Out With The (Really, Really) Old...

With the way the weather here in Portland can get, it's sometimes difficult to tell whether you're going to have a good shooting day or a bad shooting day. Today was one of those days where you just couldn't be 100% sure.

So, considering that, it seemed like a prudent plan to find something to do indoors. Unfortunately, indoor shoots are rarely dripping with "WOW!" factor, so I wasn't holding out much hope of just about anything. But, on a whim, the decision was made to go to the antique & collectables show down at the Portland Expo Center.

I know; I can hear you. "Steve", you're saying, "What gives?"

Well, the reality is that, if you don't know what you're looking for, you'll have no idea what you can find. There were some really cool things and some really quirky things, and most of it was for sale.

So, no more narrative. Here's a smattering of what I found yesterday:

Remember when airlines would give these out?

Some old, and not so old, 45 rpm's...

One of the old ones: Alvin & The Chipmunks, circa 1950's...

Yes, you're reading that correctly. It's a midget washer...

I don't know about you, but I'm questioning how I made it to 50 without owning a redneck mannequin...

My brother and I had G.I. Joe's when we were kids, and we had a lot of uniforms and equipment for them. I think, however, that we missed the whole "South Beach G.I. Joe in a Speedo" part of it all...

A WWII tank site. Mount it to your Subaru and hit the highway...

I always wanted one of these... When I was nine...

Yes, indeedy. Nothing says "indoor family fun time" more than indoor gun-play...

And nothing says "Happy Holidays" quite like a bag of marbles... From Texaco...

You know the definition of "perfect pitch"? Throwing an accordion into a dumpster and hitting a tuba...

Hey, lookathat!

I'd never seen a Beetle Bailey stuffed animal before...

For the man who has everything, a chrome dial pay phone...

Well, it looked good from a distance...

My brother Greg and I had a couple of these when we were kids. The price tag on this one was $30.00...

One of the cooler old toys I saw. This is an American Flyer "City of Denver" train set, and it came complete with tracks, transformer and whistle. It's from the 1930's, and it was in really good condition...

Part of the "100 Years Of Pop-Up Books" display. None were for sale...

A complete set of Wizard Of Oz masks from the 1950's...

This is just disturbing...

Apparently, this was a real thing at the World's Fair in Seattle in April of 1962...

A Col. Harland Sanders weather vane...

I'm gonna' go out on a limb and guess "probably not"...

This was a total restoration from the 1940's...

Nothin' made you more badass than having a Charlie Tuna radio on your bicycle...

And for those of you who need a fire truck pedal car driven by a monkey, you would not have been disappointed...

Yeah... I dunno'...

Hey, you never know. You could need one of these one day...

These were part of the most ridiculous collection on display. Some sample prices: 1) small yellow truck - $250.00, 2) green airplane - $350.00, 3) yellow airplane - $595.00, 4) red airplane - $350.00, 5) green airplane - $350.00. The most amazing part is that this guy had thousands of these toys...

 

Some very cool, old radios from the 1930's, 40's and 50's. Prices were from around $200.00 to over $700.00. AM radio never sounded so good...

 

I wasn't planning on buying anything, but I bought this. It's a bank that A&P produced. My brother had one when we were kids, so I thought I'd drop five bucks on the nostalgia. I'm glad I did, and I'm glad I attended this show...

 

The Coffin Guitar...

I've worked in the guitar industry for a long time.

In all those years, at both the retail and manufacturer levels, I've seen some nice guitars. Suffice it to say, I am no longer easily impressed by a guitar.

Now, I get to spend a good portion of my work week taking glamour photos of really nice guitars. It's a meld of my two favorite things: photography and guitars. How can that be bad?

Well, it can't, so just put that thought out of your mind.

 

With a little bit of "photo down time", though, I decided not to shoot any of the Collings, none of the Martins or the Taylors. I get compliments on my guitar photography pretty regularly, so I figured the time had come to take some glamour shots of my guitar.

This is what my daughter jokingly refers to as "The Coffin Guitar", because that's where it's going. I know she's lying, though. She'll lay it in the casket with me for the wake but, right before they slam the lid on it, she's gonna' pull this guitar out. I know she will.

This is my 1986 Alvarez-Yairi DY-66:

 

Alvarez-Yairi DY-66: Maple back and sides, Red Cedar top...

I'm often asked where I got this guitar. The truth of the matter is that there aren't a lot of these out there. While there are many with the "DY" designation, which sport Kazuo Yairi's signature on the lower bout, there aren't many DY-66 models. Some "blue books" don't even have it listed.

Anyway, the story of how I got it is mildly funny.

I re-enlisted in the Navy, the first time, in December of 1984. When I did, I received what was known as "SRB", or "selective re-enlistment bonus" (of which half was paid up front). Because I was also transferring from San Diego to Charleston, South Carolina, I was able to take up to three months of advanced pay, and advanced travel pay. When all was said and done, I had about $14,000.00 just burning a hole in my pocket. I found my way to Jim's House Of Guitars (long now defunct) and bought myself a 1974 Gibson Blue Ridge acoustic guitar. I didn't really know anything about guitars back then, aside from the fact that there were premier brands out there, and Gibson was one of them.

$480.00 later, I walked out of Jim's with my new, used 1974 Gibson Blue Ridge.

I played that guitar for a while, but was never really happy with it. In 1987, I took it to a repair shop in Charleston to have it looked at, and was told that the neck was twisting, ever so slightly. Unfortunately, there wasn't anything that could be done about it. I decided to cut my losses and sell it for $400.00.

I hung the guitar in that Charleston repair shop. The owner didn't charge a consignment fee or anything; he just liked having guitars hanging in his repair shop. Well, I walked in one day and sat down, and picked up this one guitar. I'd never heard of the brand, but thought I'd give it a strum anyway.

Whoa.

The clouds parted and angels would sing. It sounded amazing.

I looked at the price tag: $400.00.

"John", I said, "You gotta' sell my Gibson so I can buy this thing!"

"Well, the guy selling that wants to buy your Gibson. Why don't you just take that with you and I'll call you if the guy's got a problem with it.

That was 26 years ago, and I still haven't heard from him.

In the time I've had it, I've only done three things to it. First, I added a pickguard. Why? For no other reason than I'd never seen a steel string acoustic guitar without one.Second, at some point; maybe the late 1990's, I added a pickup to the guitar. I had just joined a band in San Diego and acoustic guitar would be needed. Lastly, I changed out the original brownish pearloid tuning buttons with ebony ones. They have no performance advantage. I just think they look better:

The headstock of the Yairi DY-66...

The addition of the pickguard was a fortuitous thing that I hadn't actually considered the benefits of. I put it on only because I thought the guitar looked naked without it. I never even considered the protective properties of it. Nor did I think I would ever need those properties as much as, obviously, I do:

This is what 26 years of good, honest guitar playin' looks like...

On the upper bout, just above the fretboard, I've worn about two thirds of the way through the top. When I started to get a degree of wear on the guitar, my friend Bob "Moze" Mossay, of Moze Guitars in San Diego, offered to put some finish on the wear spot to help protect it. I opted out, and I'm glad I did. Not only do I absolutely love the way this guitar looks, but I'd have worn off any finish Moze would've applied, anyway.

During the Zendog years (Zendog was my band in San Diego), we played a lot of Stones stuff, and a lot of Stones stuff uses acoustic guitar. Well, couple that with the fact that I didn't possess the most sound strumming technique to begin with, and wear and tear was bound to happen. I've even cracked the soundhole from years of putting a Feedback Buster in and pulling it out:

The cracked soundhole of the DY-66...

To me, this is simply the perfect guitar. I've owned Taylor and Martin and Fender and Gibson and Hamer and... damn, name it. I've owned countless guitars over the years, but only one has the distinction of being "the first" to stay with me for so long. This guitar has fallen down stairs, has been in a flood, has been on fire, and has been hit by a car.

I can't kill it.

It won't let me.

When I got this guitar, it was in absolutely pristine condition, as if it had just come from Final Assembly. I was blown away by the craftsmanship of this guitar. Yes, very good guitars come out of Japan, my friends, and this is one of them. I've had the unqualified pleasure of putting every ding, scratch, scrape, crack and chip in this guitar, and I wouldn't change a single thing about how this guitar has traveled through the years.

My friend Todd Mylet, owner of Portland Fretworks here in Portland, did some upkeep to it the other day, and brought it back to me with the news that, after 26 years, the guitar could use a fret job. There isn't enough metal left on them to recrown them, so they'll have to be replaced; at least the first five or so.

It's an expense that I'd rather not incur, but one which I know has come about as a result of years of enjoyment. If I extrapolate it out, it's the equivalent of about $1.31 per year, per fret. I don't know of anything else that's such a bargain.

So, why write all of this?

Well, I am constantly amused when people buy nice guitars and then don't play them. They stick them in a closet and forget about them and, when they do pull the guitar out, they don't let anyone else play it and they baby it.

I guess I can understand that when a guitar is an "investment piece", but if you spent hours playing a guitar and falling in love with the sound before you bought it, play the damn thing. Play it and make it earn its keep.

God knows this Yairi has done exactly that...

"The Yairi"...

"This Is Local?"

There's an episode of "Portlandia" that my dear friend Mike Gladstone turned me onto. In it, a couple is in a restaurant learning all about the life of the chicken they were about to eat for lunch. Not only is it kinda' funny, but it's pretty dead-on in its depiction of what some Portland locals are like. The restaurant where it takes place, The Gilt Club, is an actual place, located in Northwest Portland:

This past Sunday, I was going to be shooting an event at a restaurant in Northeast Portland, but I found myself with a couple hours to kill before the shoot, so I decide to wander over the Broadway Bridge into Northwest Portland, not far from what's known as the Pearl District. I've driven over the Broadway Bridge countless times, and have always wanted to shoot Union Station, which serves Amtrak here in Portland. I figured that a walk back across the Broadway Bridge could offer up some nice photo ops, as well.

I figured, for a change, that I would stay "local".

Okay, so that was a pretty lame set-up. But the show is funny and you should watch it.

Anywho, I found my way over to Union Station, parked the truck and gathered up my gear. Unlike other outings, and despite the pleas of some well-respected photographer friends, I made the conscious decision to shoot HDR this time out. For me, HDR isn't only about light, but about texture, as well. I've been seeing the textures in the train station and Portland's bridges for months, so I was eager to shoot them.

I don't really have a great deal to write about any of this, I just wanted to share some of the HDR stuff I shot this past Sunday, and to tell you to watch Portlandia. It's funny.

 
The first thing to catch my eye was this old Mini. It was just parked off to the side of the lot, all by its lonesome. For some reason, I find the "NO CAMPING, NO FIRES, NO DUMPING" sign kinda' funny. This shot's not HDR, but I like it:

 

After shooting the Mini, I walked over to Union Station. Unfortunately, I was only able to get exterior shots. I don't know if my shooting inside would've been frowned upon, but what I do know is that it was ridiculously crowded inside, and I just didn't want to deal with the crowds. When I have more time on my hands maybe I'll do that, but it wasn't happening this time out:

Two different views (processed with two different presets) of Union Station...

As trying to shoot inside was proving to be a pipe dream, I decided to try to get some more shots from the foot of Broadway Bridge:

I imagine that, providing I don't run afoul of security or law enforcement, I could shoot in and around Union Station all day. While it doesn't enjoy the grandeur of, say, New York's Grand Central Station does, it's certainly one of the more interesting places, from a photography perspective, that I've found in Portland.

Union Station was only part of what I was here to check out and shoot, though.

Broadway Bridge spans over the Willamette River, with "Northeast" on one side and the Pearl District on the other. I decided to hoof it to mid span and take some photos:

Looking east from the west end of Broadway Bridge...

Broadway Bridge...

Condos along the Willamette...

Steel Bridge, looking south from Broadway bridge...

The Albers Brothers Milling Co. Building...

Looking east along the north side of the bridge...

The eastern bank of the Willamette River...

The tower at Union Station, as seen from mid-span on Broadway Bridge...

I'm not entirely sure that I'm diggin' how the clouds look in these photos, but I guess I can work on that next time around. All in all, I'm mildly satisfied with how things turned out. I also learned that I can get a first class seat on a train to Seattle for $51.00, so I may have to give that a shot before too long.

With having just a couple two hours to shoot, I'm happy with what I came away with, and it reminded me that, when I get the jones to do some shooting, I don't necessarily have to gas up the truck and drive to the mountains or some waterfalls in some gorge somewhere.

Sometimes it's enough when someone looks at your photos and says "So, this is local?"