Category: France

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Quiet

Every time I travel and have a chance to live in a new place for an extended period of time, I appreciate how quiet our little cul-de-sac in Victoria is. During our last stay in Paris during my sabbatical, our apartment was on the ground floor, and the entrance from the street led directly to the living room, or séjour, as our Parisian friends called it. When people outside would sit on the steps leading to our door (I suppose, that was a convenient place to sit on the relatively lively street) and have a conversation, it would sound as if they were sitting inside and talking to us. As much as it was nice to have a chance to listen to some native French speakers, it made us appreciate the relative silence of our usual suburban living. Funny enough, the sound insulation in our Paris dwelling was so marginal that it worked, or rather didn’t, both ways. When my daughter or I would start playing violin (being very diligent students) the people outside would often leave, not because of our poor skills (I hope), but because the music would interfere with their conversation. Another evidence of the power of the music.

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L’Arbre des voyelles

Last summer in Paris, I saw, almost by chance, the sculpture by Giuseppe Penone called “L’Arbre des voyelles”, or “The tree of vowels.” I wasn’t specifically planning on visiting it, but it was marked as a point of interest on Google Maps, and I was curious to see what it was. It is located in the Tuillleries garden, in the somewhat wilder and greener part of the park. As the name suggests, it’s a sculpture of a tree. It is incredibly realistic, despite being mage of bronze. As I later learned upon doing some reading, Penone used a 30-meter uprooted oak tree as a model, eventually casting it in bronze. The bronze tree looks like it really belongs in the garden. In fact, my first thought was that it could have been easily replaced by the original tree without any loss of artistic value. But then, of course, provoking this kind of thoughts was probably the artist’s intention.

Regarding the deeper meaning, when I was looking at the sculpture, I was focussed on the roots and completely missed the significance of the five branches. At the points where the branches touch the ground, there were planted five different species of oak trees. So the significance of the artwork (or at least one of the points it conveys) is to show the role of human creativity in the evolution of the environment.

Initially, I also didn’t understand the significance of the name of the sculpture, but reading about it later, learned that the roots apparently resemble the vowels A, E, I, O, U. Penone mentioned that he was inspired by the hypothetical alphabet of the druids. On the other hand, these letters are also associated with the famous sonnet “Voyelles,” written by Arthur Rimbaud in 1871. (I read it on the Internet, so it must be true!)

For what it’s worth, it’s a nice association. Here is the original sonnet:

Voyelles

A noir, E blanc, I rouge, U vert, O bleu: voyelles,
Je dirai quelque jour vos naissances latentes:
A, noir corset velu des mouches éclatantes
Qui bombinent autour des puanteurs cruelles,

Golfes d’ombre; E, candeurs des vapeurs et des tentes,
Lances des glaciers fiers, rois blancs, frissons d’ombelles;
I, pourpres, sang craché, rire des lèvres belles
Dans la colère ou les ivresses pénitentes;

U, cycles, vibrements divins des mers virides,
Paix des pâtis semés d’animaux, paix des rides
Que l’alchimie imprime aux grands fronts studieux;

O, suprême Clairon plein des strideurs étranges,
Silences traversés des Mondes et des Anges:
—O l’Oméga, rayon violet de Ses Yeux!

Here is a English translation by Oliver Bernard: (“Arthur Rimbaud, Collected Poems (1962)”):

Vowels

A Black, E white, I red, U green, O blue : vowels,
I shall tell, one day, of your mysterious origins:
A, black velvety jacket of brilliant flies
Which buzz around cruel smells,

Gulfs of shadow; E, whiteness of vapours and of tents,
Lances of proud glaciers, white kings, shivers of cow-parsley;
I, purples, spat blood, smile of beautiful lips In anger or in the raptures of penitence;

U, waves, divine shudderings of viridian seas,
The peace of pastures dotted with animals, the peace of the furrows
Which alchemy prints on broad studious foreheads;

O, sublime Trumpet full of strange piercing sounds,
Silences crossed by Worlds and by Angels:
O the Omega, the violet ray of Her Eyes!

And I also liked this translation into Russian by Nikolai Gumilev:

Гласные

А — черно, бело — Е, У — зелено, О — сине,
И — красно… Я хочу открыть рождение гласных.
А — траурный корсет под стаей мух ужасных,
Роящихся вокруг как в падали иль в тине,

Мир мрака; Е — покой тумана над пустыней,
Дрожание цветов, взлет ледников опасных.
И — пурпур, сгустком кровь, улыбка губ прекрасных
В их ярости иль в их безумье пред святыней.

У — дивные круги морей зеленоватых,
Луг, пестрый от зверья, покой морщин, измятых
Алхимией на лбах задумчивых людей.

О — звона медного глухое окончанье,
Кометой, ангелом пронзенное молчанье,
Омега, луч Её сиреневых очей.

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The art and science of the Eiffel Tower

When I was first learning about travel stock photography, the Eiffel Tower was given as an example of a universally-recognized landmark that is both most-photographed and most demanded for editorial purposes. This is a bit surprising, because with so many images of it available, one would think that the demand would be satisfied many times over.

Still, there is something more to photographing the Eiffel Tower than simply chalking up another must-take image on the itinerary, at least for me personally. Just being there reaffirms that I am, in fact, in Paris. This is why it this one of the first sites I like to visit when I am in the city. Also, it somehow represents the synergy between the art and engineering, which I find fascinating.

For example, I found out recently that one of the first wind tunnels for fluid mechanics experiments was designed by Gustave Eiffel and installed in the aerodynamics laboratory at the foot of the tower in 1909. It was later moved to its present location in Auteuil in 1912, where it’s still operational, in principle. It is also curious that around that time, Eiffel was involved in a scientific argument about equivalency between testing the aerodynamic properties of objects in a wind tunnel and towing them through air on railroad tracks. Apparently, he appealed for mediation to Henri Poincaré, who declared that the tests would be equivalent, provided that there would be sufficient room in the wind tunnel to from around the tested object without obstruction (what we now refer to as low blockage).

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Travel photos

This summer, we took or first post-COVID long-distance trip. I had a conference in France, and my wife and daughter joined me. Afterwards, we followed up the conference with a few days of family vacation in Antibes. It was a great trip overall, and it reminded us how much we missed travelling. Looking back at my photos, though, I realize that it has always been a bit of challenge for me to enjoy the experience of the foreign locale at the moment. Interestingly, my photography interest is both the reason and the cure for this difficulty.

This disconnect with reality is described by Anthony De Mello in his book “Awareness” (the book has been largely a disappointment, but that is a different topic). He says that most people plan their vacations, book flights an, but when they get there, they immediately start worrying about their flight back home. So they are not fully present to experience their travel destination. They take pictures, but they miss the smells, the tastes, the sense of the place. So people bring back pictures of the places they didn’t actually see.

On the other hand, taking photos gives me focus by providing motivation for visiting specific sites, waiting for a certain time, when the sun hits the subject with the golden light. These are the moments that I tend to remember afterwards. During this trip, for example, we were having dinner at a street-side restaurant just steps from the Eiffel Tower, and I kept popping out from the table to peek across the corner to see if the setting sun had hit the tower.

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Photo opportunities

The concierge at my hotel in Paris (who, incidentally, could fluently speak several languages) gave me some excellent suggestions regarding moving around in Paris and interesting sights to photograph. In retrospect, most of the things he recommended turned out to be quite the opppsite (e.g. suggested metro stations were closed and supposedly photogenic sights turning out to be not so much so). He did, however, have the correct sense that timing and luck were important factors in taking a good photo. For example, he mentioned that a photo of the Eiffel Tour being struck by a lightning made the front pages of local newspapers not long ago. The Tower is the most photographed monument in the world, so for a photo of it to make front-page news requires something to be going on (in addition to the tower simply being there).

The concierge also suggested to look for a moonrise over the Notre-Dame cathedral, and I was excited to try it the same evening, because the moon was still nearly full, and I was hoping to catch it between the towers of the cathedral. Unfortunately, the location of the moonrise had shifted already, and it was no longer visible from the cathedral square. But the moon still made a spectacular appearance over the Seine river, as fellow photographers gathered on the bridges connecting ile de la Cite to the river banks to capture it.

Here is my attempt. I knew from experience that the moon needed to be exposed as a grey rock in a midday sun. This presents a dilemma if one wants to simultaneously (and correctly) expose the nigh-time scenery. Of course, taking two separate exposures and combining them in post-processing is a possibility, but if one wants to avoid compositing, it is better to underexpose the shadows and correctly expose the relatively bright moon.

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Shooting on the go

I’ve often been concerned that doing travel photography is detracting from the actual experience of taking in new sites, smells, the vibe of new places. For example, lugging the camera gear around is quite a nuisance in itself.

On the other hand, I find that taking photos, and lately videos, while wondering around actually adds focus to the present moment experience. It actually helps me formulate my expression of the new place. In this sense, photo- and videography is similar to blogging and journaling. You don’t really know what your thought about any particular subject are until you speak them out loud or put them down on paper. And writing things down is less intrusive on others because it’s easier to ignore a blog post than to tune out someone’s talking. Stating your thoughts publicly, though, is important, because it forces you to crystallize your opinion and to take ownership of it. This is equivalent to publishing photos and videos, and this is why blogging is not equivalent to journaling, which is inherently private.

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Street photography in Paris

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My first ever visit to Paris was a trip to a conference, followed by a vacation with family. The timing of the conference was perfect in that I had a chance to take photos of the Bastille Day’s fireworks. As I look back through my other photos from that trip, I noticed that I took many candid shots of tourists in the city. I took these photos as we were walking along the streets and parks with my family. Our daughter was not yet two years old, so she was often sleeping in her travel stroller, being pushed by her grandfather, who thoroughly enjoyed this duty.

Sometimes, I quickly walked ahead of my family and took photos of other people. I did not worry about lighting too much, focussing on the dynamics of the street scenes. In retrospect, the lighting was mostly quite good, since we often took our excursions in the late afternoon, to avoid the summer heat. Also, I find that many street photos look better when converted to black-and-white, since there was no opportunity to manage colours in the composition of the busy street scenes.

I mostly used a 35mm f/1.4L lens on my 5D Mark II, but I also carried a 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens whenever possible. I really like this lens for its ability isolate architectural details or pick out elements of street scenes from relatively far away.

Our expectations of travelling to Paris with a small child were very guarded, having read many negative opinions online. In reality, however, it turned out to be one of the most pleasant experiences. Parisians were incredibly accommodating and nice to us wherever we went, and our little daughter was often the reason we were invited to skip the long lines at popular tourist attractions.

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Photographing fireworks on Bastille Day in Paris

Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité


My work as an engineering professor often takes me to fascinating places for conferences and research collaborations. This is a great opportunity for photography. The only drawback is that usually I have no control of the time of the year when I visit a certain location. But sometimes, everything aligns beautifully. For example, last year’s conference in Paris could not have occurred at a better time – it started right after the Bastille Day (July 14), which happened to be a Sunday. My wife, daughter (1.5 years old at the time) and I arrived before the weekend and had a chance to explore Paris, which was getting ready for the festivities.

On the 14-th, we walked along Champ de Mars in the afternoon, took the obligatory family shot in front of the Eiffel Tower and scouted the location for photographing the fireworks, which were happening at 10 o’clock that night.

In the evening, the family stayed in the hotel, and I took a 30-minute metro ride to Champ de Mars, arriving there at about 5:30 pm. I was carrying my camera bag with a Canon EOS 5D Mark II, the lenses (70-200mm f/2.8L IS USM, Canon EF 24-105mm f/4 L IS USM and Canon EF 16-35mm f/2.8L USM), a remote switch cable and a tripod. The whole field (Champ de Mars is huge, by the way) was packed with people, standing, sitting, laying down so close to each other, there were not many places to even stand, not to mention setup the camera. Nevertheless, I picked a spot at the centreline of the field, right at the edge farthest from the Eiffel Tower, and waited until the crowd shifted enough so I could set my camera bag on the ground. Then waited a bit more (I did have more that four hours before show after all, so waiting was not a problem) and unfolded the tripod over the bag, trying to minimize my footprint.

Immediately, people who were sitting on the ground behind me informed me in broken English with a charming French accent that “It would be better for us if you were not standing there.” I assured them that I would not be standing there all four hours before the fireworks – I was going to sit down next to them and enjoy watching the crowd. That seemed to satisfy them, we introduced each other, shook hands, chatted about the Tower (“how beautiful she is”), Paris, photography, work and children. During the next four hours, as the sun was setting, I snapped a few pictures and showed them (on the camera’s LCD screen) to my new friends, who apparently also were photography enthusiasts, but were a bit limited by their pocket cameras and lack of a tripod.

The fireworks and the light and sound show were simply amazing. The energy of the crowd was exhilarating. As a bonus, I managed to take a few good pictures. All this gave me enough emotional boost to be in high spirits when I returned to the hotel after walking with the crowd, carrying my my heavy gear, for two hours after the show (the metro was closed, as it was not feasible to accommodate the masses of people that gathered for the celebration). This is when I appreciated, once again, that my tripod was made of lightweight carbon fibre.

Bastille Day fireworks. Paris, France.


As for photographing the fireworks themselves, the technique that works well for me is this:

  • Set the camera on the tripod.
  • Manually focus on infinity.
  • Set the camera to “Bulb” mode (where the shutter speed is manually controlled by pressing and releasing the shutter button).
  • Set ISO to 400 and aperture to f8.
  • Use a remote release cable to trigger the camera when the fireworks begin. Experiment with different timing relative to the explosions and different shutter opening times. I find that shutter speeds from 1 to 6 seconds work well (I count “twenty-one, twenty-two, twenty-three, …” to get the approximate timing).

Note: If the photos look good when played back on the LCD screen of the camera, they would be too dark when displayed on the computer later. This is because the LCD appears extremely bright when viewed at night – just something to be aware of.