NEW YORK PHOTO BLOG / DAVE BECKERMAN

This is really about half painting, and half photograph. It began as an infrared photo when I was experimenting with various filters on the 40D (i.e. it wasn’t a modified IR camera as I used later on). But there was enough of an outline and I had colors from another shot, so that I essentially cloned the colors of the normal shot into this one. Yes – bit by bit in 2008.

He manages one of the buildings nearby, and this is not an unusual posture for him. If you stop by around 7 a.m. you’ll find him looking out on the block, preparing to sweep and pick up garbage that’s been tossed around during the previous night.

I’m old enough to remember a time when stores weren’t gated. And I can remember when the larger stores had to put up gates, and eventually every store in the city needed some sort of protection. Even these sorts of gates don’t do the trick though; and one morning I walked by to find that someone had easily cracked the glass behind the gate in a few places. It must seem like fun for the drunk guys spilling out onto the streets in the middle of the night.