhr, Berlin Clock, Sixt, Europa-Center, Budapester Strasse, Charlottenburg, Berlin, Hauptstadt, Germany, fotoeins.com

My Berlin: An Unusual (Set Theory) Clock

I had read about this unusual clock years ago; the unusual mathematics connection was an additional “plus”.

I leave the crowds at Gedächtniskirche and Breitscheidplatz and head on over to the SixT car rental outlet on Budapester Strasse. What’s standing in front is most certainly a curiosity, even as passers-by look at me curiously.

The Berlin Clock is known in German as “Berliner Uhr”. The alternate name is “set theory clock” or “Mengenlehreuhr”, a German compound word consisting of “Menge” for quantities (sets), “Lehre” for theory, and “Uhr” for clock. The Guinness Book of Records claimed “the Berlin Clock was the first clock in the world operating according to the principles of set theory¹“.

Created by inventor Dieter Binninger, the clock first stood at the corner of Kurfürstendamm and Uhlandstrasse in West Berlin from 1975 to 1995. Local business arrangements were made with Binninger’s widow for a long-term loan including maintenance costs, and the clock was moved in 1996 to its present location at the Europa-Center.

Here is how one reads the Berlin Clock: