Jetpack for iOS | Fotoeins Fotografie

Nuremberg: Fuji(film)-Store

“Home of X Photography”

It’s a busy active crowded Saturday in Nuremberg’s city centre. There’s a big music festival with acts ranging in size from solo artists to 3-piece bands. But as I walk across town, I see a big Fujifilm sign, and as I approach, I can see this is no ordinary camera shop.

I learn there’s been a Fuji shop in the city for a number of years, and only this past February did they move to this new location. Judging by layout and the upstairs gallery, the Fuji shop has a feel similar to aLeica shop. That’s because the owner of Nuremberg’s Fuji-Store created the shop based on their experience operating the city’s Leica shop nearby. I chat with Peter, the gentleman in the shop about what’s out now and what else might be expected. We agree to a common wish: to have Fuji fill a current niche with a compact portable point-and-shoot at the right price point. How about an X80 product variant?

I’ve done my fair share of drooling (but no buying) at Leica shops in Frankfurt and Vienna, and I enjoyed doing the same to available X-models on display at Nuremberg’s Fuji-Store. Did I buy? No. Am I thinking about life after the X70? Yes.

I can also see Fuji X Weekly having some fun here in the shop.

I received neither support nor compensation for this piece. I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 2 August 2025. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

Vienna in (the) 5: artist Julia Bugram

(“Raising Hands”)

The sculpture provided the introduction three years ago. Two clasped hands, each as tall as a person. Each hand made of 1-million 1-Eurocent coins. Seen in 2022, next to St. Stephan’s Cathedral. Seen next in 2023, the sculpture moved near the big fountain at Schwarzenbergplatz. A wonderful crowdfunded project, created by Austrian artist Julia Bugram.

This past spring, I receive a kind invitation to visit her studio. It’s July and I’m in Vienna’s 5th district. I make my way up to the 2nd floor of an “Altbau”, and arrive at a cozy working art-space shared between Julia and another artist.

Julia is presently exploring themes surrounding community and society; and how art can create, enhance, and strengthen connections among people. Artistic influences include: Hilma af Klimt, Mela Diamant, Renate Bertlmann, Margot Pilz, Jakob Lena Knebl, Martha Jungwirth. Her “Raising Hands” sculpture is presently in storage, waiting for new benefactors and fresh eyes.

We spoke at some length about the economic and cultural challenges contemporary Austrian artists face in the creation and distribution of their work, as well as the difficulty of commuting between Vienna and her home in Burgenland. Despite challenges, I’m looking forward to seeing what she’ll create in the near future.

Links to her website and Instagram.

*Working art space shared by Julia Bugram and Elisabeth Hansa. (I’ve greyed out their contact numbers.)*

Julia’s recent book with images of her recent art pieces, including extensive discussion and the context of her work: “Widerstand & Neugierde: Kunst, die Veränderung fordert.” (Resistance & Curiosity: art that demands change).

*Most who directly supported the publishing her book are from Vienna, other parts of Austria, and Europe.*

Her triptych creation, “Fut – Mut – Wut”, presented here in alphabetical order with carefully selected wallpaper-like background motifs. Three words of equal length that rhyme, each word an expression of an essential facet or dimension for a woman.

*Defiance and empowerment, body autonomy, questioning the gaze, control of their own narratives*.

*Many of the pieces on the wall include sketches of plants, emphasizing her desire to commune with and derive inspiration from nature.*

My thanks to Julia for her invitation and her time. I made all images above with an iPhone15 on 11 July 2025. I received neither support nor compensation for this piece. This post composed within Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

San Francisco: Sam Wo tradition near the close

(Chinatown)

If a place provides repeatedly good reminders of personal cultural heritage through food, my expectation is one of a long-standing nature to the point of being eternal. But human beings are temporal and ephemeral, and this fact of nature must unfortunately extend to human institutions.

At address 713 Clay (near Kearny), Sam Wo (三和)* is a restaurant in San Francisco, operating as one of the oldest restaurants in the city’s Chinatown. The present owners have retired, their adult children are moving on, and the new ownership has put the future of the restaurant in question. The final day of operations is 27 January 2025, only a handful of days before Chinese New Year. Perhaps it’ll be a pause. And perhaps it’ll be gone.

I’d done my research prior to arrival, only to discover within weeks the restaurant would soon be closed. In the remaining weeks surrounding the Christmas and New Year’s holidays, I promised myself at least one visit to Sam Wo each week until the end: that their excellent “wok6 hei3” (鑊氣) is no hindrance but an encouragement. The quality of their “stir fry essence” means every meal is delicious, with every bite and flavour pointing directly to memories of an upbringing raised by immigrant parents from China’s southern province of Canton and a big chunk of time spent walking and eating within Vancouver’s Chinatown in the 1970s and 80s.

I haven’t been here in the Bay Area very long, but in Sam Wo, I found a place a little like home, where I could also polish my rust in Cantonese (廣東話) and Toisan/Hoisan (台山語). I’ll be sad to see them go, and melt away into the annals of San Francisco’s much-storied Chinatown.

* The full name for Sam Wo is 三和粥粉麵, (read here left to right) whose first 2 characters represent “three harmonies” for congee (粥), broad flat rice noodles (粉), and thin egg noodles (麵). Historically, Chinese was written right to left.

The place, the food …

2025 postscript: there are new owners, and the new re-opening is Friday, September 5.

The strange and familiar (BA11)

(nerding out at SETI)

I hadn’t seen J and J in almost 13 years.

The last time took place in La Serena, Chile at the end of 2011. Not only was it goodbye to Gemini South and Chile after 5 years, I said farewell to astronomy after almost 20 years.

But time is a tricky thing, and the moment had arrived: I had another promise to keep.

Fast forward to 2024, and I’m in the Bay Area. After reaching out a number of weeks ago, it’s wonderful to see them again after many years. They’ve kindly invited me to the SETI Institute where they work. I split from day-to-day science, but science never left, because I’m nerding out in a big way at the home of a big scientific effort: the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence.

*Cozy wide-open space, to house a number of multidisciplinary scientists to explore and study SETI themes.*

*J&J, whom I met at Gemini, moved onto SOFIA: Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy, fitted into a modified Boeing 747SP.*

*Dr. Frank Drake: 1st pres., SETI trustees board.*

*I’m nerding out in a big way: Leonhard Euler, and the famous Euler identity: e^(i•pi) = -1.*

1593: Giordano Bruno suggests possibility of life on other planets; tried & executed for heresy. 1610: Galileo Galilei discovers 4 moons orbiting Jupiter, evidence against geocentric universe; convicted of heresy & sentenced to house arrest.

I have fond memories of seeing this on the big screen. 1997: the movie “Contact” is released with Jodie Foster in the lead role as Dr. Ellie Arroway, based loosely on SETI Institute co-founder Dr. Jill Tarter.

*“To the SETI Institute gang, all my best! Jodie Foster.” (Arecibo)*

*“To the SETI Institute: live long and prosper! Leonard Nimoy.” (Celebrating 40 Years of the Drake Equation)*

*2020: COSMIC SETI installed at the VLA in New Mexico. 2022:* 🇨🇦 *CHIME in operation at SETI Institute’s HCRO in northern California.*

*Model of a segment for the 6.5-metre (21.3-foot) primary mirror of the JWST (James Webb Space Telescope).*

*Meeting room with SETI timeline on the wall.*

*Dr. Frank Drake and his equation to estimate the number of civilizations in our Galaxy.*

I made all photos above with an iPhone15 on 8 Nov 2024 (travel day 11 in the Bay Area). This post composed with Jetpack for iOS appears on Fotoeins Fotografie at fotoeins DOT com.

Drumheller AB: badlands, dinosaurs, oh my!

(Relatively short drive from Calgary)

In south-central Alberta, a leisurely 1.5 to 2 hour drive northeast from Calgary takes me past trucks, farm equipment, drilling rigs; through undulating hills and open fields of grain.

Population at a touch under 9-thousand, the city straddles the gentle flow of the Red Deer River. I’m led here by the notable attractions, and integrated over a couple of days here, they do not disappoint.