Urban Photography | Fotoeins Fotografie

Posts from the ‘Urban Photography’ category

25T18 Polaroids: Helmut & Heather

E17, B12.

Another favourite place in Berlin (and there are many) is the Museum für Fotografie, near Zoo station.

Yes, there are “Big Nudes” (literally), and there are many other nudes, many of which I can’t post here. However, what is unmistakable are the long threads connecting Helmut Newton’s photography with fashion and his focus for the power of women in image. I return to his Berlin foundation and the Museum for Photography for sharp reminders of that Newton perception.

The idea of an “instant image” (and branded successfully by Polaroid) has been around since 1947. In an age of film cameras and mobile tech was decades away, Polaroids became handy. In the intervening years and decades, artists and photographers used Polaroids as working tools and experimental testbeds for ideas. Helmut Newton used Polaroids as part of his preparation for many fashion photography sessions.

The “Polaroids” exhibition includes Newton’s collection of images, as well as works by 60 other artists and photographers. They document the allure and longevity of the “instant” medium, which is still in use today.

On Instagram, I found the creative work by Heather Malesson and Charles Johnstone. I’m pleased for them, because their recent work using the medium is also recognized in the “Polaroids” exhibition in Berlin. If my feelings about “single stationary images” remain true, then I’ve got to be grateful to Instagram as an open venue through which I’ve found many creative artists.

Berlin’s Museum für Fotografie (Helmut Newton Foundation): “Polaroids” 2025 exhibition & group show, 7 March to 27 July. A display room on the ground floor. On the opposite wall is a small collection of Polaroids.

*June Newton (aka Alice Springs) & Helmut Newton. Polaroid by Aline Cheung at Restaurant Davé in Paris, 1990.*

*The moment I saw this, I thought of Veruca Salt’s “American Thighs”: can’t fight the seether. Polaroid by Helmut Newton for “Vogue”* 🇺🇸 *in Monaco, 1979.*

*Cindy Crawford for “Vogue” 🇺🇸 . Polaroid by Helmut Newton in Saint-Tropez, 1991.*

*Cindy Crawford for “Vogue”* 🇺🇸*. Polaroid by Helmut Newton in Monaco, 2003.*

*“The Girl in the Fifth Floor Walk-Up”, by Charles Johnstone & Heather Malesson, 2014.*

*“Escape”, by Charles Johnstone & Heather Malesson, 2021.*

*Museum für Fotografie, from Berlin Zoologischer Garten station (track 4).*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 25 May 2025. I received neither request nor compensation for this content. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

25T17 Among U-stations & murals

E16, B11.

I’ve long admired the street art by Hera+Akut, whose collaborative work between 2004 and 2020 was seen around the world; and now by Hera solo, whose work conveys clear messages about the universality of women’s strength and perseverance and their accomplishments. Their murals usually span the height of several storeys along the outside wall of a building (usually, an apartment building).

Today, I hopped into Berlin’s Wedding and Moabit to chase down a couple of murals, and in between, I found a representation of design variety for which Berlin’s U-Bahn stations have long been identified. Long-time residents and urban transit geeks have always known about this, but I feel the station interiors are worth showing.

*as long as you are standing, give a hand to those who have fallen. // solange du aufrecht stehst, stütze die, die Dich brauchen. In Moabit: 2018, by Herakut, Wes21, & Onur.*

*Note how the tusks extend beyond the building’s edge, and how there’s a tiny car suspended in mid-air at the end of the elephant’s trunk.*

*U6 station Wedding. Around 1200 CE, the village of Weddinge was founded by nobleman Rudolphus de Weddinge.*

*U9 terminus station Osloer Straße, also intersects with the U8 line.*

*U8 station Gesundbrunnen, which is a major suburban- & regional-rail junction, also known informally as Nordkreuz (North cross).*

*“Generation Equality” 2023 mural by Hera, for Street Art for Mankind, located in Wedding.*

*“Not caring is no option.” The protagonist is a health worker in green scrubs, her two daughters on her left shoulder.*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 24 May 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

25T16 A swath through the city

E15, B10.

It’s already my 10th day in the German capital, and I feel like I’ve barely scratched the surface for all the good plans and intentions I drew up months in advance.

Brisk west winds carried cool temperatures that felt a lot like winter than late-spring. The mid-May chill afforded opportunity which brought me to the city’s 2nd Jewish Cemetery and to the city’s Technical Museum by mid-afternoon. What lies in between are the moments I have to be especially keen and focussed.

*Plattenbau block & Fernsehturm Tower, an East German view* *from Schönhauser Allee.*

*“In the middle of the city.” There are about 22-thousand here.*

*“Der Himmel über Berlin”: west, from Torstraße & Rosa-Luxemburg-Straße.*

*I’m staying “outside” the Ring in Pankow, which formally is a part of the federal city-state of Berlin.*

I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 23 May 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

My Fuji X70: Portra Sunset (XTrans2 recipe)

Above/featured: Morning light in San Francisco’s Financial District. Photo, 29 Mar 2025.

The Fujifilm X70 mirrorless fixed-lens prime camera has added a lot to my approach to photography for projects in both domestic and international settings. To satisfy my curiosity about Fujifilm’s analog-film simulation (film-sim) recipes, I’ve provided examples of X70 images with the following recipes:

• CineStill 800T
• Ektachrome 100SW (saturated warm)
• Fujichrome Slide
• Kodachrome 64
• Kodacolor
• Kodak Color Negative
• Kodak Platinum 200
• Monochrome Red

What follows are images made with the “Portra Sunset” recipe, which Yon Pol describes in their YouTube video.

This recipe is for X-Trans II sensors and the built-in availability of “Classic Chrome”. The settings on my X70 are:

“Classic Chrome” built-in film-sim
Dynamic Range: DR200, but I’ve set this to DR400
Color: +2 (High)
Sharpness: -1 (Medium-Soft)
Highlight: -1 (Medium-Soft)
Shadow: -1 (Medium-Soft)
Noise Reduction: -2 (Low)
White Balance: Daylight; +3 Red, -5 Blue
ISO: Auto, up to 3200

I assigned this recipe for an “all-purpose or daytime” setting as 1 of the 7 camera’s custom presets. The following JPG images are “almost” straight-out-of-the-camera; only minor adjustments to brightness level and a crop to a predefined image size have been applied, with no corrections to colour, contrast, geometric distortion, or rotation.

Just like the Kodachrome 64 recipe, Portra Sunrise uses the Classic Chrome film-sim in-camera setting that produces accentuated reds and an overall orangey-flavour. Blues seem more “subdued”, until foreground objects are illuminated against a clear blue sky. There’s more “diffuse washout” when I point closer to the sun. I imagine I’d get similar results with the Standard Provia film-sim under a clear sky with higher dust- or smoke-content in the atmosphere.

( Click here for images )

My Vienna: space invaders in the capital

Above: WN_31 at the corner of Ballgasse and Rauhensteingasse, 9 July 2024 (P15).

Don’t worry: it’s not 1529, nor is it 1683, and there are no bands of marauders on horseback arriving for a large and lengthy siege. This also does not include anything from outside the Solar System. Instead, this is about a human artist and their little creations sprinkled throughout the Austrian capital city. In fact, I’d claim their “invasion” has already succeeded.

When a wae lad was I, the video game Space Invaders was a kind of dawn, an opening to a brand new world. The lasting effects snuck into many aspects of life, including the time I dedicated to the learning, pursuit, and practice of science. In time, a video game about a battle to ward off waves of little aliens required the purchase of a large bulky black console, accompanied by a large bulky black joystick with a big red button. In the decades since, the technological leap into the first-quarter of the 21st-century means that Space Invaders is available as an online web-application, easily called upon anytime on demand.

In Vienna, the sight of little aliens prompted immediate personal curiosity, and I spent parts of three consecutive summers wandering the streets to find as many possible little “visitors”.

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