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Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
This Open Cluster, Messier 50, No. 2323 in the NGC, lies in the constellation Monoceros and spans almost 18 light-years across.
Object: M 50
Optics: Lacerta Newton 12" F4 + 3" Wynne-Corrector
Mount: Sky-Watcher EQ8
Camera: ZWO ASI 071MC Pro @-15°C, Gain=0
Exposure: total ~0,3h, RGGB 40x30sec, 200 Bias, 60 Darks, 40 Flats
Date: 2019-03-02
Location: ATHOS Centro Astronómico S.L., La Palma
Capture: Sequence Generator Pro
Guiding: Off-Axis, ASI120MM, PHD2
Image Acquisition: Stephan Schurig
Image Processing: Stephan Schurig
AstroPixelProcessor 1.071: Calibration, Registration, Normalization, Integration, Remove Light Pollution, Background Calibration, Star Colors Correction, Auto Digital Development
Photoshop 20.0.4: Curves, Exposure (Offset), Nik Dfine 2 Denoise, Star Shrink, Masked Dynamic (Dynamic, Saturation), Masked HighPass Sharpening
Remarks: ASI 071MC Pro made available by Teleskop-Service, Ransburg
Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
see www.flickr.com/photos/nebarnix/198303490/ for this image stacked with another 88 minutes of light!
Final version! Can't believe this was during the full moon as well. (be sure to view full size)
Andromeda and its companion galaxies
Camera: Pentax *IST DL
Lens: 135mm F2.8 at 2.8 (apeture ring froze on me!)
Exposure: 80 minutes (!)
Total normalized exposure (min at iso 100): 304min@iso100
Total normalized light (min at iso 100/f-ratio^2): 39min@iso100@f1
6x240 seconds@iso 200
24x120 seconds@iso 400
2x240 seconds@iso 800
ISO: 200, 400, 800
Hand Guided (no RA drive at all) with a 500mm F4.5 reflector on an EQ mount
History
The church with the downed tower
History of joy and suffering of an old christian time witness of Vienna
The Minoritenkirche in Vienna is one of the oldest and most valuable artistic churches of the city. It is therefore not surprising that it also experienced a very eventful history. In all probability, the Franciscans were - how the Friars Minor (Thomas of Celano: "Ordo Friars Minor" ) also called on account of its founders personality, called by the Babenberg Duke Leopold VI the Glorious, in 1230 into the country. Here he gave them a lot, probably with a church (probably dedicated to St. Catherine of Alexandria), before the walls of the city, between the Scots Monastery (Schottenstift) and the ducal residence. It was not until 1237, and in 1271 the entire area was included in the extended boundary wall. The Minorite Barnabas Strasser says in his chronicle from 1766 that Leopold had asked on his return from the Holy Land in 1219 Francis in Assisi to the relocation of some brothers to Vienna, which was then carried out 1224. The Franciscans, however, are detectable only in 1234 by a bull of Gregory IX . to Frederick the Warlike, the last reigning Babenberg, by the year 1239 there was already the Austrian province. The above-mentioned chapel near the present Minoritenkirche the brothers have now expanded and dedicated it to the Holy Cross ("Santa Croce"). In 1251 the dedication was by the Bishop Berthold of Passau. In addition, the friars began to build a monastery, the 1234 is mentioned in a document (the monastery comprised finally the Ballhausplatz, Minoritenplatz and parts of the Hofburg and the Public Garden) . Of the original Romanesque building stock nothing has been preserved. Especially the great fire of 1276 has cremated large parts of the Convention.
However, the strong growth of the Friars Minor now living in Vienna made a new building of the church and monastery necessary. Already laid by King Otakar II of Bohemia in 1276 the foundation stone for the new building of that temple which was now already on the present site of the church, the monarch also promised tax exemption for all who had contributed to the building of the church.
First stage of construction (beginning in the third third of the 13th century.): So he decided to build new church and convent, but by the death in battle of Ottokar in 1278 at the March Field (Jedlespeigen close Dürnkrut) delayed the construction, thus only after the turn of the century it couldbe completed. The embalmed body of Ottokar remained 30 weeks in the chapter house of the monastery until it was transferred to Znojmo and finally to Prague. The king's heart is buried in the original Chapel of St. Catherine, which was now newly assigned this name because the appropriation should be reserved to the Holy Cross of Christ, the new church and the convent . This newly built house of God was given the shape of a two-aisled nave with zweijochigem (two-bay) long choir (chancel), which closed with the five sides of a decagon. This long choir, the one 1785/86 and changed into a five-storey residential building, was canceled in 1903. In connection with the subway construction (1984-86), although archaeological excavations took place, it also laid the foundations of the former free long-choir, but most of the foundations of the old presbytery were destroyed at the same time. - The first church had a rood screen, even at the turn of the 15th/16th Century the still resulting image of the Saint Francis was attached by an unknown artist. Just from this first phase, we know by the Baroque Minoritenchronik (chronicle) first mentioned the name of a builder, namely brother Hans Schimpffenpfeil .
Second stage of construction (after 1317-1328 ) Blanche (Blanche) of Valois, the wife of Duke Rudolf III . ( 1307) and daughter of Philip the Fair, in 1304 decreed in his will to build a chapel in honor of her grandfather, the Holy King Louis IX. of France (canonized in 1297) and introduced for this purpose in 1000 available books. However, the project was realized only under Isabella (Elizabeth ) of Aragon, wife of King Frederick the Fair (1330 ). The chapel dedicated to their relatives canonized in 1317, St . Louis of Anjou, son of Charles II of Naples, great-nephew of Louis IX . of France and Franciscan archbishop of Toulouse (1297 ); it was first a self- cultivation in the NE (north-east) of the two-aisled nave Minoritenkirche, until the third construction phase it was integrated into the nave (now the north aisle with Anthony's Chapel). In 1328 the chapel was apparently completed because in 1330 the founder - was buried in the chapel of Louis - in terms of her testamentary disposition. The tomb of Queen Isabella stood in the middle of the Kapellenjochs (chapel bay) in front of the apse. The tracery show similarity with those of the Albertine choir of St. Stephen (built by Duke Albrecht II [ 1358] ) as well as with that of the Sanctuary Strassengel near the Cistercian monastery Rein near Graz (around the middle of the 14th century.). Probably belonged to the tympanum with the donor portraits of Frederick the Fair and Isabella at the feet of the Mother of God, which was inserted in the third construction phase of the church in the secondary north portal, the original entrance to the Ludwig chapel. It must be mentioned that even the Duchess Blanche (1305 ) built around 1330 a high early gothic marble grave, which unfortunately disappeared in the course of the renovation of the church in the years 1784-86 by the court architect Johann Ferdinand Hetzendorf of Hohenberg. It would be in Vienna today the only work of art of this kind
Third stage of construction (from 1339 -1400): Construction of a three-aisled hall (originally nave chapel Ludwig). The north wall of the chapel was extended to the west and in the north portal installed a second yoke. In addition, it was built a new west facade, with especially the central portal - including was designed - with jamb - pompous like the French late Gothic - perhaps under South German mediation. In the obituary of the Friars Minor brother Jacob of Paris is called ( around 1340), the confessor Albrecht II as the creator of this work of art. The duke and his wife Johanna von Außenmauer MinoritenkirchePfirt have obviously significantly contributed to the emergence of Vienna undoubtedly unique late Gothic cathedrals three portal group, there is also a representation of Albrecht and his wife in the middle portal next to the cross of Christ. Together with the two for a rich Mendikantenkirche (Mendicity church) this equipment is also of French models (see Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris [after 1285] ) constructed in 1350-1370 with splendid rose windows (with "bright" and "rotating" tracery) to the south wall - unusually without a doubt. The workshop, which built the Ludwig chapel was also busy with the west facade ("Minoritenwerkstatt" (workshop)). 1350-60 or later today, finally, the bell tower was only partially built (as a builder is a lay brother Nicholas, 1385 or 1386 called ). The tower consists mainly of two parts, a lower part made of stone blocks to the height of the nave, and an upper, octagonal section of mixed masonry. Its crown had because of damage - especially been renewed several times and was eventually removed - during the Turkish wars . The consecration of the enlarged Minoritenkirche must have taken place about the year 1390. So that the church had received its valid look for the next time.
In 1529, during the first siege of the monastery and the church even more extensive damage suffering (launch of the spire). Since the monastery of the Observant (Franciscans) had been destroyed by the Turks, these sought to supplant the Franciscans in their convent, where John Capistrano, the founder of the "brown Franciscan" (Observant) in Vienna, lived some time in the Franciscan monastery and in the Church had preached, but eventually instructed the Emperor Ferdinand I the now homeless Observant buildings on Singerschen Platz. In fact, the number of Wiener Friars Minor has then shrunk to seven, so that they felt compelled to call Fathers from Italy. But that but could not prevent that the church from 1569-1620 war a Protestant church. Interestingly, originate numerous coats of arms on the balcony of this period. At that time the Conventual were only in the possession of Louis Chapel and the Chapel of St. Catherine. Also during the second Turkish siege in 1683 the tower served as an observation tower and the Minoritenkirche was accordingly fired by the Turks and severely damaged. In 1733 the tower is adorned with a copper dome, but because of the danger of collapse eventually had to be removed. It brought the church to that low pointed tiled roof, which still exists today .
More and more, the bands developed in the Minoritenkirche, especially Ludwig chapel and cemetery, grave sites of the nobility. Besides Blanche of Valois and Isabella of Aragon and Margaret, the last country Duchess of Tyrol, was named Maultasch ( 1369 ), is buried here, as well as members of Lichtsteiner, Ditrichsteins, Puchaimer, Hojo, Stauffenberger, Greifensteiner; Piccolomini, Medici, Cavalcanti, Montaldi, Valperga, etc. (many of them are listed in the "Libro d'Oro of the "Congregation Italiana"). It should also be mentioned that the Franciscans since the end of the 14th Century took lively interest in teaching at the University of Vienna, especially of course in the subjects of theology, but also the jurisprudence. At the beginning of the 18th Century lived in the Vienna alsoin the Viennese Convention the Venetian cosmographer Br Vincenzo Coronelli, which the Emperor Charles VI. appointed to head the regulation of the Danube and its famous globes are now in the globe collection of the National Library in Vienna.
It is worthnoting, finally, the fact that around 1543 on the Ballhausplatz near the Imperial Palace from parts of the monastery a small hospital was donated and that the Franciscans for 13 years did all the counseling in this new Hofspital, at this time was the newly restored Chapel of St. Catherine Hospital Church. Another wing of the former minority monastery was home to the Imperial Court Library, 1558-1613.
To Minoritenkirche the second half of the 18th Century brought drastic changes. This development was initiated by the fact that the naturalized Italians in Vienna founded an Italian congregation in 1625/26 under the guidance of the Jesuit priest and professor at the University of Vienna Wilhelm Lamormaini. By the year 1773, when the Jesuit Order was temporarily released their Italian trade fairs celebrated this "Congregation Italiana" in a chapel of the Jesuits at Bognergasse, near the old Jesuit church "Am Hof". But in 1773 that little church was by the imperial government requisited. Then the Italians found in St. Catherine Chapel at Ballhausplatz, which popularly still is referred as the Italian church - ie not only the Minoritenkirche - a new home. After a thorough restoration of the chapel was consecrated on 1 February 1775 ceremony in memory of the "Santa Maria Maggiore" to Rome in the name of "Madonna della Neve" (Mary Snow church'). The Holy Mass conducted Antonio Salieri (1750-1825), who was in 1774 chamber composer and conductor of the Italian opera in Vienna, from 1788-90 to 1824 Kapellmeister and Director of the Court Chapel. Pope Pius VI . visited during his stay in Vienna on Good Friday of 1782 the church "Maria Schnee" on the Ballhausplatz. But this state of the law was short-lived: in 1783 Emperor Joseph II shifted the Friars Minor in the former Trinitarian on Alserstrasse, and the Minoritenkirche was on the grounds that the chapel "p Maria della Neve" for about 7,000 Italians living in Vienna was too small, the Congregation italiana transferred to the condition that the Community had now to restore the Great Church (imperial decree of June 3, 1784). The richly decorated chapel "Madonna della Neve" went on an imperial property and was finally in the late 18th Century canceled. Also, the Franciscan monastery passed into state ownership: one is used for imperial and feudal law firms. The cemetery near the church was abandoned. With the greatest financial burdens now led the congregation from the imperial mission of the church renovation, the thorough repair of the church was entrusted to the court architect Johann Ferdinand Hetzendorf of Hohenberg (1784-1789). In order to cover the construction costs somewhat, were the old long choir (chancel) and the beginning of the 14th Century. (Consecrated in 1317 ) at the western end of the south side of the nave grown (and now defunct) St. John's Chapel (Chapel Puchaimische Kapelle ) converted into residences. The solemn consecration of the church under the name of "Madonna della Neve" took place on 16 April 1786, on Easter Sunday.
But soon was moving closer to the church the next hardship: In the years of the Napoleonic wars, the church should serve as a warehouse for straw, hay and for different equipment, so in 1809 also the forced evacuation of the building took place. Shortly after engaging the French eventually turned this into a provisions store. Two-thirds of the floor was smashed by the rolling of drums and by the retraction of cars. In the middle of the church a wide, tunnel-like cavity had been excavated and other parts of the floor destroyed a in God's house capped oven. Until 18 April 1810, the then Prefect of the Minoritenkirche received back the church keys. In 1825 died one of the most famous Kongregaten (congregats) of this century, namely, the composer Antonio Salieri, and on 22 June this year resounded in the Italian national church with the participation of the court chapel and the first Hofchores (court choir) the Verdi Requiem.
As the situation after the Napoleonic war turmoil in the mid-19th Century had normalized, Emperor Ferdinand the Good in 1845 donated to the "Congregation italiana" the according to the model of Leonardo da Vinci's famous fresco (1495-97) designed mosaic of the Last Supper, which the Roman Giacomo Raffaelli of 12 panels with a total weight of 20 tons by Napoleon's orders had made in the years 1806-1814, and was eventually bought by Emperor Franz for the Belvedere Palace. To that gave Emperor Ferdinand a considerable amount (8000 guilders) to allow the mounting of the work of art in the Minoritenkirche. The inauguration of the altar took place on 26nd in March 1847. In 1852 Emperor Franz Joseph came and soon the Crown Prince Franz Ferdinand in the "Congregation ". The former paid each year mostly coming from out of town fast preachers for the Church, in return he regularly received at the Festival of Lights (2 February) as well as on Palm Sunday the sacred candle or the olive branch.
The last major change in the church took place in the years 1892-1905 at the restructuring of the Minoritenplatz. Now two new courses, namely the Ballhausplatz and Minoritenplatz emerged, the houses adjacent to the church (former Long John's Chapel Choir and) were demolished. The former Franciscan monastery had to give way to the House, Court and State Archives. Even the church was given a new face, although the plans of the architect Viktor Luntz due to financial reasons only could be realized partially, there were clearly visible changes: Most noticeable to the viewer is undoubtedly the Gothic passage on the south side of the walled grave stones originated partly from the bands, and part of the adjacent once cemetery, as well as the above installed "Minoritenhaus". 1907 were placed in the tower four new bells cast in Trento, which is, however - with the exception of one, St. Anthony ordained, Bell - 1914 confiscated. The solemn consecration of the church took place on 4 Held in May 1909 in the presence of Emperor Franz Joseph. Due to the highly cooperative attitude of the Congregation towards the transformation plans of the City of Vienna Lueger, the mayor promised that the court should never be installed directly behind the church.
More important restoration work was carried out 1960-1962 (church affairs), in the last decade, as the outer walls have been restored.
About Minoritenplatz finally should be mentioned that the pastoral care of Italians after 1786 by each rectors appointed by the Archbishop was, from 1808 to 1813 was also here Clemens Maria Hofbauer who died 1820 and later was canonized working as a church rector. Therefore, there is also his monument on the north side of the church. Since the year 1953, and officially by the order of the archbishop Ordinariate of 1 December 1957 is the Friars Minor transmitted the pastoral care of the Italian community again, firstly the Fathers belonging to the Order of Padua Province while they are under the Austrian province today. In the year 2003, ie 50 years after the adoption of the pastoral care of Italians in the Minoritenkirche by the Conventual, that Francis statue was made, nowadays, it is located on the north side of the church, next to the Baroque cultivation.
(Text by Dr. Manfred Zips , Ital. Congregation )
GatestoneInst: RT Jerusalem_Post: Turkey, Israel in war of words despite normalization t.co/c57hlVTkb4 #I… t.co/tAxjO5ekC7 (via Twitter twitter.com/Luandrew169/status/767934506334576640)
ROMA ARCHEOLOGICA & RESTAURO ARCHITETTURA 2021. “La Roma di Mussolini” - The strange backdrop to the G-20: A Roman neighborhood built as a fascist showpiece. The Washington Post (27/10/2021). Anche: Il G20 nel quartiere d’epoca fascista: "Il Washington Post" ora la cancel culture prenderà di mira l’Eur? Corriere Della Sera (28/10/2021). S.v., “Architettura fascista non fascista" (1991/2017); in: Dr. Arch. Rossana Vinci (2017); Dr. Arch. Flavia Marcello (2007); Prof. Arch. Rossana Bossoglia & Prof. Arch. Giorgio Muratore (2003) & Dr. Arch. Elisabetta Terragni (1991). wp.me/pbMWvy-287
Foto: Mauro Pagliai, “Son of the Century.” SKYPIXEL (29 Jan. 2020); in: RARA 2021 [21/08/2021].
www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/51637355274
1). ROME - The strange backdrop to the G-20: A Roman neighborhood built as a fascist showpiece. The Washington Post (27/10/2021).
In the Roman neighborhood known as EUR, all the classic telltales of Rome drop away. Gone are the cobblestone roads, the antiquities, the worn palazzi dappled like watercolors. What you get instead are broad boulevards and imposing white buildings, plus a man-made lake. Everything is orderly, planned. Look in the right direction, and you’ll even see a sculpture heroically depicting the planner: Benito Mussolini.
Conceived as a fascist showpiece for an event that never happened — war canceled the 1942 World’s Fair — EUR is getting a chance eight decades later to serve as a backdrop for a global gathering: this time, the Group of 20 summit.
Reminders of what EUR (pronounced Ay-oor) was supposed to represent are still vivid. Mussolini had hoped it would stand as an example of an ideal city, with gardens and open spaces, and he commissioned some of the most acclaimed Italian architects and artists to remake a land used previously only by farmers and an abbey of cloistered monks. EUR’s boundaries were marked off in a near-perfect pentagon. Mussolini planted a tree at the 1938 groundbreaking.
But today, EUR also has lanyard-wearing office workers eating $12 salmon wraps. It has monuments designed to glorify the fascist ideal that now house global companies, like Fendi. It has a couple of eerie blocks almost resembling Pyongyang — empty, colossal and colonnaded — but it also has dentist’s office and chain restaurants, energy company headquarters and upper-middle-class apartments.
“What I’ve often heard is that a neighborhood like this could only be built by a dictator,” said Lorenzo Volpato, 49, a self-described leftist who lives and works in EUR and called the neighborhood pleasant regardless of the fascist markers. “It’s got metro stations. It’s modern. It’s more livable than Rome.”
The neighborhood has managed to grow — and normalize — in large part because of a Roman willingness to rebuild, move on and coexist with even the worst parts of the past. It’s especially striking at a time when monuments to enslavers, Confederate generals, kings and colonial leaders have come toppling down across the United States and other parts of Europe. In EUR, such monuments have become just a part of the low-slung skyline.
“It was to be a place where you wouldn’t be bound by antiquity,” Luca Ribichini, a professor of architecture at Rome’s Sapienza University. “It was supposed to personify the new modernity.”
The plans, at least initially, fell into chaos. By 1945, the fascist regime had been toppled, Mussolini had been executed — his body hung upside down in public — and EUR was only half-completed, sealed off and all but abandoned.
But over the next decade, the postwar Italian government moved ministries to the area. Ahead of the 1960 Olympics, construction firms built roads and apartment buildings and finished what the fascists had started. Eventually, it became a sort of alternative Rome — while showing what more of Italy might have looked like had Mussolini retained power.
Foto: Mrsimone7, “Rome – Foro Italico / Stadium at Night,” Skypixel (20 Dec. 2016); in: RARA 2020 [04/08/2020].
www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/51635880647
“It’s this relic of a megalomaniacal project that has been turned into a business district,” said Agnes Crawford, a 20-year resident of Rome who leads private tours, including, occasionally, in EUR, where she said the museums are high-quality and crowd-free.
“But,” Crawford said, “it still retains some menacing overtones.”
Some of the fascist markers have been removed over the years. But other reminders remain. One of the most noteworthy markers is a large inscription at the top level of the Fendi building. The quote, without context, is fairly innocuous, paying tribute to Italians as a people of “poets, artists, heroes, saints, thinkers, scientists, navigators, migrants.” But that quote echoes a part of Mussolini’s 1935 speech announcing the invasion of Ethiopia, a campaign that later led to charges of war crimes.
Just a few blocks away, there is an even more overt Mussolini homage. It comes in the form of a towering bas-relief sculpture, selectively narrating the long history of Rome. The sculpture moves through time from top to bottom, starting with the mythological founding of the city by Romulus and Remus, continuing through the centuries with Roman conquerors returning with spoils from Jerusalem, and with the construction of St. Peter’s Square. At the bottom of the sculpture there is one dominant image: Mussolini on horseback, surrounded by soldiers, as children and women lift their hands.
Sculpted in 1939, it stands at the entrance of a building housing EUR S.p.A., the company that owns many of the properties in the neighborhood. Inside, there’s also a courtyard fountain inlaid with fascist eagles. In one of the conference rooms, sitting without fanfare in the corner, is a metal head of Mussolini.
“The debate about art and beauty goes far beyond the history of the most ferocious regimes,” said Antonio Rosati, the chief of EUR S.p.A., who said his politics lean left and he isn’t bothered by the remnants of Mussolini’s era.
There are numerous theories about why Italians have felt less of a need to fully remove the propaganda of a terrible time. One idea is that Romans have so much history, they didn’t feel compelled to single out the most recent horror. Some have noted that the fascist icons — unlike the Confederate monuments — were built contemporaneously, and don’t reflect some after-the-fact nostalgia for an earlier period.
For David Hannuna, a Jewish lawyer who was born and raised in EUR, the icons have never been a source of anger — instead, he said, they provide a reminder about progress.
“There was pride in being able to freely live, freely and openly practicing our religion, in a place where in another time that would’ve been a problem,” Hannuna said.
Standing on a street corner, awaiting a tire change, Claudio Foglia, 69, said he, too, never saw a problem with the propaganda-infused art and architecture in his 40 years of working in the neighborhood, at the Italian energy firm Eni. But he is retired now. He has started reading more, including about fascism. He said he now worries that Italy “metabolized” fascism too quickly, and without fully addressing the sentiments that made it vulnerable. Just the previous weekend, a rally in Rome against the coronavirus Green Pass had turned violent, spurned in part by leaders of Forza Nuova, a neofascist group.
“It’s painful for an Italian to read these things and realize we haven’t dealt with them,” Foglia said. “We are acting as if nothing happened.”
One thing is clear about Mussolini’s aesthetic: He liked his buildings to be seen. He signed off on the demolition of entire neighborhoods around the Vatican and the Colosseum, clearing the way for broad, showy thoroughfares that created sightlines for the most famous spots in the city. He used the same idea in EUR, where the most celebrated buildings are set off at wide distances from one another, connected by straight, flat roads.
One such road connects the Piazza della Civiltà Italiana — the arched and statue-lined Fendi headquarters — with the Palazzo dei Congressi, a travertine-clad hall designed for conferences and events.
To some observers over time, the palazzo has felt intimidating in its geometric vastness. When TV travel documentarian Anthony Bourdain visited the facility for a 2016 episode, his film crews trained their cameras on a single custodian, cleaning a hall that Bourdain said had been designed to “dwarf the individual.”
For the G-20, the palazzo is serving as a media center. Large banners with the slogan “People, Planet, Prosperity” are draped outside, and on a recent afternoon, work crews were spread out in all areas, putting up prefabricated walls, building temporary meeting spaces or interview rooms.
An official from Eur S.p.A., which manages the building, led a tour to the heart of the palazzo: a vaulted space with ample lighting, adorned in perforated material the color of gold.
“It’s a perfect cube,” said one of the officials on the tour. It’s 124 feet high, wide and long. And for now it houses 72 white media work desks.
The tour continued up to the roof deck — an area of rectangular benches, all cold marble — that was depicted as a mental institution in a classic 1970 movie, “The Conformist.” During the shooting for that film, the sky was nearly the same gray as the marble. The monochrome conveyed an eerie vibe.
But if you visit now on a gorgeous day, the marble benches glow. The severity is softened by olive trees growing from spots of soil interspersed along the roof. From way up here, you can see all of EUR — the apartments, the offices, the people ending their workdays.
The neighborhood has at least one thing in common with the rest of Rome: The view at sunset is lovely.
Fonte / source:
--- The Washington Post (27/10/2021).
www.washingtonpost.com/world/2021/10/27/g20-rome-eur/
Fonte / source, foto:
--- Mauro Pagliai, “Son of the Century.” SKYPIXEL (29 Jan. 2020); in: RARA 2021 [21/08/2021].
ROMA ARCHEOLOGICA & RESTAURO ARCHITETTURA 2021. “Via dell’Impero? È ancora in fondo a destra.” La Repubblica (21/08/2021). S.v., Mayor Virginia Raggi, NYT (22/03/2017); Francesco Rutelli, NYT (29/06/2001) & Benito Mussolini, NYT (22/04/1924). Dr. Ruth Ben Ghiat & Vera Fisogni (07/2017); Dr. Arch. Rossana Vinci (2017); Dr. Arch. Flavia Marcello (2007); Prof. Arch. Rossana Bossoglia & Prof. Arch. Giorgio Muratore (2003); Dr. Arch. Elisabetta Terragni (1991) & Prof. Arch. William L. MacDonald (1983).
Fonte / source, foto:
--- Mrsimone7, “Rome – Foro Italico / Stadium at Night,” Skypixel (20 Dec. 2016); in:
ROMA ARCHEOLOGICA & RESTAURO ARCHITETTURA 2020. The World Is Tearing Down Racist [or Fascist] Monuments but Not in Italy. The Daily Beast (15 August 2020). S.v., Finestre sull’Arte (04/08/2020) & La Repubblica (03/08/2020); anche: THE NEW YORKER (5 October 2017); Il giornale dell architettura (27/10/2017) & Il Sole 24 Ore (08/10/2017). wp.me/pbMWvy-uw
Foto: Riccardo, “Fendi’s palace, other side of Rome – This is the Fendi palace in Rome, also known as the “Square Colosseum.” Skypixel.com. (22/03/2019).
www.flickr.com/photos/imperial_fora_of_rome/51635880387
2). ROMA - Il G20 nel quartiere d’epoca fascista: "Il Washington Post" ora la cancel culture prenderà di mira l’Eur? Corriere Della Sera (28/10/2021).
Il Washington Post colpito dallo «strano sfondo» del summit: mentre i monumenti di schiavisti e e colonizzatori negli Usa sono stati eliminati a Roma sono entrati a far parte del panorama.
La scelta dell’Eur come sede del G20 romano stuzzica i guardiani Usa del politically correct. E qualcuno vorrebbe spingere la cancel culture americana attraverso l’Atlantico. Presentando l’evento con un articolo pubblicato da decine di quotidiani statunitensi e di molti altri Paesi del mondo, dall’India al Brasile, l’Associated Press si limita a menzionare che, come sede del vertice, è stata scelta un’area edificata nell’era fascista, ma il Washington Post va molto più in là: in un servizio intitolato «Lo strano sfondo del G20: un quartiere romano che doveva essere il fiore all’occhiello del fascismo» analizza storia e architettura di un luogo progettato come sede dell’Esposizione Universale di Roma del 1942 (da qui l’acronimo Eur), mai tenuta a causa della Guerra mondiale.
Il Post ripercorre il desiderio di Mussolini di celebrare con l’Expo del ’42 il ventennio fascista, la scelta dei governi antifa-scisti del Dopoguerra di «normalizzare» il quartiere, oggi zona di uffici, e il modo in cui la città ha metabolizzato l’Eur. Ma dà anche voce a chi lo considera «la reliquia di un progetto megalomane trasformata in distretto d’affari». Soprattutto, il quotidiano critica il fatto che in alcuni luoghi siano rimaste sculture dell’era fascista come il bassorilievo all’ingresso dell’edifico dell’Ente Eur che descrive varie ere storiche: da Romolo e Remo alla costruzione della basilica di San Pietro, per poi finire con un Mussolini a cavallo. Il giornale trova «scioccante che, mentre i monumenti di schiavisti, generali confederati, re e colonizzatori sono stati eliminati negli Stati Uniti e in gran parte d’Europa, a Roma sono entrati a far parte del panorama». Conclusione sconsolata: a Roma c’è talmente tanta storia che la gente non fa troppo caso a certe cose.
Fonte / source, foto:
--- Riccardo, "Fendi's palace, other side of Rome - This is the Fendi palace in Rome, also known as the "Square Colosseum." Skypixel.com. (22/03/2019).
www.skypixel.com/photos/other-side-of-rome
Fonte / source:
--- Corriere Della Sera (28/10/2021).
www.corriere.it/esteri/21_ottobre_28/g20-quartiere-d-epoc...
This is the super-detailed graph of the top 100 bands listened to in 2013. This is a "very zoomy" graph!
Basically, the Top 100 bands I listened to in 2013 are graphed at 2 week intervals, and normalized so the shape is approximately rectangular. I then hand-edited the labels to make them easier to read, though most of them are so tiny one would have to zoom in anyway.
www.last.fm/user/ClintJCL, bands, chart, music graph.
music: D.O.A. music: Death Piggy. music: Dr. Dirty. music: Friendship Is Witchcraft. music: Gwar. music: KMFDM. music: Kreator. music: My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult. music: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. music: NOFX. music: Pixies. music: Rob Zombie. music: Sepultura. music: Slayer. music: The Dave Brockie Experience. music: The Misfits. music: They Might Be Giants. music: Voltaire. music: White Zombie. music: X-Cops.
top 100.
December 31, 2013.
... Read my blog at ClintJCL at wordpress.com
... View KMFDM's official website at kmfdm.net/
Last night photographed some chickens bounced flash. I complained about about my Fuji viewfinder being too dark, not being able to see for composing and be able to focus. I do know how to use flash but seldom use it, therefore the camera/flash switches are not burned into my brain. For the hen shoots exposure was not an issue because I used bounce flash. With Fuji, and to lesser degree all cameras, it pays to now how to use flash without TTL. Turns out focus was not an issues as I didn’t realize my camera had focal assist lamp on (a happy D’oh). But composition certainly was an issues. I ended up with way too many headless chickens shots. I have now found the switch for allowing me to see a normalized view hence be able to frame. I also know where the switch is to toggle focus assist light is.
Tomorrow I will do another shoot and hopefully get a better success rate … time will tell.
Slowly coming back to feelings normalization.
Exper - www.hobosedizioni.it
Design: Apophysis - Rendering: Flam3
A mean amalgamation of the music video, "Elastic Heart" by Sia
(Here is my previous mean blend of Sia, Chandelier: flic.kr/p/q2UUz1)
TRIGGER WARNING...buahahaha!!!
A social anthropologist named J.D. Unwin studied 86 different societies. He found that when a society practiced strict heterosexual monogamy the family unit flourished and so did the society. When strict heterosexual monogamy waned, however, so did the family unit along with the society. When sexual freedom was practiced it created a weak family unit and a weak society, eventually leading to collapse.
“Sexually permissive societies always fall.” - J.D. Unwin
From feminism to the sexual revolution, to the sexual grooming of children: how will the effects of feminism and the sexual revolution end?
Sexual promiscuity and loose sexual restraints always precedes a collapse of a civilization. The more an empire becomes sexually promiscuous the less rational, creative, and productive it becomes. The more a society becomes sexually promiscuous, the more it loses its work ethic. The people become so engrossed in fulfilling their sexual fantasies of fornication and homosexuality that their birthrates drop and their society declines. Such a society becomes selfish and lazy, and it eventually collapses. This collapse of society can come in many forms: anarchy, civil war, totalitarianism, or conquest. These things have already started to happen in America: rioting, division, big government, mass migration.
The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the less productive it becomes.
The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the less creative it becomes.
The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the less innovative it becomes.
The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the less prosperous it becomes.
The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the less it thrives.
An empire in decline lives in excess, especially in sexual excess. The most successful civilizations practice strict heterosexual monogamy: marriage between one man and one woman for life. They practice chastity. They have no premarital sex, and they have no extramarital sex. The men in this kind of civilization channel their sexual responsibilities (energy) towards providing for their families, they channel their aggression (testosterone) towards protecting their families.
Sexual promiscuity eats away at the fabric of the family unit. When the structure of the family unit falls apart, so does the structure of society. The more sexual morality declines, the more perverted and sexualized a civilization becomes. They indulge in multiple sexual partners during their lifetime, becoming less and less faithful. Divorce skyrockets, splitting up families. Some remarry, and two families are mixed together. Others are raised in single parent homes, thus many children grow up in fatherless homes. These things change normal family dynamics. If you want to see how this works, then look at the ghettos in America. Black men, instead of channeling their sexual energy towards raising a family, channel their testosterone towards killing one another. Their gang is their family. But neo-Marxism (political correctness) has made these things taboo to talk about. You know the woke mindset: censor all opposition. First they censor their opposition; then in time, they kill their opposition. Since we all know history, we know how these things end.
From the 45 goals of communism (The Naked Communist):
Goal 25: Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio and TV.
Goal 26: Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as “normal, natural and healthy.”
Goal 40: Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
The industrial revolution caused great upheaval, which put a lot of strain on the family. It greatly affected the family structure, including the extended family structure (both play an important roll in raising children). First-wave feminism had some good aspects to it, like: the fight for better working conditions. The working conditions in factories were horrendous. My problem with first-wave feminism is that it rebelled against certain Biblical and traditional gender and roles. This rebellion against gender roles has continued through every wave of feminism, all the way to its fight for transgenderism. “Equality for women won’t happen until ‘all traditional gender roles’ in ‘all domains’ are equal.” Feminism is now replacing women with transwomen, and it will one day replace humans with transhumans. The second, third and fourth waves of feminism are straight up Cultural Marxism. The oppressed vs the oppressor! Equality for all: men in women’s washrooms; men in women’s change rooms; men in women’s beauty pageants; men in women’s sports; men in women’s prisons. As you can see, our culture is decaying. We are losing our morals and our sanity.
Feminism and the sexual revolution normalized sexual promiscuity among adults, then they normalized it among teenagers, and now they are normalizing it among children. They are causing children to be confused about their genders, thanks to Gender Theory (Gender-Marxism). They are causing teenagers to become disconnected from reality, which is causing them to lose their gender identities. Theses young people are being put on puberty blockers, and they are having sex changes (it’s a billion dollar industry). The more sexually promiscuous a society becomes, the less rational it becomes. The less rational a society becomes, the more the “unnormal becomes normal.” The less rational a society becomes, the more the “unnatural becomes natural.” When this happens, society thinks it’s virtuous to expose children to debauchery. In so doing, they normalize perversion, and it becomes part of the culture. Sexual grooming leads to sex. Sexual grooming is a form of sexual abuse that leads to even more sexual abuse. So if you are grooming children, what does that mean for the future? When the morality of a society collapses, so does the society. These things weren’t normal a few years ago, but society has morally declined a lot in the last few years. This is because the speed of decline increases over time. Things decline faster and faster. Once in decline, you cannot stop its momentum. Therefore, things will go from bad to worse: from normalizing transgenders to normalizing pedophiles, and onward until society collapses.
Once premarital sex becomes normal in a culture, it’s already heading down the curve of decline. A hypersexual society is a society in decline. This decline takes several generations. A sexually immoral culture spends its leisure time on fruitless endeavours such as watching porn and sleeping around. A promiscuous culture becomes less and less productive, until all people want to do is chase their sexual appetites.
Woke-Marxism has penetrated/perverted every aspect of our society. Marxism in any of its dialectical forms is just a form of Antichristism, and it will end with a global authoritarian system and an Antichrist. Where do you think the world is headed with the implementation of CBDCs, digital IDs, Social Credit Score systems, and Universal Basic Income? Do you think this will all end in democracy and freedom? As a culture becomes more and more promiscuous, it loses more and more of its commonsense. When a society loses its commonsense, it becomes weak. When a society loses its commonsense, it is easily manipulated and controlled. A healthy society needs a balance between gender roles and freedom. If you throw out traditional gender roles, you throw out freedom. They go hand in hand, because freedom needs a solid foundation. “The foolish man built his house upon the sand, and his house came tumbling down.” Freedom needs a solid foundation that is held together by solid cohesion. Therefore, if you throw out the most basic elements of your foundation (traditional gender roles) your house (society) will come tumbling down. What would happen if you made a foundation but forget one of its ingredients: cement, sand, aggregate, water? Now what would happen if you built a house on that foundation? Would it last? A weak foundation means a weak house. Such a society will gain pleasure at the expense of its freedom.
This is the fruit of feminism and the sexual revolution: large numbers of marital break ups; large numbers of common law relationships (these relationships are more apt to break up than marriages); large numbers of abortions (birth control and abortion mean declining birth rates); large numbers of babies born out of wedlock; large numbers of fatherless children; large numbers of people identifying as homosexuals and transgenders (this means even lower birthrates); large numbers of STDs, loneliness and depression—a broken society. All these things hammer away at the family structure. What are the cultural costs of fatherlessness? “Across America, 2022 data indicates there are approximately 18.3 million children who live without a father in the home, comprising about 1 in 4 US children.” “About 80% of single-parent homes are led by single mothers.” “Children from fatherless homes are more likely to be poor, become involved in drug and alcohol abuse, drop out of school, and suffer from health and emotional problems. Boys are more likely to become involved in crime, and girls are more likely to become pregnant as teens.” What are the economic costs of fatherlessness? “In fiscal year 2010, federal and state governments spent over $400 billion on means-tested welfare for low-income families with children. Roughly three-quarters of this welfare assistance, or $300 billion, went to single-parent families. Most non-marital births are currently paid for by the taxpayers through the Medicaid system, and a wide variety of welfare assistance will continue to be given to the mother and child for nearly two decades after the child is born.” The ramifications of feminism and the sexual revolution have been devastation across the board, and they continue to cause greater and greater damage to our society.
With contraception came sexual promiscuity, and lower birth rates resulted. (Like sodomy, abortion and birth control were once illegal in Canada because they were considered immoral). Why buy the cow when the milk is free? Why would a man want to settle down with a wife, if he can have casual sex with multiple women? If men throw off their responsibilities, what hope does society have? How will such men fully mature? The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the less mature it becomes. That’s why woke people are called “snowflakes.” They are grown adults, yet they have meltdowns like two year old children. The more promiscuous a culture, the more it neglects its responsibilities. When the family breaks down, so does proper parenting. The more promiscuous a culture, the more it neglects its parenting responsibilities. The more promiscuous a culture, the less it disciplines its children. The more promiscuous a culture, the more it lacks discipline. “Those who spare the rod of discipline hate their children. Those who love their children care enough to discipline them.” Teachers, do your students respect you? Children must be taught to respect their elders, even if that teaching includes discipline. A society in moral decline does not respect its elders. The more a society falls into moral decay, the less it respects human life. The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the more rebellious it becomes. Notice how we are decriminalizing things like prostitution and street drugs? Notice how we are abolishing things like school test scores? Therefore, the decline continues.
As the traditional family has declined, critical thinking has declined. Welcome to post-truth, where feelings trump truth! If you don’t validate their fantasies they get angry. If you use facts to prove them wrong they get offended. Sexual freedom has been slowly destroying the family structure, which has resulted in the loss of its traditional gender roles along with its family identity. This has led to increased mental health problems, mass shootings, and social upheaval. These are all symptoms of a society that is spiraling into collapse.
It wasn’t hard for me to find radicals when looking into some of the prominent writers of first-wave feminism. First-wave feminism definitely paved the way for the other three waves of feminism. Thanks to fourth wave feminism our children are being brainwashed into transgenderism. Thanks to fourth wave feminism our children can read pornographic school books, which depict adults and children committing sex acts together. Thanks to fourth wave feminism transvestites are allowed to read library books to our children. Thanks to fourth wave feminism transvestites are allowed to dance erotically in front of our children. The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the more deviant it becomes. The more promiscuous a culture becomes, the more depraved it becomes.
First-wave feminism is like the devil coming to your door with a box of candy. The handsome devil says, “I’ll give you some candy if you’ll let me into your house.” You reply, “Wow, that candy sure looks good! Please come into my house.” Then, ever so slowly, the devil destroys your house and you end up homeless. You took the candy (bait), but you will lose your society as a consequence. Have you not told your children: do not take candy from strangers? Then why have you given your children to the very child predators you told them to stay way from? As the Bible says: you are deceived and deceiving others. You took the bait and then gave these devils your children. First-wave feminism was the devil’s Trojan horse.
Islamic culture, with its polygamy, has not thrived like Western culture. Its cultural achievements can’t remotely be compared to the achievements of the West. As we watch Europe’s decline, we see weaponized mass migration. The social demographics in Europe are changing. Another culture is changing the social demographics. This culture is the Muslim culture. Many times I‘ve heard Muslim’s say: we’ll give birth to more children than you, and we’ll eventually out number you and take over your country from within. Yet this is only partly true. The crime stats in Europe concerning Muslim men are terrible. They commit high numbers of rape and gang rape. In the UK Muslim grooming gangs have been allowed to groom under aged girls for years. This means that the Muslim culture in Europe will also decline because of their ever-increasing sexual deviancy. They won’t succeed in replacing the culture of Europe, but they will forever change the demographics of Europe. These changes will not be reversed. A similar thing is happening in the United States. The social demographics have greatly changed, and they will continue to change until the American empire collapses.
“Socialists thought gender divisions were byproducts of capitalism: once capitalism was eliminated, gender inequality would supposedly vanish.”
The goal: destroy capitalism and implement global authoritarianism.
This stuff isn’t anything new. It happened in ancient times with pagan worship. Ishtar, also known as the Queen of Heaven, had the ability to change a person’s gender. “To destroy, to create, to tear out, to establish are yours, Inanna (Ishtar). To turn a man into a woman and a woman into a man are yours, Inanna.” Her priests were surgically altered men; they dressed up as women and had female names.
The Bible lays out a spiritual war between God and satan. “For we are not fighting against flesh-and-blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in the heavenly places.” When talking about all this sexual immorality, I can see charismatic Christians say: this is of the spirit of Leviathan. According to the Bible, fire came from Leviathan’s mouth and smoke from his nostrils. Doesn’t that sound like a dragon? How about the Dragon in the Book of Revelation? Isaiah 27:1 says: “In that day, the LORD will punish with his sword—his fierce, great and powerful sword—Leviathan the gliding serpent, Leviathan the coiling serpent; he will slay the monster of the sea.” Leviathan is called a serpent and a sea monster. Who was the serpent in the Garden of Eden? Who is this Leviathan mentioned in the beginning and end of the Bible? Revelation 13:1 “The Dragon stood on the shore of the sea. And I saw a Beast coming out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns, and on each head a blasphemous name.” Like father like son! The Dragon (father) is the one behind the Beast (son) and the Beast (Antichrist) system. Revelation 13:18 “This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the Beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666.” 1 John 4:2-3 “This is how you can recognize the Spirit of God: Every spirit that acknowledges that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, but every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world.”
“When sexual promiscuity is restrained in a society, it channels its energy towards more productive endeavors. When sexual promiscuity is unrestrained in a society, it channels its energy towards more unproductive endeavors.”
Proverbs 5:8-10 “Keep far away from her (the adulteress), and don't go near the entrance to her house, so that you don't give your honor to others, and waste your best years, so that strangers don't enrich themselves at your expense, and your work won't end up the possession of foreigners.”
Women’s liberation: get women into the work force, so that we can get twice the taxes, and then we can get their children into school at an early age, so that we can indoctrinate them and break up the family.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=YGpJJTCz40s
Revelation 9:21 “And they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries (drugs, intoxications) nor of their [sexual] immorality nor of their thefts.”
Adriene had this silver necklace made for my birthday. She appreciates my attempts to reclaim this word. When I was in college, I became sick and infuriated when hearing men call other men "pussys" for not being a "real man." But even more untolerable was hearing other women call other men "pussys" for failing at "manhood."
Whenever I heard "pussy" used in such a condescending way, I would always say "excuse me? those are my genitals you are referring to and my Pussy is POWERFUL, not weak. So if you are going to de-masculinize a man, you can de-phallasize him, you can call him an ass asshole, you can call him a dick, a bastard, but never give him the power of your pussy."
After giving that speech once every week I decided something had to be done, women needed to reclaim the word "pussy" and in effect reclaim their own pussies. So I coined the term "pussy power kunt control." Pussy Power stuck while kunt control fell to the wayside. I made buttons with the word "Pussy Power" and I passed it out to women who honored their pussies by referring to it as celebratory word, not a hurtful word.
Adriene has known me for about 10 years now and I think she has heard me give that speech so many times. Finally I have a beautiful necklace for my birthday from one of my best friends! thank you Adriene! you TOO have the power of the Pussy!
We will reclaim an identity that we allowed to be taken away from and reclaim the responsibilities that comes along with it. If YOU have Pussy Power, NEVER let a man or boy and most importantly another woman call another male a pussy in a hurtful or denigrating way. Those are YOUR genitals. PUSSY POWER!
Now on a separate note - Several friends commented on how they were so amazed I could post these photos about Adriene's pussy power necklace gift for me openly on flickr. My birthday was back in April - and those few comments made me pause before posting this on my blog. So here are my thoughts on this matter.
so when my friends told me that I was brave to openly post these- I ask them why exactly should I have been embarrassed or afraid? They would say well you know you get google searched for jobs and grants and people might think that you are a liability or they may judge you before they get to meet you. Academic colleagues have said well your students are going to find it and you're never going to get tenured for posting this or what happens if your professor sees this online? Well duh - I always googled people before I would interview, hire or even meet someone. I would like to remind everyone that I was openly doing internet searches on potential dates and hirings back in the late 1900's and early 2000's before Google even existed ok?
So of COURSE I understand that this public internet posting will be potentially seen by my past, current and future colleagues and/or students. But I don't think I am doing anything wrong or embarrassing when I insist that women not allow the word "pussy" to be used in a derogatory way. I am not using it in a nasty way - so how is that a liability? What I find offensive is when people remain quiet when something offensive is said. And worse off I find it offensive when people judge others for unsubstantiated reasons. To be anymore hush-hush with pussy feeds into larger schemas of patriarchy and misogyny.
I stand behind my attempts to un-dirty the word in a fashionable way. For too long (not in all communities) women's reproductive organs have been considered to be profane and unworthy of equal respect to the phallus. The sexuality associated with vaginas have been seen as a threat and rituals are created to take away the power from their vaginas. The menstrual cycles that women go through are seen as filthy - requiring physical separation of women from the community. I find it problematic that although we have formal gender equality, this is not always reflected in our vernacular. The heavy association of the word "pussy" is too weighted on the side of the "nasty" or as lacking a cock which means lacking power. So powerful and normalized is the cock that we celebrate and laugh at the word. Even when a male is called a "cock" - like "he's such a cock," he's a cock precisely because of his unwarranted use of power. We laugh at jokes about "dicks' - such as Justin Timberlake's Dick in a Box - but the word pussy is so nasty and weak that it can't even be intellectualized or comedized (I made this word up) in popular culture. My point is that the verbal representitive use of genitals reflects underlying real world inequalities and tensions between males and femals.
I simply will not be embarassed by the names of female genitals - And if this prevents me from being hired - then I certainly don't belong at that organization, institution or company. And if students can't take me seriously after reading this, then they need to grow up. Really. and if Professors find this and are horrified then I am sure glad that they aren't working with me.
When we make a claim to an identity, it's not just about claiming rights or something abstract like belonging - but it's about claiming responsibility to that identity. So in claims that I make - like I claim I am Chinese-American or I claim that I am from the U.S. or that I live in Brooklyn or that I a female- then I take a responsibility in those claims to act and to practice what I claim.
And hopefully future colleagues who do come upon this will see that this is a sign of character - that I am not afraid to stand behind someone or something. Now I am not some militant gender freak - so I feel no need to parade my thoughts or beat up people for calling men pussies. Nor do I lack the sense to wear this necklace when I interview someone or when I am being interviewed - or at some funding meeting or my dissertation defense or even at any professional meetings. I don't believe in drawing unnecessary attention to myself and detracting from the larger goals or messages in professional situations because I do understand wearing this necklace entails the burden of explaining the message - which I embrace in moments when I want to teach people about pussy power. BUT I will wear it when I find see fit and fashionable! And if after reading this explanation and you still find my pussy power offensive, horrific or distasteful then it's time to bring in some humor into your life and chillll out! Go turn on Prince and Mozart and watch some South Park.
with some heavy processing work
If someone is interested, this is the production line:
Raw-Development and tonemapping by Oloneo PhotoEngine
Local Normalization, Anisotropic Smoothing and Shock Filters by gimp-plug-in g´mic
Curves and Resizing in gimp and some Octave Sharpening from g´mic in the end.
The goal of "SlutWalk" is to bring together people of all genders, ages, professions, religions, ethnicities, sexual orientations, and economic statuses to create a dialogue and bring an end to attitudes that normalize victim blaming and slut shaming and to ultimately put an end to rape culture.
Licensing information: Due to the nature of this event and its goal to protect victims of violence everywhere, all photos are copyrighted and may not be used without explicit permission.
If you would like to use this photo to protect survivors of sexual assault and prevent violence, feel free to send me a request. for more information see www.slutwalkdc.com
Any other use, including embedding, is a violation of the license. Thank you and thanks for promoting the health of people and the communities they bring health to.
President Donald J. Trump, joined by White House senior staff members, delivers a statement announcing the agreement of full normalization of relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates Thursday, Aug. 13, 2020, in the Oval Office of the White House. (Official White House Photo by Joyce N. Boghosian)
Health benefits
Potential health benefits of banana consumption. By a high potassium to sodium content, bananas may prevent high blood pressure and its complications. High fiber content may also contribute to this effect. High potassium may also prevent renal calcium loss, in effect preventing bone breakdown. In diarrhea, it contributes with electrolyte replacement, as well as increased absorption of nutrients. Bananas also have some antacid effect, protecting from peptic ulcers. Pectin content, a hydrocolloid, can ease constipation by normalizing movement through the intestine. The low glycemic index in unripe bananas is of particular benefit to people with diabetes. High fructooligosaccharide content may work as a prebiotic, nourishing the intestinal flora to produce beneficial vitamins and enzymes. Carotenoid content has antioxidant effects, and protects against vitamin A deficiency, resulting in e.g. night blindness. Moderate consumption decreases risk of kidney cancer, possibly due to antioxidant phenolic compounds In contrast, large consumption of highly processed fruit juice increases the risk of kidney cancer.
Fruit consumption in general decreases the risk of age-related muscular degeneration
### ........must view as slide show.......##
"The Scroll and Key Society is a secret society, founded in 1842 at Yale University, in New Haven, Connecticut. It is one of the oldest Yale secret societies and reputedly the wealthiest. The society is one of the reputed "Big Three" societies at Yale, along with Skull and Bones and Wolf's Head. Each spring the society admits fifteen rising seniors to participate in its activities and carry on its traditions.
Yale University is a private Ivy League research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Founded in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the world.
Chartered by the Connecticut Colony, the Collegiate School was established in 1701 by clergy to educate Congregational ministers before moving to New Haven in 1716. Originally restricted to theology and sacred languages, the curriculum began to incorporate humanities and sciences by the time of the American Revolution. In the 19th century, the college expanded into graduate and professional instruction, awarding the first PhD in the United States in 1861 and organizing as a university in 1887. Yale's faculty and student populations grew after 1890 with rapid expansion of the physical campus and scientific research.
Yale is organized into fourteen constituent schools: the original undergraduate college, the Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and twelve professional schools. While the university is governed by the Yale Corporation, each school's faculty oversees its curriculum and degree programs. In addition to a central campus in downtown New Haven, the university owns athletic facilities in western New Haven, a campus in West Haven, and forests and nature preserves throughout New England. As of 2021, the university's endowment was valued at $42.3 billion, the second largest of any educational institution. The Yale University Library, serving all constituent schools, holds more than 15 million volumes and is the third-largest academic library in the United States. Students compete in intercollegiate sports as the Yale Bulldogs in the NCAA Division I – Ivy League.
As of October 2020, 65 Nobel laureates, five Fields Medalists, four Abel Prize laureates, and three Turing Award winners have been affiliated with Yale University. In addition, Yale has graduated many notable alumni, including five U.S. presidents, 10 Founding Fathers, 19 U.S. Supreme Court Justices, 31 living billionaires, 54 College founders and presidents, many heads of state, cabinet members and governors. Hundreds of members of Congress and many U.S. diplomats, 78 MacArthur Fellows, 252 Rhodes Scholars, 123 Marshall Scholars, 102 Guggenheim Fellows and nine Mitchell Scholars have been affiliated with the university. Yale is a member of the Big Three. Yale's current faculty include 67 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 55 members of the National Academy of Medicine, 8 members of the National Academy of Engineering, and 187 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. The college is, after normalization for institution size, the tenth-largest baccalaureate source of doctoral degree recipients in the United States, and the largest such source within the Ivy League. It also is a top 10 (ranked seventh), after normalization for the number of graduates, baccalaureate source of some of the most notable scientists (Nobel, Fields, Turing prizes, or membership in National Academy of Sciences, National Academy of Medicine, or National Academy of Engineering).
New Haven is a city in the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located on New Haven Harbor on the northern shore of Long Island Sound in New Haven County, Connecticut, and is part of the New York City metropolitan area. With a population of 134,023 as determined by the 2020 United States Census, New Haven is the 3rd largest city in Connecticut after Bridgeport and Stamford and the principal municipality of Greater New Haven, which had a total population of 864,835.
New Haven was one of the first planned cities in America. A year after its founding by English Puritans in 1638, eight streets were laid out in a four-by-four grid, creating the "Nine Square Plan". The central common block is the New Haven Green, a 16-acre (6 ha) square at the center of Downtown New Haven. The Green is now a National Historic Landmark, and the "Nine Square Plan" is recognized by the American Planning Association as a National Planning Landmark.
New Haven is the home of Yale University, New Haven's biggest taxpayer and employer, and an integral part of the city's economy. Health care, professional and financial services and retail trade also contribute to the city's economic activity.
The city served as co-capital of Connecticut from 1701 until 1873, when sole governance was transferred to the more centrally located city of Hartford. New Haven has since billed itself as the "Cultural Capital of Connecticut" for its supply of established theaters, museums, and music venues. New Haven had the first public tree planting program in America, producing a canopy of mature trees (including some large elms) that gave the city the nickname "The Elm City"." - info from Wikipedia.
The fall of 2022 I did my 3rd major cycling tour. I began my adventure in Montreal, Canada and finished in Savannah, GA. This tour took me through the oldest parts of Quebec and the 13 original US states. During this adventure I cycled 7,126 km over the course of 2.5 months and took more than 68,000 photos. As with my previous tours, a major focus was to photograph historic architecture.
Now on Instagram.
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Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
Ok, this history work is a strange hobby. If there’s anything unethical or dumb, please comment below so it can be corrected. In the 1840s, it was a common practice to name areas for the ethnic groups who occupied them. For example, places along a creek might be named “Italian Bar” or “Chinese Bar.” Some of these names persist on maps today. This is a database I cooked up to enter data. The user interface is terrible.
My idea was to create a map that would show travels of a group of people during California’s Gold Rush. I planned to donate the finished product to a university that had done some work with the miners. The end product would be a set of PDF maps, each plotting their travels during a two-week period — unless they were stationary. This data would overlay a present-day USGS data layer with terrain and roads. I had some books with historic text describing where they traveled. I was partly inspired by someone who had done historic maps of communities in Scotland going back to about the 13th century, I think.
The original process started with a passage from text. It would say something like, “Thursday afternoon: went to Schmidt General Store and exchanged [amount] ounces of gold dust for a pick and shovel.” Easy, right? So I figure you just establish a latitude and longitude for Schmidt General Store and type that, a date, and the place name label into ArcMap. Typing data into a spreadsheet-like table: I can handle that.
Pretty quickly I figure out it’s not so easy to find the location of a store in 1850. Maybe the store was initially a tent and then it moved when they built a permanent structure. I’m digging around in old USGS maps.
I had to start referring to 19th-century newspapers to figure out things like variant names. Say, for example, the general store was located in Placerville, California. During one visit they call it, “Schmidt General Store.” They also misspell location names, for example, “Smit’s Store.” Other texts, or other entries in the same text, they call it “Placerville,” “P-ville,” or “Hangtown.” So now I need a “simple” database with two tables, one table showing all variant names which describe the same coordinates. I need a homemade gazetteer. I wind up looking at all of this stuff about gazetteers on the UC Santa Barbara web site.
Now, I read a passage “Proceeded west along Dingweed Creek until we reached Negro Bar.” The first time this name occurs, I wind up digging through all sorts of data trying to determine the exact latitude and longitude of Negro Bar. Of course, I discover there are two dozen Negro Bars. Thankfully, they’ve told me it’s somewhere along Dingweed Creek. A month later they return and camp overnight at Negro Bar. All I need to do is enter the date and click the radio button for that location. I’ve realized it will be years before this is finished.
Speaking of bars, apologies if reading this triggers an impulse to visit your local bar.
Some of the above place names are examples for illustration purposes and not from any historic text.
There are several screens. For example, I don’t need to see latitude and longitude on this screen. I just need to get the correct place name from the list. It’s a mess but I can find my way around because I wrote the mess.
“…We’re here on Earth to fart around.”
— Kurt Vonnegut
So, they're really tiny, but a little bigger than squinkies, and not squishy-squishy-squashy like squinkies. I will probably buy more but I will certainly wait until the prices normalize, I paid what will likely prove to be egregiously inflated, because I needed to satisfy my curiosity.
Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
Fireworks are a class of low explosive pyrotechnic devices used for aesthetic and entertainment purposes. The most common use of a firework is as part of a fireworks display (also called a fireworks show or pyrotechnics), a display of the effects produced by firework devices.
Fireworks take many forms to produce the four primary effects: noise, light, smoke, and floating materials (confetti for example). They may be designed to burn with colored flames and sparks including red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, and silver. Displays are common throughout the world and are the focal point of many cultural and religious celebrations.
Fireworks are generally classified as to where they perform, either as a ground or aerial firework. In the latter case they may provide their own propulsion (skyrocket) or be shot into the air by a mortar (aerial shell).
Modern colored fireworks were invented in Europe in the 1830s. Modern skyrocket fireworks have been made since the early 20th century.
Saint-Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601,911 residents as of 2021, with more than 6.4 million people living in the metropolitan area. Saint-Petersburg is the fourth-most populous city in Europe, the most populous city on the Baltic Sea, and the world's northernmost city of more than 1 million residents.
The Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments constitute a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Saint Petersburg is home to the Hermitage, one of the largest art museums in the world, the Lakhta Center, the tallest skyscraper in Europe, and was one of the host cities of the 2018 FIFA World Cup and the UEFA Euro 2020.
The name day of Peter I falls on 29 June, when the Orthodox Church observes the memory of apostles Peter and Paul. The consecration of the small wooden church in their names (its construction began at the same time as the citadel) made them the heavenly patrons of the Peter and Paul Fortress, while Saint Peter at the same time became the eponym of the whole city. When in June 1703 Peter the Great renamed the site after Saint Peter, he did not issue a naming act that established an official spelling; even in his own letters he used diverse spellings, such as Санктьпетерсьбурк (Sanktpetersburk), emulating German Sankt Petersburg, and Сантпитербурх (Santpiterburkh), emulating Dutch Sint-Pietersburgh, as Peter was multilingual and a Hollandophile. The name was later normalized and russified to Санкт-Петербург (Saint-Petersburg).
The Traction was available in "Commerciale" version as from 1938, and exclusively in black, as such the beginning of a normalization of colours that would ever more "blacken" the range. The rear opens in two parts, in fact a "break" before its time.
1.911 cc
4 in-line
56 HP @ 3.800 rpm
Vmax : 115 km/h
Exposition : Citroën 100 Years
27/06/2019 - 03/09/2019
Autoworld
Brussels - Belgium
August 2019
1. SI: People have learned to normalize the bad state of streets and communal spaces, leading to a scarcity of caring to fix them.
2. Materials: Adobe lightroom; Digital camera; Door with a sticker on it (59)
3. Idea: I wanted to capture this sticker that's falling off and in need of replacement. (79)
4. Process: I zoomed in and filled in the frame to capture the sticker (58)
When I was here back in 2010, there were mostly old classic cars. In 2015, model cars are noticeably more common on the streets. Now that Cuba has normalized relationships with the U.S, I'm sure 2020 will be significantly different.
A short history of Wenceslas Square
In 1348, Bohemian King Charles IV founded the New Town of Prague. The plan included several open areas for markets, of which the second largest was the Koňský trh, or Horse Market (the largest was the Charles Square[2]). At the southeastern end of the market was the Horse Gate, one of the gates in the walls of the New Town. During the Czech national revival movement in the 19th century, a more noble name for the street was requested. At this time the statue was built, and the square was renamed.
On 28 October 1918, Alois Jirásek read the proclamation of independence of Czechoslovakia in front of the Saint Wenceslas statue.The Nazis used the street for mass demonstrations. During the Prague Uprising in 1945, a few buildings near the National Museum were destroyed. They were later replaced by department stores.
On 16 January 1969, student Jan Palach set himself on fire in Wenceslas Square to protest the invasion of Czechoslovakia by the Soviet Union in 1968.
On 28 March 1969, the Czechoslovakian national ice hockey team defeated the USSR team for the second time in that year's Ice Hockey World Championships. As the country was still under Soviet occupation, the victory induced great celebrations. Perhaps 150,000 people gathered on Wenceslas Square, and skirmishes with police developed. A group of agents provocateurs provoked an attack on the Prague office of the Soviet airline Aeroflot, located on the street. The vandalism served as a pretext for reprisals and the period of so-called normalization. In 1989, during the Velvet Revolution, large demonstrations (with hundreds of thousands of people or more) were held here.
Wenceslas Square is lined by hotels, offices, retail stores, currency exchange booths and fast-food joints. To the dismay of locals and city officials, the street is also a popular location for prostitutes to ply their trade late at night. Many strip clubs exist on and around Wenceslas Square, making Prague a popular location for stag parties.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wenceslas_Square
Prague, capital of the Czech Republic, is bisected by the Vltava River. Nicknamed “the City of a Hundred Spires,” it's known for its Old Town Square, the heart of its historic core, with colorful baroque buildings, Gothic churches and the medieval Astronomical Clock, with a popular show. Completed in 1402, pedestrian Charles Bridge is lined with 30 statues of saints.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt7PvTwYF3E&feature=share&...
Full Feature in 9 Parts
American International Pictures lived up to its name on this project. Terrore nello spazio was a Spanish/Italian/American effort. The American release title, Planet of the Vampires (PoV) suggests a campier film than it is. There actually aren't any vampires in the usual sense. Yet, it is still a horror/sci-fi hybrid. Director Mario Bava (famous for horror pictures) gives the dark screenplay by Ib Melchior a good presentation, despite a low budget.
Synopsis
Mysterious signals received from a distant planet named Aura suggest some intelligent life, perhaps a distress call. Two interplanetary space ships are sent to investigate. The Galliot goes in first, but seems to crash. The crew of the Argos go lower to check on them. A sudden increase of gravity pins everyone to the floors and the Argos seems to be doomed to crash. At the last minute, the gravity normalizes and Captain Mark Markary is able to land the Argos. When various members of the crew awaken, they go viciously homicidal temporarily. Captain Mark is able to restore order. The Galliot is found near by, perfectly intact. When a team of the Argos investigate, they find the entire crew of the Galliot dead. They killed each other. The Galliot's "Meteor Rejector" device is smashed, making the ship unspaceworthy. The Argos team return later to find no bodies. (They are rising from the dead, but the Argos crew don't know this yet.) A team from the Argos find a derelict alien ship with a huge alien skeleton out front. Mark and Sanya check it out and almost become trapped inside. Various crewmen, usually given lone sentry jobs, disappear one by one. Two Galliot crewmen appear with a story of being unconscious after the landing. They are taken aboard the Argos, but it was a trick. They were zombies who came to steal the Argos's "Meteor Rejector" device. One zombie explains that Aura is inhabited by a race of energy beings. The Auran sun is dying but they cannot construct spaceships. So, they lured other race's ships to Aura to hijack their bodies and flee. The takeover can be done willingly too. Captain Mark says "Never". Mark, Sanya and Wess steal back the Meteor Rejector and plant bombs aboard the Galliot. They take off in the Argos. Wess discovers that Mark and Sanya are possessed by the Aurans. He smashes the Meteor Rejector, thinking he's stopping the Aurans. He dies in the process. Possessed Mark and Sanya decide to set down on an obscure little planet: Earth. The End.
PoV has the quirky charm typical of Italian sci-fi, but also some visual fun via Bava's sense of art.
The American title is a misnomer, but probably deemed better (by A.I.P.) for marketing. The dead bodies, re-animated by the Auran energy beings, were more the classic zombie than the classic vampire. There is no sucking of blood or needing of human blood, etc. The whole rising-from-the-grave scene is clearly in the zombie idiom. Mixed into the zombie trope is the familiar 50s theme of alien-takeover.
Like many B movies, the production budget for PoV was very tight. Modern viewers could easily scoff at the modest special effects and simple sets. Yet, fans of B sci-fi can appreciate how much mileage Bava got from his shoestring budget. He made an entire alien planet out of a few "rock" props left over from a prior sword-and-sandal film, making use of lots of dry ice fog to disguise how sparse things were. The ship models were quite small (and therefore cheaper), but he manages to make them look larger. To save on matte art and optical effects, Bava used mirrors to put actors and small models into the same shot. Of course, having the Argos and Galliot be identical ships meant handy double use. The giant alien skeleton was probably his biggest expense, but well worth it.
Bava also made ample use of strong color to make things look "alien." Pairs of red-green, or red-blue, or green-orange lights add a vivid other-worldliness. The lighting is reminiscent of that used in the soviet film: Mechte Navstrechu ('62) ("A Dream Come True"). American audiences wouldn't get to see the soviet footage until 1966 when A.I.P. created another of their mash-ups, this one entitled: Queen of Blood.
Some viewers see an inspiration for Ridley Scott's famous Alien (1979). Certainly the scene in which Mark and Sanya discover and explore the derelict alien ship bears a strong resemblance. Even though this scene in PoV is more of a sidetrack than pivotal, it is certainly possible that Scott drew upon it as a portion of his story.
Screenwriter Ib Melchior was fond of the notion that alien planets harbored mysterious danger. His dark vision was quite the opposite of the almost glib notion that alien beings would be pretty women in short skirts. Melchior's Angry Red Planet ('60) featured ominous unseen Martians who tell the earthlings to get lost and never ever come back. Journey to the Seventh Planet ('62) featured a malicious intellect being that messed with the earthlings' minds and was trying to get off its cold, dark moon, to a better planet -- like earth.
The ending of PoV is decidedly un-hollywood. Most of the crew die. Even the last uncompromised humans (Wess) dies trying to stop the Aurans. He fails, despite his heroic sacrifice. Auran-Mark and Auran-Sanya fly down to an unsuspecting earth. The danger of the mind-controlling energy being Aurans was about to be loosed on our simple civilization. On its own, such an ending does have nihilist overtones. It also smacks of a potential sequel along the Body Snatchers line.
Bottom line? PoV will not impress modern viewers who rate movies by how lavish the effects are. It is still a budget film. It also suffers some of the usual pitfalls of foreign films repackaged for American release. There are almost too many characters who are easy to mix up (everyone wore identical leather suits) Nonetheless, it one of the better B movies of the 60s.
officially the State of Eritrea, is a country in the Horn of Africa. It is bordered by Sudan in the west, Ethiopia in the south, and Djibouti in the southeast. The east and northeast of the country have an extensive coastline on the Red Sea, directly across from Saudi Arabia and Yemen. The Dahlak Archipelago and several of the Hanish Islands are part of Eritrea. Its size is just under 118,000 km2 (45,560 sq mi) with an estimated population of 5 million. The capital is Asmara.
History
Eritrea is an ancient name, associated in the past with its Greek form Erythraía (Greek alphabet Ερυθραία), and its derived Latin form Erythræa. In the past, Eritrea had given its name to the Red Sea, then called the Erythræan Sea. The Italians created the colony of Eritrea in the 19th century around Asmara, and named it with its current name. After World War II Eritrea was annexed to Ethiopia.In 1991 the People's Liberation Front defeated the Ethiopian government. Eritrea officially celebrated its independence on May 24, 1992.
Prehistory
One of the oldest hominids, representing a possible link between Homo erectus and an archaic Homo sapiens, was found in Buya (Eritrean Danakil) in 1995 by Italian scientists. The cranium was found to be over 1 million years old. Furthermore, in 1999, the Eritrean Research Project Team discovered some of the earliest evidence of human tool-use in the harvesting of marine resources. The site contained obsidian tools dated to the paleolithic era, over 125,000 years old.
Epipaleolithic or mesolithic cave paintings in central and northern Eritrea attest to early hunter-gatherers in this region. An American paleontologist, William Sanders of the University of Michigan, also discovered a possible missing link between ancient and modern elephants in the form of the fossilized remains of a pig-sized creature in Eritrea. The fossil, which is 27 million years old, pushes the origins of elephants and mastodons five million years further into the past and indicates that modern elephants originated in Africa.
Antiquity
The oldest written reference to the territory now known as Eritrea is the chronicled expedition launched to the fabled Punt (or Ta Netjeru, meaning land of the Gods) by the Ancient Egyptians in the twenty-fifth century BC under Pharaoh Sahure. Later sources from the Pharaoh Hatshepsut in the fifteenth century BC present a more detailed portrayal of an expedition in search of frankincense. The geographical location of the missions to Punt is described as roughly corresponding to the southern west coast of the Red Sea. The name Eritrea is a rendition of the ancient Greek name Ἐρυθραία, Erythraía, meaning the "Red Land". The earliest evidence of agriculture, urban settlement and trade in Eritrea was found in the western region of the country consisting of archaeological remains dating back to 3500 BC in sites called the Gash group. Based on the archaeological evidence, there seems to have been a connection between the peoples of the Gash group and the civilizations of the Nile Valley namely Ancient Egypt and Nubia.
In the highlands, especially in Asmara's suburbs, scores of ancient sites have been documented, including Sembel, Mai Chiot, Ona Gudo, Mai Temenai, Weki Duba and Mai Hutsa. Mostly dating to the early and mid-1st millennium BCE (800 to 350 BCE), these communities consisted of small towns, villages, and hamlets built of stone. The proximity of these ancient communities to gold mines suggest that part of their prosperity was linked to the mining and processing of gold. Around the mid-1st millennium, several sites with Sabaean remains (inscriptions, artifacts, and monuments) seem to emerge in the central highlands, for example, at Keskese. Between the eighth and fifth century BCE, a kingdom known as D'mt was supposedly established in what is today Eritrea and the Tigray province of northern Ethiopia.
After D'mt's decline around the fifth century BC, the state of Aksum arose in much of Eritrea and the northern Ethiopian Highlands. It grew during the fourth century BC and came into prominence during the first century AD, minting its own coins by the third century, and converting in the fourth century to Christianity, thereby becoming the second official Christian state (after Armenia), and the first country to feature the cross on its coins. According to Mani, it grew to be one of the four greatest civilizations in the world, on a par with China, Persia, and Rome. In the seventh century, with the advent of Islam across the Red Sea in Arabia and the Arab invasion and subsequent destruction of Adulis, Aksum's main port city, Aksum's trade and power on the Red Sea began to decline and the empire gradually diminished and was overtaken by smaller rival kingdoms.
Medieval period
During the medieval period, contemporary with and following the gradual disintegration of the Aksumite state between the 9th and 10th centuries, several states as well as tribal and clan lands emerged in the area known today as Eritrea. Between the eighth and thirteenth century, northern and northwestern Eritrea had largely come under the domination of the Beja, a Cushitic people from northeastern Sudan. The Beja brought Islam to large parts of Eritrea and connected the region to the greater Islamic world. Nonetheless, Christians of the Axumite era continued to inhabit these areas and retain their religion.
In the main highland area and adjacent coastline of what were previously Muslim (Beja) ruled areas, a Christian Kingdom called Midir Bahr or Midri Bahri (Tigrinya for land of the sea) arose, ruled by the Bahr Negus or Bahr Negash, ("ruler of the sea") emerged in the 15th century. The southeastern parts of Eritrea, inhabited by the independent Afar since ancient times, came to form part of the Islamic Adal Sultanate. Parts of the southwestern lowlands of Eritrea were under the dominion of the then Christian/Animist Funj Sultanate of Sinnar.
An invading force of the Turkish Ottoman Empire, under Suleiman I, conquered Massawa in 1557 from the Christians, building what is now considered the "old town" of Massawa on Batsi island. They also conquered the towns of Hergigo and Debarwa, the capital city of Yeshaq, the contemporary Christian Bahr Negus, before being driven back to the coast by 1578. The Ottomans remained in control of the important ports of Massawa and Hergigo and their environs, and maintained their dominion over the coastal areas for nearly 300 years, absorbing the coastal areas of the disintegrated Adal Sultanate as vassals in the 16th century. The Funj Sultanate of Sinnar converted to Islam in the 16th century but maintained independent control of the southwestern areas of Eritrea until being absorbed into the Ottoman Empire in the early 19th century.
With the feudal rule of the Bahr Negus in the predominantly Christian highland interior severely weakened from the 17th century up until modern times, the area was dubbed Mereb Mellash by locals and neighboring Ethiopians alike, meaning "beyond the Mereb" (in Tigrinya). This name defined the territory as being north of the Mareb River which to this day is a natural boundary between the modern states of Eritrea and Ethiopia.[18] Roughly the same area also came to be referred to as Hamasien, a name that survived until modern times, designating a much smaller area (province) immediately surrounding the capital Asmara, until being absorbed into the new administrative divisions in 1994. In these areas, feudal authority was particularly weak or nonexistent, and the autonomy of the landowning peasantry was particularly strong; a kind of republican rule was prevalent, governed by local customary laws legislated by elected elder's councils (shimagile). In 1770, the Scottish researcher James Bruce describes Hamasien and Abyssinia as "different countries who are often fighting" (SUKE, p. 25).
Colonialism
Italian colonisation arguably began with the purchase of the locality of Assab by a Roman Catholic priest by the name of Giuseppe Sapeto acting on behalf of a Genovese shipping company called "Rubattino" who bought the land from the Afar Sultan of Obock (a vassal of the Ottomans) in 1869. This happened in the same year as the opening of the Suez Canal.
With the approval of the Italian parliament and King Umberto I of Italy (later succeeded by his son Victor Emmanuel III), the government of Italy in 1879 bought the Rubattino company's holdings and from 1882 expanded its possessions northward along the Red Sea coast toward and beyond Massawa, encroaching on and quickly expelling previous 'Egyptian' possessions but meeting stiffer resistance in the Eritrean highlands from the invading army of the Emperor Yohannes IV of Ethiopia.
Italy declared Eritrea a territory of Italy as of New Years Day 1890. The Kingdom of Italy ruled Eritrea from 1890 to 1941. Approximately 100,000 Italian colonists settled during the 1930s in the Colonia Primigenia (as Eritrea was called by the Italians, meaning they considered Eritrea their first and most important colony). Some of the greatest feats accomplished by the Italian colonialists in Eritrea was the building of Eritrea's modern capital; Asmara, and the Eritrean railway.
Between 1936 and 1941, the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini briefly created the Italian Empire, with the short-lived union of Eritrea, Ethiopia and Italian Somaliland. Eritrea enjoyed considerable industrialization and development of modern infrastructure during Italian rule (such as roads and the Eritrean Railway). The Italians remained the colonial power in Eritrea throughout the lifetime of Fascism and the beginnings of World War II, until they were defeated by Allied forces in 1941, and Eritrea came under British administration.
In the Peace Treaty of February 1947, Italy surrendered all her colonies, including Eritrea. While under British trusteeship, the United Nations decided to federate Eritrea with Ethiopia in 1950 after a lengthy inquiry regarding the status of Eritrea.
Eritrean War of Independence
The sandals worn by the fighters of independence have become iconic. A monument in central Asmara of such sandals was erected in memoriam. Barely 10 years into the federation with Ethiopia, in 1961, the 30-year Eritrean Struggle for Independence began, following the Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie I's dissolution of the federation and shutting down of Eritrea's parliament.
The Emperor declared Eritrea the fourteenth province of Ethiopia in 1962.[22] Eritreans formed the Eritrean Liberation Front (ELF) and rebelled.
The ELF was initially a conservative grass-roots movement dominated by Muslim lowlanders. The ELF received backing from Nasser's Egypt as part of a policy of expanding Arab Nationalist political influence in the region (some Eritreans were Arabic-speakers - one of the rather loose conditions for being part of the 'Arab Nation'). Ethiopia's imperial government received support from the United States which had established a radio listening base, called the Kagnew Station, in Eritrea's Ethiopian-occupied capital, Asmara. Internal divisions within the ELF based on religion, ideology, ethnicity, clan and, sometimes, personalities, led to the weakening and factioning of the ELF from which sprang the Eritrean People's Liberation Front.
The EPLF professed Marxism and egalitarian values devoid of gender, religion, or ethnic bias. Its leadership was educated in China. It came to be supported by a growing Eritrean diaspora. Bitter fighting broke out between the ELF and EPLF during the late 1970s and 1980s for dominance over Eritrea. The ELF continued to dominate the Eritrean landscape well into the 1970s when the struggle for independence neared victory due to Ethiopia's internal turmoil caused by a socialist revolution against the monarchy there.
The ELF's gains suffered when Ethiopia's ailing US-backed Emperor was deposed and replaced by the Derg, a Marxist military junta with backing from the Soviet Union and other communist countries, who continued the Ethiopian policy of repressing Eritrean "separatists" with increased military assistance and fervor. Nevertheless, the Eritrean resistance, which saw itself forced to retreat from most of the Eritrean countryside it had previously occupied, became instead entrenched in the northern parts of the country around the Sudanese border from where the most important supply lines came. The heavily bombarded and embattled northern town of Nakfa came to symbolize the Eritrean struggle. (The Eritrean currency is named after it.)
The numbers of the EPLF swelled in the 1980s. The EPLF relied largely on armaments captured from the Ethiopian army itself as well as financial and political support from the Eritrean diaspora and the cooperation of neighboring states hostile to Ethiopia's government Somalia and Sudan (although the support of the latter turned into hostility in agreement with Ethiopia during the Gaafar Nimeiry administration between 1971 and 1985) as well as Ethiopian resistance and separatist movements. Drought, famine, and intensive offensives launched by the Ethiopian army on Eritrea took a heavy toll on the population — more than half a million fled to Sudan as refugees. In 1985, Eritrean elite commandos infiltrated the Ethiopian- and Soviet-held air force base in Asmara and destroyed all 30 fighter jets there, suffering only one casualty. In 1988, a massive Ethiopian military offensive against Eritrean rebels backfired with a third of the Ethiopian army annihilated in the northern Eritrean town of Afabet.
Following the decline of the Soviet Union in 1989 and diminishing support for the Ethiopian war, Eritrean rebels advanced further, capturing the port of Massawa and putting the Ethiopian and Soviet naval capabilities there out of action. By 1990 and early 1991 virtually all Eritrean territory had been liberated by the EPLF except for the capital, whose only connection with the rest of government-held Ethiopia during the last year of the war was by an air-bridge. In 1991, the Ethiopian army finally capitulated and its leader Mengistu Hailemariam fled to Zimbabwe where he resides to this day. Eritrean rebels entered the capital Asmara and began to govern Eritrea on May 24, 1991. The new Ethiopian government, consisting of a coalition of Ethiopian resistance and separatist movements allied with Eritrea's rebels, conceded Eritrea's demand to have an internationally (UN) supervised referendum dubbed UNOVER to be held in Eritrea. This took place in April 1993 with an overwhelming vote by Eritreans for independence. Independence was declared on May 24, 1993.
Independence
Upon Eritrea's declaration of independence, the leader of the EPLF, Isaias Afewerki, became Eritrea's first Provisional President, and the Eritrean People's Liberation Front (later renamed the People's Front for Democracy and Justice, or PFDJ) created a government.
Faced with limited economic resources and a country shattered by decades of war, the government embarked on a reconstruction and defense effort, later called the Warsai Yikalo Program, based on the labour of national servicemen and women. It is still continuing and deploys the conscripted, which is drawn from anyone male or female who has graduated high school, into a combination of duties ranging from military service to construction projects, health care, teaching and training/education as well as agricultural work to improve the country's food security.
The government also attempts to tap into the resources of the Eritreans living abroad by levying a 2% tax on the gross income of those who wish to gain full economic rights and access as citizens in Eritrea (land ownership, business licenses and other privileges for nationals etc), while at the same time encouraging tourism and investment both from Eritreans living abroad and other foreign investors. This has been complicated by Eritrea's tumultuous relations with its neighbours, lack of stability and subsequent political problems.
Eritrea severed diplomatic relations with Sudan in 1994, citing that the latter was hosting Islamic terrorist groups to destabilize Eritrea, and both countries entered into an acrimonious relationship, each accusing the other of hosting various opposition rebel groups or "terrorists" and soliciting outside support to destabilize the other. Diplomatic relations were resumed in 2005 following a reconciliation agreement reached with the help of Qatar's negotiation in 1999.[29][30] Eritrea now plays a prominent role in the internal Sudanese peace and reconciliation effort.
Perhaps the conflict with the deepest impact on independent Eritrea has been the renewed hostility with Ethiopia. In 1998, a border war with Ethiopia over the town of Badme occurred. The Eritrean-Ethiopian War ended in 2000 with a negotiated agreement known as the Algiers Agreement, which assigned an independent, UN-associated boundary commission known as the Eritrea-Ethiopia Boundary Commission (EEBC), whose task was to clearly identify the border between the two countries and issue a final and binding ruling. Along with the agreement the UN established a temporary security zone consisting of a 25-kilometre demilitarized buffer zone within Eritrea, running along the length of the disputed border between the two states and patrolled by UN troops in the mission named UNMEE. Ethiopia was to withdraw to positions held before the outbreak of hostilities in May 1998. The peace agreement would be completed with the implementation of the Border Commission's ruling, also ending the task of the peacekeeping mission of UNMEE. The EEBC's verdict came in April 2002, which awarded Badme to Eritrea. However, Ethiopia refused to withdraw its military from positions in the disputed areas, including Badme, and also refused to implement the EEBC's ruling, and the dispute is ongoing.
Eritrea's diplomatic relations with Djibouti were briefly severed during the border war with Ethiopia in 1998 due to a dispute over Djibouti's intimate relation with Ethiopia during the war but were restored and normalized in 2000. Relations are again tense due to a renewed border dispute. Similarly, Eritrea and Yemen had a border conflict between 1996 to 1998 over the Hanish Islands and the maritime border, which was resolved in 2000 by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague.
Geography
Eritrea is located in Northeast Africa, more specifically in the Horn of Africa, and is bordered on the northeast and east by the Red Sea. The country is virtually bisected by one of the world's longest mountain ranges, formed by the processes that formed the Great Rift Valley, with fertile lands to the west, descending to desert in the east. Eritrea, at the southern end of the Red Sea, is the home of the fork in the rift. The Dahlak Archipelago and its fishing grounds are situated off the sandy and arid coastline. The land to the south, in the highlands, is slightly drier and cooler.
The Afar Triangle or Danakil Depression of Eritrea is the probable location of a triple junction where three tectonic plates are pulling away from one another: the Arabian Plate, and the two parts of the African Plate (the Nubian and the Somali plate) splitting along the East African Rift Zone (USGS). The highest point of the country, Emba Soira, is located in the center of Eritrea, at 3,018 meters (9,902 ft) above sea level.
The main cities of the country are the capital city of Asmara and the port town of Asseb in the southeast, as well as the towns of Massawa to the east, and Keren to the north.
Other Info
Oficial Name:
tir: ሃግሬ ኤርትራ (Hagəre Ertra)
ara: دولة إرتريا (Dawlâtu Iritriyā)
Hagere Ertra
Independence:
May 24, 1991
-de jure May 24, 1993
Area:
121.320 km2
Inhabitants:
4.906.585
Language:
Afar [aar] 160,000 in Eritrea (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Southern Eritrea. May also be in Somalia. Alternate names: Afaraf, "Danakil", "Denkel". Dialects: Central Afar, Northern Afar, Aussa, Ba'adu. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Cushitic, East, Saho-Afar
More information.
Arabic, Hijazi Spoken [acw] Red Sea coast. Alternate names: Hijazi. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, Central, South, Arabic
More information.
Arabic, Standard [arb] Middle East, North Africa. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, Central, South, Arabic
More information.
Bedawi [bej] 150,000 in Eritrea (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Population includes 20,000 Hadendoa (1970 Bendor). Alternate names: Bedàwie, Beja, Bedawiye, Bedawye, Bedauye, Bedwi, Bedya, Bedja, Lobat. Dialects: Hadareb (Hadaareb), Bisharin (Bisarin, Bisariab), Hadendoa (Hadendowa), Beni-Amir, Ababda, Amara. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Cushitic, North
More information.
Bilen [byn] 70,000 (1995). Central Eritrea, in and around the town of Keren. Alternate names: Bogo, Bogos, Bilayn, Bilin, Balen, Beleni, Belen, Bilein, Bileno, North Agaw. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Cushitic, Central, Northern
More information.
English [eng] Classification: Indo-European, Germanic, West, English
More information.
Italian [ita] A few monolinguals. Classification: Indo-European, Italic, Romance, Italo-Western, Italo-Dalmatian
More information.
Kunama [kun] 107,000 in Eritrea (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Population includes 1,000 in Ilit, 600 in Odasa. Population total all countries: 108,883. Western Eritrea, on the Gash and Setit rivers, Sudan border and into Tigray Province. Barka is south of Barentu; Marda is north, northeast, and east of Barentu and in Barentu; Aimara is west of Barentu; Laki-Tukura is south of Aimara, west of Barka; Tika is south of Laki-Tukura, west of Barka. None in Sudan. Also spoken in Ethiopia. Alternate names: Baza, Baaza, Bazen, Baazen, Baazayn, Baden, Baaden, Bada, Baada, Cunama, Diila. Dialects: Barka (Berka), Marda, Aimara (Aaimasa, Aymasa, Odasa), Tika (Tiika, Lakatakura-Tika), Ilit (Iliit, Iiliit, Iilit), Bitama (Bitaama), Sokodasa (Sogodas, Sogadas), Takazze-Setiit (Setiit, Setit), Tigray. Bitama and Ilit are nearly unintelligible to speakers of other Kunama. Barka is the largest dialect and intelligible to speakers of all others. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Kunama
More information.
Nara [nrb] 80,000 (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). In and north of Barentu, western Eritrea, adjoining Kunama territory which is to the south. Alternate names: Nera, "Barea", "Barya", "Baria", Higir, Koyta, Mogareb, Santora. Dialects: Considerable dialect variation within the four main groups: Higir, Mogareb, Koyta, Santora. Little intelligibility of Kunama. Classification: Nilo-Saharan, Eastern Sudanic, Eastern, Nara
More information.
Saho [ssy] 180,000 in Eritrea (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). Population total all countries: 202,759. Southern Eritrea. Also spoken in Ethiopia. Alternate names: Sao, Shaho, Shoho, Shiho. Dialects: Very close to Afar. The Irob dialect is only in Ethiopia. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Cushitic, East, Saho-Afar
More information.
Tigré [tig] 800,000 in Eritrea (1997 census). Also spoken in Sudan. Alternate names: Khasa, Xasa. Dialects: Mansa' (Mensa). Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, South, Ethiopian, North
More information.
Tigrigna [tir] 1,200,000 in Eritrea (2001 Johnstone and Mandryk). South and central Eritrea. Alternate names: Tigrinya, Tigray. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, South, Ethiopian, North
More information.
Extinct languages
Geez [gez] Extinct. Alternate names: Ancient Ethiopic, Ethiopic, Ge'ez, Giiz. Classification: Afro-Asiatic, Semitic, South, Ethiopian, North
Capital city:
Asmara
Meaning country name:
Named by Italian colonizers, from the Latin name for the Red Sea "Mare Erythraeum" ("Erythraean Sea") which in turn derived from the ancient Greek name for the Red Sea: "Erythrea Thalassa".
Description Flag:
The current flag of Eritrea was adopted on December 5, 1995, and uses the basic layout of the flag of the Eritrean People's Liberation Front, with the wreath with upright olive branch symbol derived from the 1952 flag.
The flag is dominated by a red triangle extending from the hoist to the fly with complementary green and blue triangles above and below. Green stands for the fertility of the country respectively for agriculture; blue stands for the ocean and red for the blood lost in the fight for freedom. In the red triangle a yellow wreath symbol with 14 leaves on each side derived from the 1952 flag replaces the yellow star of the EPLF flag. The use of triangles is also important, because reading the flag from left to right it is important to note that the red shrinks which represents that in the end Eritrea will see peace and blood will no longer be spilled for the nation.
Coat of arms:
The Coat of Arms of Eritrea was adopted May 24, 1993, on the date of declaration of independence. It shows a dromedary in natural colors surrounded by an olive wreath. On the bottom is a band with the name of the nation in the official languages - English in the middle, Tigrinya on the left and Arabic on the right.
National Anthem: Ertra, Ertra, Ertra ,
Tigrinya: ኤርትራ ኤርትራ ኤርትራ
Tigrinya
ኤርትራ ኤርትራ ኤርትራ፡
በዓል ደማ እናልቀሰ ተደምሲሱ፡
መስዋእታ ብሓርነት ተደቢሱ።
መዋእል ነኺሳ ኣብ ዕላማ፡
ትእምርቲ ጽንዓት ኰይኑ ስማ፡
ኤርትራ'ዛ ሓበን ውጹዓት፡
ኣመስኪራ ሓቂ ከምትዕወት፡
ኤርትራ ኤርትራ (ክልተ ግዜ)
ኣብ ዓለም ጨቢጣቶ ግቡእ ክብራ።
ናጽነት ዘምጽኦ ልዑል ኒሕ፡
ንህንጻ ንልምዓት ክንሰርሕ፡
ስልጣኔ ከነልብሳ ግርማ
ሕድሪ'ሎና ግምጃ ክንስልማ፡
ኤርትራ ኤርትራ (ክልተ ግዜ)
ኣብ ዓለም ጨቢጣቶ ግቡእ ክብራ።
Tigrinya with Romanization
Ertra, Ertra, Ertra,
Beal dema'nalkese tedemsisu,
Meswaéta bharnet tdebisu.
Mewaél nekhisa'b élame,
TémErti tsnt koynu sma,
Ertra za haben wtsuAt,
Ameskira haki kem téwet.
Ertra, Ertra,
Abalem chebitato gbué kbra.
Natsänet zemtsä’ lä‘ul nihh,
N'hntsa n'lm‘at k'serihh,
S'lthane k'nelbsa grma,
Hihdri-lena gmja k'nslma.
Ertra, Ertra,
Abalem chebitato gbué kbra.
English translation
Eritrea, Eritrea, Eritrea,
Her enemy decimated,
and her sacrifices vindicated by liberation.
Steadfast in her goal,
symbolizing endurance,
Eritrea, the pride of her oppressed people,
proved that the truth prevails.
Eritrea, Eritrea,
holds her rightful place in the world.
Dedication that led to liberation,
Will buildup and make her green,
We shall honour her with progress,
We have a word to her to embellish.
Eritrea, Eritrea,
holds her rightful place in the world.
Internet Page: www.eritreaeritrea.com
eritrea in diferent languages
eng | afr | arg | ast | bre | cat | ces | cor | cym | dan | est | eus | fao | fin | glg | glv | hun | ibo | ina | ita | jav | jnf | lim | lld | mlg | mlt | nld | nor | roh | rup | slk | sme | spa | sqi | srd | swa | swe | tgl | vor: Eritrea
dsb | hrv | hsb | lav | slv: Eritreja
crh | kaa | uzb: Eritreya / Эритрея
deu | ltz | nds: Eritrea / Eritrea; Erythräa / Erythräa
hat | tur | zza: Eritre
hau | kin | run: Eritreya
ind | msa: Eritrea / اريتريا
pol | szl: Erytrea
aze: Eritreya / Еритреја
bam: Eritire
bos: Eritreja / Еритреја
epo: Eritreo
fra: Érythrée
frp: Èritrê
fur: Eritree
gla: Ertra
gle: An Eiritré / An Eiritré
haw: ʻElikilea
isl: Erítrea
kmr: Êrîtrê / Еритре / ئێریترێ
kur: Erître / ئەریترە
lat: Erythraea
lin: Elitré
lit: Eritrėja
mol: Eritreea / Еритрея
nrm: Éritraée
oci: Eritrèa
por: Eritreia / Eritréia
que: Iritrya
rmy: Eritreya / एरित्रेया
ron: Eritreea
scn: Eritrìa
slo: Eritrea / Еритреа
smg: Eritrėjė
smo: Eriteria
som: Ereteeriya; Eriteeriya; Eretareeya
tet: Eritreia
tuk: Eritreýa / Эритрея
vie: Ê-ri-tơ-rê-a
vol: Lerüträn
wln: Eritrêye
wol: Eritere
abq | alt | che | chm | kir | kjh | kom | krc | kum | rus | tyv | udm: Эритрея (Ėritreja)
bak: Эритрея / Eritreya
bel: Эрытрэя / Erytreja
bul: Еритрея (Eritreja)
chv: Эритрейӑ (Ėritrejă)
kaz: Эритрея / Erïtreya / ەريترەيا
kbd: Эритрея (Ăritreja)
mkd: Еритреа (Eritrea)
mon: Эритрей (Äritrej)
oss: Эритрей (Ėritrej)
srp: Еритреја / Eritreja
tat: Эритрея / Eritreä
tgk: Эритрея / اریتریه / Eritreja
ukr: Еритрея (Erytreja)
ara: إريتريا (Irītriyā); أريتريا (Arītriyā); إرتريا (Iritriyā); أرتريا (Aritriyā); إرتيريا (Irtīriyā); أرتيريا (Artīriyā)
fas: اریتره (Erītre)
prs: اریتریا (Erītriyā)
pus: اريتريا (Irītriyā); اېريتريا (Erītriyā)
uig: ئېرىترېيە / Éritréye / Эритрея
urd: اریٹریا (Irīṫriyā); ارٹریا (Iriṫriyā); اریٹیریا (Irīṫīriyā)
div: އެރިތްރިއާ (Eritri'ā)
heb: אריטראה (Erîṭreʾah); אריטריאה (Erîṭrêʾah); אריתריאה (Erîtrêʾah)
lad: איריטריאה / Eritrea
yid: עריטרײאַ (Eritreya)
amh | tir: ኤርትራ (Ertra)
ell-dhi: Ερυθραία (Eryṯraía)
ell-kat: Ἐρυθραία (Eryṯraía)
hye: Էրիտրեա (Ēritrea)
kat: ერიტრეა (Eritrea)
hin: इरिट्रिया (Iriṭriyā); एरिट्रिया (Eriṭriyā); एरीट्रिया (Erīṭriyā)
ben: ইরিত্রিয়া (Iritriyā); এরিট্রিয়া (Eriṭriyā)
pan: ਈਰਿਟਰੀਆ (Īriṭrīā)
kan: ಎರಿಟ್ರಿಯ (Eriṭriya)
mal: എരിട്രിയ (Eriṭriya)
tam: எரித்திரியா (Erittiriyā); எரித்ரியா (Eritriyā)
tel: ఎరిట్రియా (Eriṭriyā)
zho: 厄立特里亞/厄里特尼亚 (Èlǐtèlíyà)
jpn: エリトリア (Eritoria)
kor: 에리트레아 (Eriteuraea)
mya: အီရီထရီးယား (Iẏitʰáẏìyà)
tha: เอริเทรีย (Ēritʰriya)
khm: អេរីទ្រា (Erītrā)
www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt7PvTwYF3E&feature=share&...
Full Feature in 9 Parts
American International Pictures lived up to its name on this project. Terrore nello spazio was a Spanish/Italian/American effort. The American release title, Planet of the Vampires (PoV) suggests a campier film than it is. There actually aren't any vampires in the usual sense. Yet, it is still a horror/sci-fi hybrid. Director Mario Bava (famous for horror pictures) gives the dark screenplay by Ib Melchior a good presentation, despite a low budget.
Synopsis
Mysterious signals received from a distant planet named Aura suggest some intelligent life, perhaps a distress call. Two interplanetary space ships are sent to investigate. The Galliot goes in first, but seems to crash. The crew of the Argos go lower to check on them. A sudden increase of gravity pins everyone to the floors and the Argos seems to be doomed to crash. At the last minute, the gravity normalizes and Captain Mark Markary is able to land the Argos. When various members of the crew awaken, they go viciously homicidal temporarily. Captain Mark is able to restore order. The Galliot is found near by, perfectly intact. When a team of the Argos investigate, they find the entire crew of the Galliot dead. They killed each other. The Galliot's "Meteor Rejector" device is smashed, making the ship unspaceworthy. The Argos team return later to find no bodies. (They are rising from the dead, but the Argos crew don't know this yet.) A team from the Argos find a derelict alien ship with a huge alien skeleton out front. Mark and Sanya check it out and almost become trapped inside. Various crewmen, usually given lone sentry jobs, disappear one by one. Two Galliot crewmen appear with a story of being unconscious after the landing. They are taken aboard the Argos, but it was a trick. They were zombies who came to steal the Argos's "Meteor Rejector" device. One zombie explains that Aura is inhabited by a race of energy beings. The Auran sun is dying but they cannot construct spaceships. So, they lured other race's ships to Aura to hijack their bodies and flee. The takeover can be done willingly too. Captain Mark says "Never". Mark, Sanya and Wess steal back the Meteor Rejector and plant bombs aboard the Galliot. They take off in the Argos. Wess discovers that Mark and Sanya are possessed by the Aurans. He smashes the Meteor Rejector, thinking he's stopping the Aurans. He dies in the process. Possessed Mark and Sanya decide to set down on an obscure little planet: Earth. The End.
PoV has the quirky charm typical of Italian sci-fi, but also some visual fun via Bava's sense of art.
The American title is a misnomer, but probably deemed better (by A.I.P.) for marketing. The dead bodies, re-animated by the Auran energy beings, were more the classic zombie than the classic vampire. There is no sucking of blood or needing of human blood, etc. The whole rising-from-the-grave scene is clearly in the zombie idiom. Mixed into the zombie trope is the familiar 50s theme of alien-takeover.
Like many B movies, the production budget for PoV was very tight. Modern viewers could easily scoff at the modest special effects and simple sets. Yet, fans of B sci-fi can appreciate how much mileage Bava got from his shoestring budget. He made an entire alien planet out of a few "rock" props left over from a prior sword-and-sandal film, making use of lots of dry ice fog to disguise how sparse things were. The ship models were quite small (and therefore cheaper), but he manages to make them look larger. To save on matte art and optical effects, Bava used mirrors to put actors and small models into the same shot. Of course, having the Argos and Galliot be identical ships meant handy double use. The giant alien skeleton was probably his biggest expense, but well worth it.
Bava also made ample use of strong color to make things look "alien." Pairs of red-green, or red-blue, or green-orange lights add a vivid other-worldliness. The lighting is reminiscent of that used in the soviet film: Mechte Navstrechu ('62) ("A Dream Come True"). American audiences wouldn't get to see the soviet footage until 1966 when A.I.P. created another of their mash-ups, this one entitled: Queen of Blood.
Some viewers see an inspiration for Ridley Scott's famous Alien (1979). Certainly the scene in which Mark and Sanya discover and explore the derelict alien ship bears a strong resemblance. Even though this scene in PoV is more of a sidetrack than pivotal, it is certainly possible that Scott drew upon it as a portion of his story.
Screenwriter Ib Melchior was fond of the notion that alien planets harbored mysterious danger. His dark vision was quite the opposite of the almost glib notion that alien beings would be pretty women in short skirts. Melchior's Angry Red Planet ('60) featured ominous unseen Martians who tell the earthlings to get lost and never ever come back. Journey to the Seventh Planet ('62) featured a malicious intellect being that messed with the earthlings' minds and was trying to get off its cold, dark moon, to a better planet -- like earth.
The ending of PoV is decidedly un-hollywood. Most of the crew die. Even the last uncompromised humans (Wess) dies trying to stop the Aurans. He fails, despite his heroic sacrifice. Auran-Mark and Auran-Sanya fly down to an unsuspecting earth. The danger of the mind-controlling energy being Aurans was about to be loosed on our simple civilization. On its own, such an ending does have nihilist overtones. It also smacks of a potential sequel along the Body Snatchers line.
Bottom line? PoV will not impress modern viewers who rate movies by how lavish the effects are. It is still a budget film. It also suffers some of the usual pitfalls of foreign films repackaged for American release. There are almost too many characters who are easy to mix up (everyone wore identical leather suits) Nonetheless, it one of the better B movies of the 60s.
Walking day: from Shepherds Bush to Ravenscourt Park ro Acton to Gunnersbury Park to Kew and then home from Richmond station.
I found an interesting web article (undated) giving some background to this mural: "The pan-London MyMural project launches in Acton this week with a beautiful painting by artist Leonard Lesic.
The London Mayors Office is supporting the project, its methodology and aspirations. Adam Cooper from the Culture and Creative Industries Unit, Greater London Authority stated: “MyMural is a great initiative that is bringing a fantastic new piece of art to Acton. The mural at Berrymede School will hopefully inspire a next generation of young artist."
MyMural inspires, enables and normalizes the possibilities for new artworks among everyday settings. Thanks to support from Cockayne – Grants for the Arts (London Community Foundation), GLA Mayors Office and a Charity Auction donation from Stik, we are very pleased to announce that MyMural is launching in Acton. This pilot contributes to an important sea change in the way artists work with residents in the city.
Marcus Willcocks and Prof. Lorraine Gamman, partners from University of the Arts London explained: “MyMural is a new scheme that pairs street artists with communities who want to integrate more art, creativity and colour into their neighourhoods. Leonard Lesic’s work creatively responds to topics discussed as important among the community at Berrymede Infant School. As well as providing the ‘canvas’, the school community helped curate the opportunity and agree the artist, in collaboration with Rachel Pepper and team at Artification, Mark Clack at Wood Street Walls, and the DAC/MyMural team at Central Saint Martins. We are so grateful to support from the GLA, the London Community Foundation and artist, Stik, for their confidence in MyMural. Through collective effort the project working to bring artists and neighbourhood communities together more easily, to curate our streets less as ‘developed’ places and more as living, breathing,
creative places.”
MyMural brings together internationally experienced collaborators from arts facilitation, practice-led academic research and engagements, together with regional and local authorities and a world-renowned street art practitioner to bring new opportunities for high-quality artworks to happen in new contexts in London.
The Mayor of London has highlighted culture as one of his key priorities. He is committed to ensuring that London retains its status as the world’s leading capital city for culture and creativity and ensuring more Londoners access arts and culture. A key feature of London’s Cultural Infrastructure Plan is to give outstanding artists opportunities to make exciting new work, encourage Londoners to get more involved in creative activities, as well as cultivate London’s creative value by opening access to the use of spaces as open galleries.
MyMural began by meeting and speaking with residents about the kind of imagery and art they would like to see in their neighbourhood. The resulting Artist Opportunity was based on these aspirations. It was shared and artists responded to the brief. We received numerous artist submissions which residents viewed and voted for. The MyMural team invited the shortlisted artists to develop their site specific design. Artist Leonard Lesic was selected.
Leonard painted a beautiful piece on the wall of a nearby, now demolished, block in 2013. We are very pleased that he returns to South Acton to create this new public art for Acton in 2019.
"ARTification has been bringing art to the streets since 2005. A bridge between artists and residents, we have created 20+ pieces of street art in the public realm including the tallest in the UK by Stik and Thierry Noir. We are very pleased that MyMural is creating the latest piece to take art to the streets." Dr Rachel Pepper (ARTification Director)
Feedback from Berrymede Infants School about the painting:
“This MyMural community project is a great way of bringing art and pleasure to everyone in the Acton area” Mrs Ohene (Head teacher)
"Having a wall that is colourful which will attract the children's eye at playtime and give them many opportunities to have discussions about the things on the painting is an excellent way to engage children.” Fahmida (Parent Governor)
“The mural captures the idea that working hard at school will give you the freedom to go anywhere you want.” Mrs Shawe (Parent support adviser).
Leonard Lesic, the Artist commented:
"I am very excited to be painting in Acton again after six years. The first time on Charles Hocking House was a great time, and I have a lot of nice memories. The idea of painting at Berrymede school is wonderful, and the mural will have positive message looking into future.''
Leonard responded imaginatively to the brief, and we are very pleased to see a new and inspirational mural in Acton.
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MyMural is an initiative between Stik, Central Saint Martins, Artification, Wood Street Walls and the Greater London Authority. It is a new pilot scheme working with artists and residents, to enable fantastic artworks on shared residential and community buildings across London.
ARTification is an Acton-based charity that celebrates art, culture, community."
Source: www.artification.org.uk/blog/aspirational-mural-acton
Invisibility is so 20th Century. Thank you to the people at Lush Cosmetics for improving the health of the people we serve by normalizing their humanity. Allies need allies.
NCTE Showcase Event at Lush Tysons Corner, Virginia, USA, see: www.facebook.com/events/1762695184025567/
A statue of celebrated New York photographer Diane Arbus by English sculptor Gillian Wearing was on display in Doris C. Freedman Plaza in Central Park from October 20, 2021 to August 14, 2022. The life-size sculpture, standing shoes-to-the-ground without a base at 5’6” tall, depicts Arbus with "depicts Arbus with her finger on the shutter button of her iconic twin lens camera, as she might have been seen in the 1950s and '60s.”
Diane Arbus (1923-1971) photographed a wide range of subjects including strippers, carnival performers, nudists, people with dwarfism, children, mothers, couples, elderly people, and middle-class families, often in familiar settings, helping to normalize marginalized groups and highlighting the importance of proper representation.
Urbex Benelux -
Between 1940 and 1945, the factory was badly damaged by bombing, which caused major fires in the paper and wood supplies. At the end of the war, only one machine was ready to use, but a law passed in October 1942 required businesses with damage greater than 25 percent to stop.
After a slow start-up, the company worked back in 1947 with 140 employees and production had increased to four tons per year. It would take until 1949 before the supply could be normalized.
Remake! I took the original photo version of this in 2010 to bring awareness to "Violence Against Women". At the time, I did not know that this would directly impact me in 2011 when I met my abuser, William.
A few weeks ago, William's mother sent me a friend request on Facebook, so I decided to remake this photo. There's no escaping this, even years into my healing. I'm reminded of it constantly. From his mother Pauline trying to add me on Facebook, to his partner Victoria liking my photos on Instagram. I have a life sentence of being a domestic abuse survivor. Antagonized. Intimidated.
The abuse didn't start with violence. For years, William broke me down & made me dependent on him. He made me cut off my friends, ruined my relationship with my family, got me a job at his workplace so I'd be near him, changed schools so we'd share the same campus. So we moved in together in late 2013 after I had nothing left. It only took until early 2014 for him to start beating me.
This is the reality. Abuse is a slow burn & then it's a horrific explosion. Rinse, repeat. He made me believe that I deserved everything & that I was crazy for not seeing that. Years later, after re-learning how to be a functioning person, I'll never be 100% okay again. Especially not with his loved ones doing this to me. But I've accepted this because I'm not the one who should be ashamed.
If my vulnerability brings awareness to this horrific issue, it will be worth it. Survivors are dealing with indescribable pain. I may seem strong, then I get a friend request on Facebook & I'm suddenly 22, hiding under the bed, while William drags me out to choke me. How can we accept that people do this to their loved ones? How can we accept that his loved ones are still trying to terrorize me?
Stop the violence. Be kind to each other. Normalize knowing the red flags of abuse. Support each other, even from afar. Call out assholes. Check in on your loved ones. Partner violence rates have increased because of the pandemic. We need to talk about this more. Survivors should not be embarrassed. People like William and his loved ones should be.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
The visualization shows the influence of the economic crisis in the lexicon of Italian fiction. Analyzed(*) are the ten books awarded with the last ten editions of the Strega Prize. Books are arranged chronologically (x-axis) and by the total number of words (y-axis). For each novel the visualization displays a syntactic and semantic study on the frequency of fifty words, divided into five categories, and related to the theme of the crisiss. In order to understand the actual influence of the crisis semantic vocabulary within the novel, the visualization also shows the placement of the words along the timeplot of the novel through a dispesion plot on books’ length normalized.
View On Black Common kidneyvetch (Anthyllis vulneraria)!
Anthyllis is little known today but was traditionally used to relieve spasms, detoxify, reduce swelling, and promote wound healing.
Elisabeth Sigmund rediscovered anthyllis, finding it normalized both oily and dry conditions as well as severely irritated skin. Anthyllis has a generally stimulating and normalizing effect on the skin.
早川裕弌・小花和宏之・齋藤 仁・内山庄一郎
※本号掲載総説参照（321-343頁）．
This is an example of 3D point cloud by Structure-from-Motion (SfM) Multi-View Stereo (MVS) photogrammetry. The 3D point cloud was produced from thousands of aerial photographs taken by small unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), or unmanned aircraft or aerial system (UAS). The spectrum of colors indicates different information given to each point: red-green-blue (RGB) color, normalized differential vegetation index (NDVI) calculated using a near infrared camera data, topographic shade by eye-dome lighting (EDL), morphological roughness, and surface curvature. These data are readily obtained by SfM-MVS photogrammetry, and can be effectively used for various applications in geomorphology and related studies. For more details on SfM-MVS photogrammetry, see our review article in this issue (p. 321-343).
(Yuichi S. Hayakawa, Hiroyuki Obanawa, Hitoshi Saito, Shoichiro Uchiyama)
www.researchgate.net/publication/304674520_SfMduoshidians...
12 hours of integration time:
Ha: 24 x 600 second exposures
Sii: 24 x 600 second exposures
Oiii: 24 x 600 second exposures
Bortle Class 4
Equipment: HEQ5 Pro | ASI Air Mini | William Optics Z61 w/ 61a field flattener | ZWO 533 MM Pro w/ 1.25” Filter Wheel | ZWO EAF | Optolong LRGB, Ha, Sii, and Oiii filters.
Processed in PixInsight: Combined channels in PixelMath. BlurXterminator (Correct only). Spectrophotometric Calibration to remove green cast.
BlurrXterminator again for sharpening. StarXterminator so I could edit the nebula and stars separately. Used SCNR on star image. Narrowband Normalization to change the pallet to SHO and made further color adjustments. Removed color noise and grain with NoiseXterminator.
Stretched both star and starless image with Histogram Transformation. Did some more with Curves Transformation.
Used Selective Color Correction for some more adjustments. Blended the star and starless image back together with PixelMath. Reduced star size with Star Reduction.
Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
President Barack Obama, right, meets with Vietnamese Communist party secretary general Nguyen Phu Trong in the Oval Office of the White House, on Tuesday, July 7, 2015, in Washington. Trong is the de facto leader of Vietnam despite holding no official government post, and is visiting Washington to boost ties 20 years after the U.S. and Vietnam normalized relations following the Vietnam War. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)
Sony RX1 User Report.
I hesitate to write about gear. Tools are tools and the bitter truth is that a great craftsman rises above his tools to create a masterpiece whereas most of us try to improve our abominations by buying better or faster hammers to hit the same nails at the same awkward angles.
The internet is fairly flooded with reviews of this tiny marvel, and it isn’t my intention to compete with those articles. If you’re looking for a full-scale review of every feature or a down-to-Earth accounting of the RX1’s strengths and weaknesses, I recommend starting here.
Instead, I’d like to provide you with a flavor of how I’ve used the camera over the last six months. In short, this is a user report. To save yourself a few thousand words: I love the thing. As we go through this article, you’ll see this is a purpose built camera. The RX1 is not for everyone, but we will get to that and on the way, I’ll share a handful of images that I made with the camera.
It should be obvious to anyone reading this that I write this independently and have absolutely no relationship with Sony (other than having exchanged a large pile of cash for this camera at a retail outlet).
Before we get to anything else, I want to clear the air about two things: Price and Features
The Price
First things first: the price. The $2800+ cost of this camera is the elephant in the room and, given I purchased the thing, you may consider me a poor critic. That in mind, I want to offer you three thoughts:
Consumer goods cost what they cost, in the absence of a competitor (the Fuji X100s being the only one worth mention) there is no comparison and you simply have to decide for yourself if you are willing to pay or not.
Normalize the price per sensor area for all 35mm f/2 lens and camera alternatives and you’ll find the RX1 is an amazing value.
You are paying for the ability to take photographs, plain and simple. Ask yourself, “what are these photographs worth to me?”
In my case, #3 is very important. I have used the RX1 to take hundreds of photographs of my family that are immensely important to me. Moreover, I have made photographs (many appearing on this page) that are moving or beautiful and only happened because I had the RX1 in my bag or my pocket. Yes, of course I could have made these or very similar photographs with another camera, but that is immaterial.
35mm by 24mm by 35mm f/2
The killer feature of this camera is simple: it is a wafer of silicon 35mm by 24mm paired to a brilliantly, ridiculously, undeniably sharp, contrasty and bokehlicious 35mm f/2 Carl Zeiss lens. Image quality is king here and all other things take a back seat. This means the following: image quality is as good or better than your DSLR, but battery life, focus speed, and responsiveness are likely not as good as your DSLR. I say likely because, if you have an entry-level DSLR, the RX1 is comparable on these dimensions. If you want to change lenses, if you want an integrated viewfinder, if you want blindingly fast phase-detect autofocus then shoot with a DSLR. If you want the absolute best image quality in the smallest size possible, you’ve got it in the RX1.
While we are on the subject of interchangeable lenses and viewfinders...
I have an interchangeable lens DSLR and I love the thing. It’s basically a medium format camera in a 35mm camera body. It’s a powerhouse and it is the first camera I reach for when the goal is photography. For a long time, however, I’ve found myself in situations where photography was not the first goal, but where I nevertheless wanted to have a camera. I’m around the table with friends or at the park with my son and the DSLR is too big, too bulky, too intimidating. It comes between you and life. In this realm, mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras seem to be king, but they have a major flaw: they are, for all intents and purposes, just little DSLRs.
As I mentioned above, I have an interchangeable lens system, why would I want another, smaller one? Clearly, I am not alone in feeling this way, as the market has produced a number of what I would call “professional point and shoots.” Here we are talking about the Fuji X100/X100s, Sigma DPm-series and the RX100 and RX1.
Design is about making choices
When the Fuji X100 came out, I was intrigued. Here was a cheap(er), baby Leica M. Quiet, small, unobtrusive. Had I waited to buy until the X100s had come out, perhaps this would be a different report. Perhaps, but probably not. I remember thinking to myself as I was looking at the X100, “I wish there was a digital Rollei 35, something with a fixed 28mm or 35mm lens that would fit in a coat pocket or a small bag.” Now of course, there is.
So, for those of you who said, “I would buy the RX1 if it had interchangeable lenses or an integrated viewfinder or faster autofocus,” I say the following: This is a purpose built camera. You would not want it as an interchangeable system, it can’t compete with DSLR speed. A viewfinder would make the thing bigger and ruin the magic ratio of body to sensor size—further, there is a 3-inch LCD viewfinder on the back! Autofocus is super fast, you just don’t realize it because the bar has been raised impossibly high by ultra-sonic magnet focusing rings on professional DSLR lenses. There’s a fantastic balance at work here between image quality and size—great tools are about the total experience, not about one or the other specification.
In short, design is about making choices. I think Sony has made some good ones with the RX1.
In use
So I’ve just written 1,000 words of a user report without, you know, reporting on use. In many ways the images on the page are my user report. These photographs, more than my words, should give you a flavor of what the RX1 is about. But, for the sake of variety, I intend to tell you a bit about the how and the why of shooting with the RX1.
Snapshots
As a beginning enthusiast, I often sneered at the idea of a snapshot. As I’ve matured, I’ve come to appreciate what a pocket camera and a snapshot can offer. The RX1 is the ultimate photographer’s snapshot camera.
I’ll pause here to properly define snapshot as a photograph taken quickly with a handheld camera.
To quote Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” So it is with photography. Beautiful photographs happen at the decisive moment—and to paraphrase Henri Cartier-Bresson further—the world is newly made and falling to pieces every instant. I think it is no coincidence that each revolution in the steady march of photography from the tortuously slow chemistry of tin-type and daguerreotype through 120 and 35mm formats to the hyper-sensitive CMOS of today has engendered new categories and concepts of photography.
Photography is a reflexive, reactionary activity. I see beautiful light or the unusual in an every day event and my reaction is a desire to make a photograph. It’s a bit like breathing and has been since I was a kid.
Rather than sneer at snapshots, nowadays I seek them out; and when I seek them out, I do so with the Sony RX1 in my hand.
How I shoot with the RX1
Despite much bluster from commenters on other reviews as to the price point and the purpose-built nature of this camera (see above), the RX1 is incredibly flexible. Have a peek at some of the linked reviews and you’ll see handheld portraits, long exposures, images taken with off-camera flash, etc.
Yet, I mentioned earlier that I reach for the D800 when photography is the primary goal and so the RX1 has become for me a handheld camera—something I use almost exclusively at f/2 (people, objects, shallow DoF) or f/8 (landscapes in abundant light, abstracts). The Auto-ISO setting allows the camera to choose in the range from ISO 50 and 6400 to reach a proper exposure at a given aperture with a 1/80 s shutter speed. I have found this shutter speed ensures a sharp image every time (although photographers with more jittery grips may wish there was the ability to select a different default shutter speed). This strategy works because the RX1 has a delightfully clicky exposure compensation dial just under your right thumb—allowing for fine adjustment to the camera’s metering decision.
So then, if you find me out with the RX1, you’re likely to see me on aperture priority, f/2 and auto ISO. Indeed, many of the photographs on this page were taken in that mode (including lots of the landscape shots!).
Working within constraints.
The RX1 is a wonderful camera to have when you have to work within constraints. When I say this, I mean it is great for photography within two different classes of constraints: 1) physical constraints of time and space and 2) intellectual/artistic constraints.
To speak to the first, as I said earlier, many of the photographs on this page were made possible by having a camera with me at a time that I otherwise would not have been lugging around a camera. For example, some of the images from the Grand Canyon you see were made in a pinch on my way to a Christmas dinner with my family. I didn’t have the larger camera with me and I just had a minute to make the image. Truth be told, these images could have been made with my cell phone, but that I could wring such great image quality out of something not much larger than my cell phone is just gravy. Be it jacket pocket, small bag, bike bag, saddle bag, even fannie pack—you have space for this camera anywhere you go.
Earlier I alluded to the obtrusiveness of a large camera. If you want to travel lightly and make photographs without announcing your presence, it’s easier to use a smaller camera. Here the RX1 excels. Moreover, the camera’s leaf shutter is virtually silent, so you can snap away without announcing your intention. In every sense, this camera is meant to work within physical constraints.
I cut my photographic teeth on film and I will always have an affection for it. There is a sense that one is playing within the rules when he uses film. That same feeling is here in the RX1. I never thought I’d say this about a camera, but I often like the JPEG images this thing produces more than I like what I can push with a RAW. Don’t get me wrong, for a landscape or a cityscape, the RAW processed carefully is FAR, FAR better than a JPEG.
But when I am taking snapshots or photos of friends and family, I find the JPEGs the camera produces (I’m shooting in RAW + JPEG) so beautiful. The camera’s computer corrects for the lens distortion and provides the perfect balance of contrast and saturation. The JPEG engine can be further tweaked to increase the amount of contrast, saturation or dynamic range optimization (shadow boost) used in writing those files. Add in the ability to rapidly compensate exposure or activate various creative modes and you’ve got this feeling you’re shooting film again. Instant, ultra-sensitive and customizable film.
Pro Tip: Focusing
Almost all cameras come shipped with what I consider to be the worst of the worst focus configurations. Even the Nikon D800 came to my hands set to focus when the shutter button was halfway depressed. This mode will ruin almost any photograph. Why? Because it requires you to perform legerdemain to place the autofocus point, depress the shutter halfway, recompose and press the shutter fully. In addition to the chance of accidentally refocusing after composing or missing the shot—this method absolutely ensures that one must focus before every single photograph. Absolutely impossible for action or portraiture.
Sensibly, most professional or prosumer cameras come with an AF-ON button near where the shooter’s right thumb rests. This separates the task of focusing and exposing, allowing the photographer to quickly focus and to capture the image even if focus is slightly off at the focus point. For portraits, kids, action, etc the camera has to have a hair-trigger. It has to be responsive. Manufacturer’s: stop shipping your cameras with this ham-fisted autofocus arrangement.
Now, the RX1 does not have an AF-ON button, but it does have an AEL button whose function can be changed to “MF/AF Control Hold” in the menu. Further, other buttons on the rear of the camera can also be programmed to toggle between AF and MF modes. What this all means is that you can work around the RX1’s buttons to make it’s focus work like a DSLR’s. (For those of you who are RX1 shooters, set the front switch to MF, the right control wheel button to MF/AF Toggle and the AEL button to MF/AF Control Hold and voila!) The end result is that, when powered on the camera is in manual focus mode, but the autofocus can be activated by pressing AEL, no matter what, however, the shutter is tripped by the shutter release. Want to switch to AF mode? Just push a button and you’re back to the standard modality.
Carrying.
I keep mine in a small, neoprene pouch with a semi-hard LCD cover and a circular polarizing filter on the front—perfect for buttoning up and throwing into a bag on my way out of the house. I have a soft release screwed into the threaded shutter release and a custom, red twill strap to replace the horrible plastic strap Sony provided. I plan to gaffer tape the top and the orange ring around the lens. Who knows, I may find an old Voigtlander optical viewfinder in future as well.
Kamera: Nikon FM
Linse: Nikkor-N Auto 24mm f2.8 (1970)
Film: Rollei P&R 640 @ box speed
Kjemi: Rodinal (1:25 / 13:30 min. @ 20°C)
Thursday 29 February 2024: Today, at the Nabulsi roundabout just south of Gaza City, Israel committed a horrible massacre shooting into a large crowd of civilians desperate for food who was gathering around humanitarian aid trucks. Israel killed more than 100 people and seriously injured 700 - this is a TOTAL WAR CRIME.
Al Jazeera: Cold-blooded massacre (publ. 29 Feb. 2024) [Requires log-in to see]
Israelis have confirmed that IDF soldiers shot against a ‘violent crowd’ who moved towards them ‘menacingly’. Israel claim they are ‘investigating’ the event. In the American Fox News, these news are reported as a ‘deadly stampede’ and a ‘deadly aid incident’.
Fox News: Deadly stampede over aid in Gaza (publ. 29 Feb. 2024) [Fox changed the title 3 hours later]
There have been so many shocking events happening in the last few days - Aaron Bushnell self-immolating, and today this massacre - that I feel we also need to remind ourselves to keep our eyes seriously steady and hyper-focused on what is happening in the background.
First of all, the ICJ hearing on the legality of Israel´s occupation of Palestine concluded on monday, and it concluded with some of the best presentations held in all the hearings. I would like to highlight the supreme presentation delivered by the Arab League, and also the presentations of Spain and the Maldives. All nations heard presented similar views, with the exception of USA, the UK, Zambia and Fiji. USA, the UK, Zambia and Fiji’s presentations were more focused on the importance of entering private ‘negotiations’ between the parties rather than the court should decide on anything pertaining to the actual legality of Israel’s occupation. USA, UK, Zambia and Fiji wants this matter to be settled outside the court.
In my view, the Palestinians should NEVER EVER enter ANY negotiations on Israel’s occupation led by America and be tricked into settling a ‘deal’ with Israel. There is NOTHING legal about Israel’s occupation of their land. The whole world knows it.
Secondly, as the ICJ hearings were being concluded, prime minister Mohammad Shtayyeh (b. 1958) suddenly announced that the Palestinian government resigns. This smells America a looong way. First of all, the PA government hasn’t really resigned. The corrupt interloper Mahmoud Abbas (b. 1935) is still in reign as their President, and the old government still continues - only now in an administrative role and not in a political role. To me, it sounds very much like the USA is trying to lay the ground for a new government that they - will choose. I say; let the Palestinians themselves choose their own government in free and open elections.
Thirdly, suddenly the geriatric American president Joe Biden (b. 1942) starts talking about his ‘hope’ for a possible hostage deal and a ceasefire within next monday; March 4th. Well dream on, Joe, that ‘deal’ will not be happening because Israel refuses to meet the demands of Hamas of a permanent ceasefire, and the USA does not want to include the resistance movement in Gaza in their future plans for a new Palestinian government.
So that is where we stand today. What atrocities will Israel commit tomorrow? We shall see. In the meanwhile, I will present to you the most excellent presentation in the ICJ held by the League of Arab States, represented by Abdel Hakim El Rifai and Ralph Wilde. If there is ONE presentation you need to see, hear or read - it is this one:
International Court of Justice: Day 6 hearing on the legal consequences of Israel's occupation of Palestinian territories (publ. 26 February 2024) [Video]
International Court of Justice: Legal Consequences arising from the Policies and Practices of Israel in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem [Transcripts and Documents]
The PRESIDENT: I thank the delegation of Zambia for its presentation. I invite the next participating delegation, the League of Arab States, to address the Court and I call Mr Abdel Hakim El Rifai to the podium.
Mr EL RIFAI: [ARAB LEAGUE] (26 Feb. 2024)
1. Thank you, Mr President, honourable Members of the Court, it is a great honour and privilege to appear before you today, on behalf of the League of Arab States.
2. I would like to read a statement by His Excellency Mr Ahmed Aboul Gheit (b. 1942), Secretary- General of the League of Arab States.
3. The League of Arab States attaches high importance to the present proceedings, hoping that they contribute to safeguarding the principles of international law, to uphold the inalienable right of the Palestinian people to self-determination, and end the last oppressive, expansionist, apartheid, settler-colonial occupation, still standing in the twenty-first century.
4. The persistence of this occupation, acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, crimes against humanity, displacement of populations, imprisonment of Palestinians behind illegal segregation walls, expansion of illegal settlements, creating new political realities on the ground aiming at complicating the dismantling of the occupation ⎯ all ⎯ will never discourage Palestinians from claiming their legitimate inalienable rights.
5. The insistence on placing Israel above the law, through the politicization of accountability and adopting double standards in the application of justice is a direct threat to international peace and stability.
6. Ending Israel’s total impunity, and subjecting it ⎯ like any other State ⎯ to the universal rules of international law, will help annul its pretexts to systematically reject peace initiatives, the most serious of which is the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002, which offered full normalization of relations with all Arab States, in exchange of Israel only respecting its already established obligations, under the bodies of international law, human rights law, and the United Nations Security Council and General Assembly resolutions.
7. This prolonged occupation is an affront to international justice. The failure to bring it to an end has led to the current horrors perpetrated against the Palestinian people, amounting to genocide. There can be no moral or juridical justification for occupying lands, killing, terrorizing and displacing their populations.
8. The League of Arab States trusts the esteemed Court will confirm the illegality of this occupation and unambiguously rule on the legal consequences for all parties, especially those who turn a blind eye, facilitate, assist or participate in any way in perpetuating this illegal situation.
9. Only the rule of law ⎯ not the prevailing “law of the jungle” ⎯ will pave the way to peace in the whole region. Ending the occupation is the gateway to peaceful coexistence.
10. Thank you very much for your kind attention. I now respectfully request, Mr President, that you call on Dr Ralph Wilde, Senior Counsel and Advocate, to address the legal questions before the Court.
The PRESIDENT: I thank Mr El Rifai. I now give the floor to Mr Ralph Wilde. You have the floor, Sir.
Mr WILDE: [ARAB LEAGUE] (26 Feb. 2024)
1. Mr President, distinguished Members of the Court, it is a great honour and privilege to appear before you, and to represent the League of Arab States.
1. MORE THAN CENTURY-LONG DENIAL OF SELF-DETERMINATION OF, AND WAR AGAINST, THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE, ON THE BASIS OF RACISM
2. The Palestinian people have been denied the exercise of their legal right to self-determination through the more than century-long violent, colonial, racist effort to establish a nation State exclusively for the Jewish people in the land of Mandatory Palestine.
3. When this began after the First World War, the Jewish population of that land was 11 per cent. Forcibly implementing Zionism in this demographic context has necessarily involved the extermination, or forced displacement of, some of the non-Jewish Palestinian population; the exercise of domination over, and subjugation, dispossession and immiseration of, remaining non-Jewish Palestinians; the emigration to that land of Jewish people, regardless of any direct personal link; and the denial of Palestinian refugees the right to return. All operating through a racist distinction privileging Jewish people over non-Jewish Palestinian people.
4. This has necessitated serious violations of all the fundamental, jus cogens and erga omnes norms of international law — the right of self-determination, the prohibitions on aggression, genocide, crimes against humanity, racial discrimination, apartheid and torture ⎯ and the core protections of international humanitarian law.
5. Today I will address, first, violations of international law arising out of the régime of racial domination — apartheid — perpetrated against the Palestinian people across the entire land of historic Palestine, and then, second, the existential illegality of Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since 1967.
6. As a necessary prerequisite, I must begin with the special right granted to the Palestinian people in the League Covenant.
2. PALESTINIAN SELF-DETERMINATION UNDER ARTICLE 22 OF THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS COVENANT
7. The legal right of self-determination of the Palestinian people originates in the “sacred trust” obligations of Article 22 of the League Covenant, part of the Versailles Treaty. Palestine ⎯ an “A” class Mandate under British colonial rule ⎯ was, after the First World War, supposed to have its existence as an independent State “provisionally recognized”: a sui generis right of self-determination. The United Kingdom and other members of the League Council attempted to bypass this, incorporating the 1917 Balfour Declaration commitment to establishing a national home for the Jewish people in Palestine into the instrument stipulating how the Mandate would operate. However, the Council had no legal power to bypass the Covenant in this way. It acted ultra vires, and the relevant provisions were, legally, void. There was and is no legal basis in that Mandate instrument for either a specifically Jewish State in Palestine, or the United Kingdom’s failure to discharge the “sacred trust” obligation to implement Palestinian self-determination.
3. SELF-DETERMINATION IN INTERNATIONAL LAW AFTER THE SECOND WORLD WAR —AN ADDITIONAL RIGHT
8. After the Second World War, a self-determination right applicable to colonial peoples generally crystallized in international law.
9. For the Palestinian people, this essentially corresponded to, and supplemented, the pre-existing Covenant right, regarding the same, single territory. The 1947 proposal to partition Palestine was contrary to this; the Arab rejection an affirmation of the legal status quo.
10. In 1948, then, Palestine was, legally, a single territory with a single population enjoying a right of self-determination on a unitary basis.
4. NAKBA IN 1948 — VIOLATION OF SELF-DETERMINATION AND CREATION OF A RÉGIME INVOLVING AN ONGOING VIOLATION OF THIS RIGHT,
AS WELL AS RACIAL DISCRIMINATION AND APARTHEID
AND A DENIAL OF THE RIGHT TO RETURN
11. Despite this, a State of Israel, specifically for Jewish people, was proclaimed in 1948 by those controlling 78 per cent — more than three quarters — of Palestine, accompanied by the forced displacement of a significant number of the non-Jewish Palestinian population — the Nakba, catastrophe. This illegal secession was an egregious violation of Palestinian self-determination. Israel’s statehood was recognized, and Israel admitted as a United Nations Member, despite this illegality. Israel is not the legal continuation or successor of the Mandate.
12. This violation of Palestinian self-determination is ongoing, and unresolved. Two key elements are:
13. First, Palestinian people not displaced from the land proclaimed to be of Israel in 1948, and their descendants, have been forced to live as citizens— presently they constitute 17.2 per cent — of a State conceived to be of and for another racial group, under the domination of that group, necessarily treated as second class, because of their race.
14. Second, Palestinian people displaced from that land, and their descendants, cannot return.
15. These are serious breaches of the right of self-determination, the prohibitions of racial discrimination and apartheid, and the right of return. They must end, immediately.
5. 1967 ISRAELI CAPTURE OF THE PALESTINIAN GAZA STRIP AND WEST BANK (INCLUDING EAST JERUSALEM)
16. As if this ongoing Nakba was not catastrophic enough, in 1967 Israel captured the remaining 22 per cent of historic Palestine — the Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem — the Naksa. It has maintained that use of force to remain in control for the 57-year period since.
6. ILLEGAL RACIAL DOMINATION — APARTHEID — FROM THE JORDAN RIVER TO THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA
17. For more than half a century, then, a State defined to be of and for Jewish people exclusively has governed the entire land of historic Palestine and the Palestinian people there. And the régime of racial domination — apartheid — and denying return, has been extended throughout. In the case of Palestinians living in the occupied territory, this has involved the same serious violations of international law, supplemented by serious violations of norms applicable in occupied territory.
18. Indeed, these people are subject to an even more extreme form of racist domination, as they are not even citizens of the State exercising authority over them. Even in East Jerusalem, which Israel has purported to annex, the majority non-Jewish Palestinian residents do not have citizenship, whereas Jewish residents, including illegal settlers, are citizens.
19. Just as in territorial Israel, in occupied territory, these serious violations concerning how Israel exercises authority over the Palestinian people must end immediately.
20. However, here, a more fundamental matter must also be addressed. The illegality of the exercise of authority itself.
7. THE GAZA STRIP AND WEST BANK AS PALESTINIAN TERRITORY, WITH THE CONSEQUENCE THAT ISRAEL’S PURPORTED ANNEXATION, AND ATTEMPTED COLONIZATION, ARE ILLEGAL
21. The enduring Palestinian right of self-determination means that the Palestinian people, and the State of Palestine, not Israel, are sovereign over the territory Israel captured in 1967. For Israel, the land is extraterritorial, and, given what I said about the Mandate, territory over which it has no legal sovereign entitlement.
22. Despite this, Israel has purported to annex East Jerusalem and taken various actions there and in the rest of the West Bank constituting de jure and de facto purported annexation, including implanting settlements. It is Israeli policy that Israel should be not only the exclusive authority over the entire land between the river and the sea, but also the exclusive sovereign authority there.
23. This constitutes a complete repudiation of Palestinian self-determination as a legal right, since it empties the right entirely of any territorial content.
24. Actualizing this through de facto and de jure purported annexation is, first, a serious violation of Palestinian self-determination and, second, because it is enabled through the use of force, a violation of the prohibition on the purported acquisition of territory through the use of force in the law on the use of force, and so an aggression. Serious violations of further areas of law regulating the conduct of the occupation are also being perpetrated, notably the prohibitions on implanting settlements and altering, unless absolutely prevented, the legal, political, social and religious status quo.
25. The occupation is, therefore, existentially illegal because of its use to actualize purported annexation. To end this serious illegality, it must be terminated: Israel must renounce all sovereignty claims and all settlements must be removed. Immediately.
26. However, this is not the only basis on which the occupation’s existential legality must be addressed.
27. We need to delve deeper into both the law of self-determination and the law on the use of force.
8. SELF-DETERMINATION AS A RIGHT TO BE SELF-GOVERNING, REQUIRING THE OCCUPATION TO END IMMEDIATELY
28. Beginning with self-determination: this right, when applied to the Palestinian people in the territory Israel captured in 1967, is a right to be entirely self-governing, free from Israeli domination.
29. Consequently, the Palestinian people have a legal right to the immediate end of the occupation. And Israel has a co-relative legal duty to immediately terminate the occupation.
30. This right exists and operates simply and exclusively because the Palestinian people are entitled to it. It does not depend on others agreeing to its realization. It is a right.
31. It is a repudiation of “trusteeship”, whereby colonial peoples were ostensibly to be granted freedom only if and when they were deemed “ready” because of their stage of “development” determined by the racist standard of civilization. The anti-colonial self-determination rule replaced this with a right based on the automatic, immediate entitlement of all people to freedom, without preconditions. In the words of General Assembly resolution 1514, “inadequacy of . . . preparedness should never serve as a pretext for delaying independence”.
32. Some suggest that the Palestinian people were offered, and rejected, deals that could have ended the occupation. And, therefore, Israel can maintain it pending a settlement. Even assuming, arguendo, the veracity of this account, the “deals” involved a further loss of the sovereign territory of the Palestinian people.
33. Israel cannot lawfully demand concessions on Palestinian rights as the price for ending its impediment to Palestinian freedom. This would mean Israel using force to coerce the Palestinian people to give up some of their peremptory legal rights: illegal in the law on the use of force and, necessarily, voiding the relevant terms of any agreement reached. The Palestinian people are legally entitled to reject a further loss of land over which they have an exclusive, legal, peremptory right. Any such rejection makes no difference to Israel’s immediate legal obligation to end the occupation.
9. THE OCCUPATION AS AN ILLEGAL USE OF FORCE IN THE JUS AD BELLUM AS A GENERAL MATTER (BEYOND THE LINK TO PURPORTED ANNEXATION)
34. Turning to the law on the use of force: Israel’s control over the Palestinian territory since 1967, as a military occupation, is an ongoing use of force. As such, its existential legality is determined by the law on the use of force, as a general matter, beyond the specific issue of annexation.
35. Israel captured the Gaza Strip and West Bank from Egypt and Jordan in the war it launched against them and Syria. It claimed to be acting in self-defence, anticipating a non-immediately imminent attack. The war was over after six days. Peace treaties between Israel and Egypt and Jordan were subsequently adopted.
36. Despite this, Israel maintained control of the territory — continuing the use of force enabling its capture.
37. Israel’s 1967 war was illegal in the jus ad bellum — even assuming, arguendo, its claim of a feared attack, States cannot lawfully use force in non-immediately imminent anticipatory self-defence.
38. Alternatively, assuming ⎯ again arguendo ⎯ that the war was lawful, the justification ended after six days. However, the jus ad bellum requirements continued to apply to the occupation as itself a continuing use of force. In 1967, with self-determination well established in international law, States could not lawfully use force to retain control over a self-determination unit captured in war, unless the legal test justifying the initial use of force also justified, on the same basis, the use of force in retaining control. Moreover, this justification would need to continue, not only in the immediate aftermath, but for more than half a century. Manifestly, this legal test has not been met.
39. Israel’s exercise of control over the Gaza Strip and West Bank through the use of force has been illegal in the jus ad bellum since the capture of the territory, or, at least, very soon afterwards.
40. The occupation is, therefore, again existentially illegal in the law on the use of force — an aggression — this time, as a general matter, beyond illegality specific to annexation. To terminate this serious violation, the occupation must, likewise, end immediately.
10. ILLEGAL FORCE DOES NOT BECOME LAWFUL IN RESPONSE TO RESISTANCE TO IT
41. What of Israel’s current military action in Gaza? This is not a war that began in October 2023. It is a drastic scaling-up of the force exercised there, and in the West Bank, on a continual basis, since 1967. A justification for a new phase in an ongoing illegal use of force cannot be constructed solely out of the consequences of violent resistance to that illegal use of force. Otherwise, an illegal use of force would be rendered lawful because those subject to it violently resisted — circular logic, with a perverse outcome.
11. ISRAEL CANNOT LAWFULLY USE FORCE TO CONTROL THE PALESTINIAN TERRITORY FOR SECURITY PURPOSES/PENDING A PEACE AGREEMENT
42. More generally, Israel cannot lawfully use force to control the Palestinian territory for security purposes pending an agreement providing security guarantees. States can only lawfully use force outside their borders in extremely narrow circumstances. Beyond that, they must address security concerns non-forcibly.
43. The United States of America, the United Kingdom and Zambia suggested here that there is a sui generis applicable legal framework, an Israeli-Palestinian lex specialis. This somehow supersedes the rules of international law determining whether the occupation is existentially lawful. Instead, we have a new rule, justifying the occupation until there is a peace agreement meeting Israeli security needs. This is the law as these States would like it to be, not the law as it is. It has no basis in resolution 242, Oslo or any other resolutions or agreements. Actually, you are being invited to do away with the very operation of some of the fundamental, peremptory rules of international law itself. As a result, the matters these rules conceive as rights vested in the Palestinian people would be realized only if agreement is reached, and only on the basis of such agreement. At best, if there is an agreement, this means one that need not be compatible with Palestinian peremptory legal rights, determined only by the acute power imbalance in Israel’s favour. At worst, if there is no agreement, this means that the indefinite continuation of Israeli rule over the Palestinian people in the occupied Palestinian territories, on the basis of racist supremacy and a claim to sovereignty, would be lawful. This is an affront to the international rule of law, to the United Nations Charter imperative to settle disputes in conformity with international law, and to your judicial function as guardians of the international legal system.
44. A final potential basis sometimes invoked to justify continuing the occupation should be addressed. Occupation and human rights law — applicable to illegal and lawful occupations alike — oblige Israel to address security threats in occupied territory. However, they only regulate the conduct of an occupation when it exists. They do not also provide a legal basis for that existence itself. Existential legality is determined by the law of self-determination and the jus ad bellum only. There is no “back door” legal basis for Israel to maintain the occupation through the imperatives of occupation and human rights law.
12. EXISTENTIAL ILLEGALITY OF ISRAEL’S OCCUPATION OF THE PALESTINIAN GAZA STRIP AND WEST BANK, INCLUDING EAST JERUSALEM
45. In sum: the occupation of the Palestinian Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem, is existentially illegal on two mutually reinforcing bases.
46. First, the law on the use of force. Here, the occupation is illegal both as a use of force without valid justification, and because it is enabling an illegal purported annexation. As such, it is an aggression.
47. Second, the law of self-determination. Here, it is illegal again because of the association with illegal purported annexation, and also, more generally, because it is, quite simply, an exercise of authority over the Palestinian people that, by its very nature, violates their right to freedom.
48. This multifaceted existential illegality — involving serious violations of peremptory norms — has two key consequences.
49. First: the occupation must end: Israel must renounce its claim to sovereignty over the Palestinian territory; all settlers must be removed. Immediately. This is required to end the illegality, to discharge the positive obligation to enable immediate Palestinian self-administration, and because Israel lacks any legal entitlement to exercise authority.
50. Second, in the absence of the occupation ending, necessarily, everything Israel does in the Palestinian territory lacks a valid international legal basis and is, therefore (subject to the Namibia exception), invalid, not only those things violating the law regulating the conduct of the occupation. Those norms entitle and require Israel to do certain things. But this does not alter the more fundamental position, from the law on the use of force and self-determination, that Israel lacks any valid authority to do anything, and whatever it does is illegal, even if compliant with or pursuant to the conduct-regulatory rules.
13. THE WORDS OF REFAAT ALAREER
51. I will close by quoting Palestinian academic and poet Refaat Alareer (1979-2023), from his final poem posted 36 days before he was killed by Israel in Gaza on 6 December 2023:
If I must die, you must live to tell my story [...]
If I must die
let it bring hope, let it be a story.
Thank you for your attention.
The PRESIDENT: I thank the delegation of the League of Arab States for its presentation. Before I invite the next delegation to make its oral statement, the Court will observe a break for 10 minutes. The sitting is suspended.
The Court adjourned from 11.25 a.m.to 11.40 a.m.