I finally got the chance to go to downtown Chicago. “Finally” because it’s rather far from where I live, I hate paying for the parking and since it’s the end of December, the weather isn’t helping either. This time I picked the right day, Sunday December 24^th, the day before Christmas. The weather was sunny though cold. Too cold for my thin skin. I arrived there around noon and found my favorite parking building, not very far from the lake.

My target was Michigan Avenue, or the Magnificent Mile as it’s called. It’s also known as the Miracle Mile. They say that only a miracle would keep someone from spending money in one of the hundreds of shops on the Mile. Well, the miracle happened that day. Apart from a drink at Starbucks, I didn’t spend a cent. I don’t understand this “shopping” craze anyway but that’s another story. Besides, my aim was to take photos.

This is the beginning of a series of photographs taken that day. I will keep posting as I finish processing them in Photoshop.

One word about my equipment… I carried the Canon 30D, of course, with the Canon 50mm f/1.4 and the Canon EF-S 10-22mm. I also got to shoot a few frames with a Canon 70-200mm f/4 that I borrowed from a friend who tagged along. Interestingly enough I didn’t use the 10-22 at all on this occasion.

This photo was taken on one of the streets, as I made my way towards Michigan Avenue. I love these news stands, so colorful…

There’s a very nice antique-looking clock on a building next to “Hotel Monaco”. This vintage timepiece seemed to be working correctly.

Here’s the same clock from a different perspective, with the tall skyscrapers in the background. The first image is the original photo I took. The second is processed in Photoshop. I didn’t know which to post because I like both.

A passenger barge was moored next to a pier on the Chicago River. Everything looked deserted that Sunday, especially at that time of the day.

This entry was posted on Saturday, December 30th, 2006 at 9:14 pm and is filed under Canon EOS 30D, Street. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.