I suppose I should give the actual definition of the term “city proper” before I explain our informal tag-line. The term, “city proper” refers to the finite population of a city inside of its precise city limits. Meaning that if New York City‘s city limits were 1 square foot, by 1 square foot and one person lived inside of that square foot, New York City‘s “city proper” population would be 1, but their metropolitan area, or metropolitan statical area (MSA) [New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ-PA MSA] population is 20,000,000-ish (2020 census). Its how a city like my own, Columbus, Ohio can claim to be the 14th largest city in the United States (city-proper population of 905,748; [2020 census]), but in reality Columbus and its Metropolitan Area / Metropolitan Statistical Area is actually the 32nd largest MSA in the country with a population of 2,138,926; [2020 census].
I felt like I had to bring all of that up to explain the play of words I’m using on the term for our tag-line. I generally operate from the position most people get it, but since this is a blog where I can just take a long time to type out un-necessarily lengthly explanations, I’m going to do just that.
It should be clear to anyone who has come across my Metroscap.com collections that I love taking pictures of cities at night. Whether its Columbus, New York, Detroit, Philadelphia or Nashville, I’m trying to capture images from every city that makes that city look stunning in a frame on a wall. TO ME, the best way to make a city or cityscape photographs look incredible is to first capture them at night. The bright city lights, traffic in the foreground, or the rushing water of a river under a bridge all bring elements ofmotion and vibrant activity most people associate with downtown life. What I’m trying to do as an artist / photographer is to capture that feeling into one (or a series of) pictures for that city. Then, the second most important part of the formula to achieving that ‘stunning look’ for a picture on a wall, is to do it in black and white. Did you know that every single photograph I’ve captured for my collections as been originally shot in full-color. Its true, all 100-some thousand captures. All in color. Sure some of those color images are absolutely stunning, but, again TO ME, I don’t think the color photos work on a wall to accomplish what I’m trying to convey about any of the cities in the collection. The black & white image instantly becomes timeless, classic, and elevates the scene to a more artistic feel than the color versions could ever accomplish. Its especially true for the photographs that are more street-scene / cityscape than the skyline-scene cityscape photographs.
In this New York City Flatiron building photograph, the majority of the light sources in this photograph are sodium lights that give off that very orange-hued light mixed with other lights around the building that are closer to a taxi-yellow in hue. In color, it looks ok, because our eyes see it that way all the time, but by removing ALL of the color and allowing the deep blue night sky to just become black, and all of those orange, yellow and red lights to just become a bright-white, the contrast that creates transforms the image into something less distracting, but still vibrant; less everyday and more timeless; and less photograph, and more art….
At least that’s what I think is happening, but I’m biased because I’m the one saying that is happening with my photography. So when I use the term “City. Proper.” as our tag-line, I’m trying to convey that the way that I take cityscape pictures for my Metroscap.com collections, is the proper way to do it.
But again, That’s just the opinion of a guy who makes a living selling Framed, Ready-to-Hang Black and White Pictures of cities (mostly) at Night.