A Polaroid Elegy

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

gull slide, photo by mfophotos

Frequent Michigan in Pictures contributor Mark O’Brien has just published A Polaroid Elegy – My Last Year With A Polaroid Camera. He writes:

This book is really about a journey into the slightly surreal world of Polaroid photography. Not everything you see looks the same after being shot with a Polaroid camera, and this book may give you a better appreciation for the wonderful invention of Edwin Land. The film used to create the photos in this book will no longer be available, hence the title.

Click through to preview and order the book. You can see many Polaroid photos Mark has taken in his Polaroids slideshow (photo set).

No Polaroids you say? Savepolaroid.com (where you can learn more about the history of Polaroid and Edwin Land’s work) notes that on February 8, 2008, Polaroid Corporation announced that it will discontinue production of all instant film. Apparently there is something called PolaPremium that will be revealed in a few days, so all may not be lost. Speculation is rampant.

Madonna in Detroit

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Madonna in Detroit

Madonna in Detroit, photo by irinuchka.

Irina was one of many who got to see Madonna’s show at Ford Field in Detroit on November 18, 2008. You can (and should) see this bigger in her Madonna concert slideshow.

You can get much more of Madonna (Madonna Louise Ciccone) on Absolute Michigan and (of course) at Madonna.com.

Piglet says: Don’t sleep on the Exposure.Detroit show!

Posted on by farlane

Piglet, photo by Aaron Fortin

Aaron took this photo of the newborn piglet at the Miracle of Life Exhibit at this summer’s Michigan State Fair. You can see it bigger in his Pets & Animals slideshow (full set).

The next Exposure.Detroit show opens tomorrow night (Friday, November 14) from 7-10 PM at the Bean and Leaf Cafe in Royal Oak. In addition to Aaron, the photographers are:

Brett Lawrence

Niki Collis (Luna.Nik)

Rebecca Gutierrez (Luna’s Eyes)

Ken Jacoby

Poster designed by Ajit.

Happy Zombies at the World Record Grand Rapids Zombie Walk

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Untitled, photo by chad℠.

Chad captured this cool view of the likely world record Grand Rapids Zombie Walk. GR based Spout writes:

Thursday, October 30, Grand Rapids, Michigan. A seemingly average midwestern city. Until the zombies invade. A throng of at least 3,370 zombies flowed through the downtown streets (it’s very likely it was over 4,000) to try and break the world record for the largest zombie walk. The event, organized by college sophomore Rob Bliss, shattered the previous record of 1,375, set just a few days earlier in the Pittsburgh suburb of Monroeville. If Monroeville sounds familiar to zombie fans, it should. The Monroeville Mall was the setting of George Romero’s Dawn of the Dead.

View a Grand Rapids Zombie Walk slideshow and share your GR Zombie Walk photos right here on Flickr. Much more Halloween fun at Absolute Michigan!

Update: Chad has a Zombie Walk set up now (slideshow).

Creating Cities in Michigan

Posted on by farlane

Lansing, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Flint, Traverse City, Marquette and Kalamazoo are by no means all of Michigan’s cities (or even the largest). Each, however, seems to be an anchor for its region – a center to which people look to for culture, entertainment and commerce.

October 13-15, 2008, lovers of cities large & small from Michigan and all over the country will head to Detroit for the Creative Cities Summit 2.0 (CCS2), an exploration of what our cities could become and how we can work to make them. Organizers have chosen Detroit, a city so deeply forged in America’s industrial fires that it’s been devastated by the flickering of that flame. I’m headed down there and will try to bring some of the ideas back to you through Absolute Michigan – I hope that some of you can join me there.

The Photos (left to right)

Creative Cities Summit 2.0 in Detroit on Oct. 13-15, 2008

CCS2 will present a dynamic and engaging conversation about how communities around the world are integrating innovation, social entrepreneurship, sustainability, arts & culture and business to create vibrant economies. Full conference registration is $300 for the two and half day event, and there’s also a “no frills” registration that is only $100. There’s also a free “Unconference” at the Museum of Contemporary Art Detroit (MOCAD) on the 12th for designers, urban planners, civic leaders, entrepreneurs, artists, students, community leaders to explore and discuss what’s possible for Detroit.
Keynote speakers include:

  • Bill Strickland, MCG-Bidwell Corp.
  • Richard Florida, Author Who’s Your City
  • Charles Landry, Author The Art of City Making
  • John Howkins, Author The Creative Economy
  • Dean Kamen, Inventor, DEKA
  • Majora Carter, Sustainable South Bronx
  • Doug Farr, Architect and Author Sustainable Urbanism
  • Ben Hecht, Pres. & CEO Living Cities
  • Tom Wujec, Fellow, Autodesk
  • Carol Coletta, CEOs for Cities
  • Giorgio Di Cicco, Poet Laureate, City of Toronto and Author, The Municipal Mind
  • Diana Lind, Editor, Next American City magazine

Breakout sessions on topics such as:

  • Race and the Creative City
  • Cities, Universities & Talent
  • Marketing, Media and the Creative City
  • Measuring New Things – ROI in the Creative Economy
  • Creative (Small) Cities
  • New Ideas in Urban Amenities
  • Community Vitality: The Role of Artists, Gays, Lesbians & Immigrants
  • Midwest Mega-region: How the Midwest Can Compete
  • Transportation Innovation for Cities
  • Making the Scene: Music & Economic Development

Much (much) more at creativecitiessummit.com.

Haunted Houses, Corn Mazes & Spooky Attractions, oh my!

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Haunted House Behind the Middle School

Haunted House Behind the Middle School, photo by country_boy_shane.

‘Tis now the very witching time of night,
When churchyards yawn and hell itself breathes out
Contagion to this world.
~William Shakespeare

Hold on, man. We don’t go anywhere with “scary,” “spooky,” “haunted,” or “forbidden” in the title.
~Shaggy from Scooby-Doo

Over on Absolute Michigan, our Fearsome Finder of Frights has compiled a list of haunted houses, corn mazes and scary attractions from all over Michigan that you can enjoy throughout the month and all across the state.

The photo is part of Shane’s Romeo (Michigan) set (slideshow) and he and the readers lay out the tale of what appears to be a haunted house in training. Check it out, if you dare…

Fall Color Tours: Marquette, Negaunee, Au Train

Posted on by farlane

The Start of Autumn by Marjorie Obrien

The start of Autumn, photo by I am Jacques Strappe

You can get 100+ more photos of the Upper Peninsula in autumn from Marjorie (slideshow).

Last fall through Absolute Michigan/Michigan in Pictures we started using the great information compiled in Travel Michigan’s Fall Color Tours as a starting point to point you to some great fall color touring (and fall color photos) around the state.  We’re trying to add to what they’ve put together – not rip them off! As always, if you have links to information or photos that we missed, comments or reports, post them in the comments below!

We’ll start with a driving tour of the Central Upper Peninsula that’s best from mid-September to early October and about 185 miles long. The tour starts in the UP’s largest city, Marquette. Marquette features some amazing architecture. You can read about and see pictures of it courtesy of Marjorie’s blog, Michigan Architecture, especially the beautiful red sandstone.

I recommend wandering around downtown for a while to check out the buildings and maybe grab a muffin from Babycakes and some coffee at Dead River Coffee. Travel Michigan (TM) recommends a visit the Marquette Harbor Lighthouse, home of the Marquette Maritime Museum. The lighthouse (pictured right by n. weaver, part of his UP slideshow) was constructed in 1866 and is the oldest significant structure in the city and more importantly, the lighthouse is one of the most historic navigation beacons on Lake Superior. There’s a nice little park behind it where you can swim if you are totally insensitive to temperature.

TM suggests that Presque Isle Park is also worth a visit and it is, offering a slow, brief jaunt along the rugged Superior shore and lots of nice little trails. It’s also a great bike ride along the shore on an excellent bike path from the lighthouse.

Now’s probably a good time for a map – click TM’s map to see larger. Heading north on County Road 550 to Big Bay takes you on a half hour cruise through some beautiful country rich in trees and views.  You can stop and do the 20 minute or so climb of Sugarloaf Mountain (see some pics from Lake Superior Photo). In Big Bay is the Thunder Bay Inn where you are required by travel writer code to mention  “Anatomy of a Murder” which was filmed there. Unfortunately the Thunder Bay Inn has been shuttered.  You can stop in at some of the other businesses and stay at the Big Bay Point Lighthouse Bed and Breakfast (if you call, they sometimes offer tours).

From Big Bay, head back on County Road 510 through the Huron Mountains and trees that arch over the roadway to form a tunnel of color. At US-41 head right and south into Negaunee (Chippewa word for pioneer) where you can visit the Michigan Iron Industry Museum, site of the first iron forge in the Lake Superior region. Negaunee’s Union Station Depot looks like a neat place to stay.  From Negaunee, continue to Ishpeming, home of the U.S. National Ski & Snowboarding Hall of Fame and the Cliff’s Shaft Mine Museum.

The route takes you down County Road 476 to Palmer and from there on M-35 south to Gwinn. You can enjoy hiking and mountain biking at Anderson Lake West State Forest Campground or continue south on M-35 to Little Lake where you take County Road 456 east to US-41. A left US-41 takes you north to M-94 where you turn right on M-94 to Chatham and can ask “Honey – are you sure we’re not lost?” 3 miles north off M-94 at Sundell are the about 100′ high Laughing Whitefish Falls (photo right by Church of One).

From there it’s east until you reach H-03 located between Chatham and Forest Lake, north on H-03 along the AuTrain River and past AuTrain Lake until you reach the junction of M-28. You can go east 12 miles along the Lake Superior shoreline on 28 to Tyoga Pathway or go west back to Marquette.

Check out more Michigan Fall Color Tours on Michigan in Pictures and also our fall wallpaper collection!

Michigan Logging Train Excursion

Posted on by farlane

Excursion Logging Train, Harbor Springs, photo from Detroit Publishing Co., c1906 (at the Library of Congress)

I noticed that the Newaygo Logging Festival (Eventful link w/ map) happens this weekend. Several recent conversations and excursions of my own have driven home how profoundly the logging industry has shaped Michigan. Like miners, the timber trade roamed from river mouth to natural harbor up and down our Great Lake shoreline, into connected lakes and with the coming of the railroad, across the entire Lower & Upper Peninsulas.

At every stop, when the trees were gone, the land was left cleared and ready for villages and farms. Many of those working in the timber trade turned to farming and town building, and the names of the founders of these towns (and the owners of the dry goods stores) were often the names of the principals of the lumber companies.

Over Labor Day Weekend, I think it would be neat if Michigan were to somehow remember and honor the role of logging and loggers played in creating our state.

…and when it’s not such a lovely, last weekend of summer out there, be sure to check out some Michigan lumbering history and this really cool collection of Michigan logging photos from MichiganEpic.org.

Seriously, these logging photos are great!

Michigan Lake Monsters, Sea Serpents & Serendipity

Posted on by farlane

at Mackinac

at Mackinac :: a composite from -3 and -43 by Emery Co Photo

Last night I was looking for Creative Commons photos* with the appropriate license of the Mackinac Bridge so I could photoshop up a little something for Weird Wednesday: Michigan Sea Monsters (be sure to go back and read this!). I love it when the last Wednesday of the month rolls around as I get a chance to indulge my love of fooling with Photoshop. I was especially fired up as this month’s feature from Weird Michigan by Linda S. Godfrey because it was the feature that I had hoped to run last year as the debut of Weird Wednesdays on Absolute Michigan.

In my search, I saw this photo of the Bridge and thought “Now that looks cool & misty.” Then I came upon this photo of a rock and said “Sea serpent ahoy!” The coolest part was that both photos were taken by Emery Co Photo (emerycophoto.com). I contacted her and she graciously allowed me to use them.

Hope you all get some time on the water this weekend and that everyone remembers that on the list of things we should be worrying about, sea serpents in Michigan come in somewhere around #23,432,555. ;)

*That would be the Attribution-ShareAlike Creative Commons license. There are also a number of people in the Absolute Michigan pool who have told me that they are OK with me manipulating their photos for features on Absolute Michigan.

Golden Journey… Standup paddle surfing

Posted on by Michigan in Pictures

Golden Journey....

Golden Journey…., photo by Doug Langham.

Doug has a great shot of a sport I’ve been itching to try. Wikipedia’s Stand Up Paddle Surfing entry says:

Stand Up Paddle, (SUP), is an emerging global sport with a Hawaiian heritage. It can be traced back to the early days of Polynesia. The sport is ancient form of surfing and began as a way for surfing instructors to manage their large groups of learner surfers as standing on the board gave them a higher view point increasing visibility of what was going on around them such as incoming swell….

Today SUP, or Stand-Up-Paddle, is gaining popularity as the demands for global-conscious green sports increase. Additionally the sport benefits athletes with a strong ‘core’ workout. SUP’ing is popular at warm coastal climates and resorts, and is gaining in popularity as celebrities are sampling the sport and cross-over athletes are training with SUP. SUPs have been spotted around the globe anywhere there is easy access to safe waters as well as in the surfing lineups of the world.

Like on the Great Lakes, for example. As the photo shows, the sport isn’t wave-dependent. However, as this video from Stand Up Paddle Surfing Magazine shows, it’s fun in the waves too!