Werner bracing for a slow exposure 32 stories over Minneapolis on the Foshay Observation Deck.

Last weekend I ventured on a Minneapolis Photo safari with Diane, Werner and Rob. Diane was the one that came up with the location — the observation deck of the 447 foot-tall 1929 Foshay Tower. The tower has an interesting history. It was completed just months before the 1929 stock market crash and had (according to Wikipedia) a fantastic dedication ceremony:

Foshay invited 25,000 guests to the dedication ceremony and provided all-expenses paid trips to many who included cabinet members, senators and congressmen. Half nude dancers entertained. Each guest received a gold pocket watch. The military gave 19-gun salutes. John Philip Sousa conducted music, including “Foshay Tower-Washington Memorial March” a march he wrote for the occasion. Foshay presented Sousa with a check for US$20,000.

But Sousa’s check bounced and soon after the building went to the creditors and poor Wilbur Foshay landed in jail and never was able to live in the apartment he built for himself on the 28th and 29th floors.

The tower held the record until the IDS Center was built in the 1970s. It eventually fell into disrepair and it disappeared from the public consciousness as other buildings surrounded it and hid it from view.

In 2006 it was purchased by local investors and everyone but Keys Cafe moved out as the building was converted into a W Hotel. On August 13th of 2008 the W opened with a museum on the 30th floor that leads to the 32nd floor observation deck.

Shooting the city from above at night is pretty fascinating, there are so many lights of varying color and the glass buildings offer fantastic reflections (see above). You might recognize the parking lot in the lower right corner.

We arrived at the tower around 6:30 just in time to watch the sun set. I’m planning on going back soon, it was a lot of fun. If you’d like to join me, let me know.

Whether you are lost or not depends on your perspective.

I’ve been having fun photographing simple thinks like ducks, flowers and grasses. Something so simple is a great challenge both compositionally and observationally. This photo exhibits one of my favorite points of photography — you don’t photograph an object, you record light interacting with it.

Just like Denver last week, my hometown is now on the armed camp of the national stage. It seems that nobody here is from here. I went downtown after the big protest march just to look around. It was in the high 80s and that’s pretty warm for us northerners. I wasn’t there for the big march, but I did get to watch a fun little low-key interplay last night. As I was walking around, I noticed this group of about 75 officers march out of the convention zone and over to the corner of Kellog and St. Peter.

I love the flourish-like zip-tie handcuffs on these dudes (and dudettes, there were quite a few female troops in the ranks as well). Here’s the set up, the officers marched out to this corner and just stood there for at least fifteen minutes. As far as I can tell, they were there to guard the Crown Plaza Hotel — as the evening wore on, several large motorcades came and went from the hotel. Boy, did these guys draw attention to themselves!

Sure as shoot, the code pink protesters that were on the St. Peter bridge hanging their banners for the benefit of the coast guard gunboats patrolling the Mississippi found out about it and came up the corner with their megaphone and banners. It was pretty entertaining, over a hundred police officers and several dozen photographers watched about ten loud protesters dance in the street.

Did I say a lot of police? I guess after the afternoon teargassing event, they weren’t taking chances. Now with only ten protesters, this seems ridiculous, but a lot of things didn’t happen. The 50,000 protest march of less than 10,000 went through town and then over the St. Peter bridge to Harriet Island (a festival ground across the Mississippi). President Bush was going to be speaking, but didn’t come to town because of the Hurricane. But the cops were still playing by the old schedule. I would imagine that Bush was going to be at the Crown Plaza (the Texas delegation was staying there) and security was expecting 50,000 protesters across the bridge (which the city had barricaded with four old dump trucks). In addition to the re-enforcements, the cops in the front row now have tear-gas launchers — note the green canisters on their chests.

OK, so back to the pictures. This guy had the oddest little sign he kept standing and holding at the police. I never figured out what it said. Hand-hold shooting by street-light requires a fuzzy-high ISO. Note to the protesters, I know it’s too much to ask for you to take a bath, but please don’t sing. I commented on the off-key singing to another photographer and he said that he offered a cop $20 to shoot the singer :).  The cops were actually pleasant. I stepped behind them to take this picture and one of them looked over his shoulder at me. I said “I’m just taking pictures, I don’t want to surprise you”, to which he replied, “No, you don’t” and smiled.

After an hour of dancing and (ugh) singing, the protesters got bored and the one with a megaphone declared “let’s go this way” and they danced off. Remember the guy with the little sign? He stuck around for his 15 minutes. I’m glad he did, this was my favorite picture of the night.

Thanks to the protesters for an evening’s entertainment, but thanks especially to the cops for remaining calm and not minding us damn photographers walking all around them. It was still near 80 degrees out and I was warm wearing a t-shirt, I can’t imagine wearing riot gear.

Professional Minneapolis Photographer Mitch Rossow shares daily photos of the city he loves. Exploring Minneapolis through Photography while teaching composition and techniques.

Back by popular demand, here’s some more infrared photos.

You can see the split bridge crossing the pond in front. I always have to cross it when I visit the garden, I think evil spirits are supposed to get stuck on the bridge, I guess evil spirits aren’t able to turn corners over water, must be a feng-shui thing.

Love this stuff, looks so surreal doesn’t it?

Professional Minneapolis Photographer Mitch Rossow shares daily photos of the city he loves. Exploring Minneapolis through Photography while teaching composition and techniques.

This is the Heffelfinger Fountain in the Lyndale Park Rose Garden on the Northeast shore of Lake Harriet. It’s the second oldest rose garden in the U.S. and was designed by Theodore Wirth.

Yes, this is infrared. I’ve posted a few of these over time and y’all demanded more of them, so here ya go.

I’ll be bringing you photos of the parks and trails for most of the month; I’d like to prove the beauty of this city’s greenspaces before I begin the State Fair. The State Fair is big deal here, it runs from the 21st thru Sept 1st. There’s tons of fun there, but it’s mainly about things you really shouldn’t be eating — on a stick. Batter-fried cheese curds, Batter-fried candy bars, Batter-fried oreos, some obscenity called a scotch egg and walleye-on-a-stick are a few crowd pleasers of yore. The latter I’ve not seen, but my dad is fascinated by — since he won’t come up here, I gotta go find one. So enjoy the pretty pictures while they last.

Professional Minneapolis Photographer Mitch Rossow shares daily photos of the city he loves. Exploring Minneapolis through Photography while teaching composition and techniques.

I love these guys, I haven’t seen them for a year and haven’t photographed one for an even longer time.