NYC: The Fast and Enormous

[photosmash=]

Growing up in Queens, I was an avid fan of Spiderman.  I would often dream of slinging from skyscraper to skyscraper, and swooping down Manhattan streets to save the day.  Although, I will never be able to do this, through photography, I can always capture the views of the city that Spiderman would probably see a lot of if only he existed.  In this gallery, I display different views of the city, including ground level, aerial, and distanced views, in order to display the immense size and the speed of New York City.

“Karnveer! Pay attention to the directions, and stop taking pictures.  We just missed another turn because of you” Brandon yelled frantically. Brandon, Tracy and I were driving to the Metropolitan Opera to watch Rigoletto, and I was the GPS system (reading the directions).  Both Tracy and Brandon were worried about being late, while I was calmly taking pictures of everything that caught my attention.  My deviation from reading the directions had caused us to miss a turn, but it was worth it, because we eventually made it to the Metropolitan Opera on time, and I got my photos.  These photos were taken in the night, and were taken from ground level.  One of my favorite photos taken on our journey was of the twin buildings of the Time Warner Center. I thought the photo was very unique due to the contrast between the vibrant red lights from the cars, and the blue and white lights coming from the buildings above.  Another one of these photos that I really liked was “Blurred City”, because I took it when the car was moving fast, and due to the speed, the lighting came out fuzzy; it captures the theme of speed that exists in New York City life.

If you want to feel like you are on top of the world, nothing will provide you a better feeling of this than looking down from a New York City skyscraper.  In July and August, through a summer program I was in, I was able to access some very high vantage points at some of the biggest buildings in New York including the Sony Tower, and the law offices of Winston and Strawn at the Met Life Building. At these incredible heights, the city appeared to be toy-like. When I looked out of the windows at these buildings, especially at the Sony Tower, I was amazed by the seemingly infinite amount of buildings lined up one after the other.  While at the Winston and Strawn office, I was awestruck when I looked down at the speed of New York City; cars and people raced up and down the city streets and showed no signs of stopping; with my photos, I tried to slow it down.

Some of my favorite photos of New York City are actually from outside of the city. The “Sunset from Queens” photo was taken from the Van Wyck Expressway; in the backdrop of this photo, you can see the New York skyline in a reverse fashion.  Here, these larger than life buildings appear microscopic.  Although the photo is taken from a great distance, the skyscrapers are still visible, showing their tremendous sizes.  To take this photo, I had to pull down the window, and hold out my phone firmly, making sure I didn’t drop it.  My dad constantly reminded me that if I dropped it, he wasn’t going to pay for a new one, so I was definitely under pressure.  The other photo that I took from outside of the city was the “The Empire State Building from the Queensboro Bridge”.  This photo appears blurry, because it was one I took while we were heading away from the city, and I had to position myself in an awkward position to take it.  These two photos were much different from the other ones I took, because they look at the city from the outside.

With it’s heaven reaching skyscrapers, and rocket fast life style, New York City can’t possibly be captured in a few photos.  But that hasn’t stopped me from trying.  Over the past six months I’ve really been exposed to New York City, and wherever I’ve gone, I’ve snapped photos of everything I’ve seen.  In this album, I’ve included photos that capture the size and speed of New York City.