Letters Home a visual diary of Matthew Ginn's activities in Portland, Oregon, and beyond971-219-7189
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architecture
Getting to know Cleveland
As you may know, Perrie and I will be moving to Cleveland in a few weeks. I’m really excited to explore the city, meet people, and get to know my way around. When we were there last weekend, I had a couple hours to walk around downtown and of course I brought my camera. I [...]
Newberry House
One of the most interesting assignments I received recently was to photograph Carl VanderZanden and his home. VanderZanden is a pretty interesting guy in his own right. For instance, he spends a lot of his time living and working in the less-traveled parts of Africa, most recently Madagascar. However, the especially unusual thing is his [...]
Go Ducks!
As you might imagine, the whole state of Oregon seems to have it’s eyes focused squarely on Glendale, Arizona, today, as the University of Oregon Ducks play tonight in the BCS “championship” football game. I’m not a particular fan of the Ducks (or the OSU Beavers, for that matter). Nevertheless, and notwithstanding the significant points [...]
Fort Mississauga
Perrie and I made a quick trip up to Toronto/Niagara last weekend for some family functions, and while we were there we took a bit of time to explore Niagara-on-the-Lake. There are lots of interesting things to see there, but the coolest, unexpected find for us was definitely Fort Mississauga. Fort Mississauga sits on the [...]
25th & Lovejoy
I was out in NW Portland—not too far from my old apartment—a couple of weeks ago, to shoot a really cool synagogue with a fascinating history. I’ll post some pictures of that in the near future. But kitty-corner to that, I came across the 25th and Lovejoy Medical Building. I’ve seen it before, of course, [...]
Can you find your high school?
Since I’ve just wrapped up the Portland High Schools project, I thought it would be fun to play a game. Can you identify all 10 schools from the photographs? Some are easier than others. You can see additional images from this series on the Homestead Images website.
Marshall High School
The Homestead Images high school project is nearly done—all 10 schools have been photographed, and eight sets of photos have been finished. Just as I was working on set number nine, the Portland high school scene was thrown into a tizzy. On Sept. 27, after years of work and months of review, Portland Public Schools [...]
Portland high school architecture
As one of my personal projects this summer, I’ve set out to photograph all 10 public high schools in the Portland school district. The buildings represent a significant but under-appreciated investment in public architecture. In Portland, the (original) buildings generally date from two periods. Major construction on six of the 10 occurred between 1909 and [...]
Roosevelt High School
The sun was shining when I got up this morning, so I headed straight out to Roosevelt High School to capture a photograph I’ve been eying for a while now. The photo is the latest addition to my architectural photography portfolio. The main building at Roosevelt High School was built in 1921 and it is [...]
Sights seen in Eureka
Or is that sites and scenes? Here are some of my personal pictures from last week’s trip to Eureka, California. They were taken on two different days; the weather was much nicer on Thursday than Friday. Most are from the “Old Town” area (1st to 5th Streets, between about B Street and M) but some [...]
Saturday morning in the Pearl District
Perrie had a short appointment in Portland’s Pearl District on Saturday Morning, so I wandered around the neighbourhood while I was waiting. I decided at the last minute to leave the ultra-wide angle lens on the camera for a different look. Afterwords, we went for brunch at Besaw’s in Northwest.
Running the gauntlet of Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside
As I mentioned in my last post about Vancouver’s Chinatown, Perrie and I stood out like a pair of snowmen in the desert, a couple of (relatively) tall, young white folk in a street full of older Asians. For much of the walk back to our hotel we stood out just as much, but for [...]
Construction photography
I’ve been visiting the Broadstone Enso Apartments on behalf of Homestead Images about once a month since April or May, photographing the action as the construction progresses. There have been some good images along the way, but last week everything came together to make some particularly nice images. They’re finished the framing now, most of [...]
Photographing bSide6
I got up before dawn Sunday morning to photograph bSide6, a new, seven-story building designed by Works Partnership, at the corner of East Burnside and SE Sixth (hence the name). The building has retail space on the bottom floor, but most of the space is designated as studio space for the city’s creative community. bSide6 [...]
The art of construction
I’ve been a bad blogger of late, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been shooting. Among other things, I am in the midst of shooting a construction project in the Pearl District (yes, there still is some of that going on). Here are a couple of “arty” images from the Broadstone Enso Apartments (Yorke & [...]
Sportsshooter update
As mentioned in my previous post, I had the opportunity to photograph Memorial Coliseum from the inside last weekend during the Rose Festival. Since it was the home of the Trail Blazers, and still hosts some sporting events (like most Winter Hawks home games), I thought it would be an appropriate topic for my SportsShooter.com [...]
2009 Rose Festival: Crowning the Queen
Grant High School junior Rachel Seeman is escorted from the Memorial Coliseum June 6, moments after being announced as the 2009 Queen of Rosaria. I spent yesterday morning at Memorial Coliseum photographing the crowning of the 2009 Rose Festival Queen and the Grand Floral Parade. Actually, I was there to photograph the building, but that’s [...]
Cheesman Park
The pavilion in Denver’s Cheesman Park was built with money donated by the widow of Denver pioneer Walter Cheesman about 100 years ago. I was in Colorado on business last weekend, with jobs Friday evening, Saturday morning and Sunday morning. That left a fair bit of time in between to explore Denver and the Front [...]
Memorial Coliseum spared (for now)
Mayor Sam Adams announced Wednesday that Memorial Coliseum site is off the table as an option for the Portland Beavers new baseball stadium. Shortly after the Rose City was awarded a MLS expansion franchise in March, the City revealed plans to raze the Trail Blazers’ old home to make space for a new baseball stadium. [...]
Memorial Coliseum
A few weeks ago, Portland was awarded a MLS (soccer) expansion franchise, to start play in 2011. The plan is to renovate PGE Park to add more seats to accomodate the larger crowds the team is expected to draw. That means that stadiums other major tenant, the Portland Beavers (AAA affiliate of the San Diego [...]
Architectural photography for Portland and beyond
It took about two months longer than I’d hoped, but my new website is now live. Homestead Images provides photographic services for architects, engineers, builders and developers across the United States and Canada. We are also available to travel elsewhere as necessary. Pictured at left and below: Sum-Thing New Condominiums, in SE Portland. Designed by [...]
Architectural photography
My postings have been a bit sporadic recently because I’ve been really busy with family stuff, mostly related to my brother’s wedding which is this Saturday. But I haven’t been totally slacking on the work front. My Aunt Katy built a house in King City (north of Toronto) about three years ago. The architect, Terry [...]
Nothing to do with basketball
… Fifteen centimetres of snow fell overnight in the region, but the major pummelling of up to 35 cm began Saturday afternoon and lasted into the evening. Wednesday’s storm unleashed 28 cm of white powder on the Ottawa area. … (CBC report, Mar. 10) … Like a swaggering house guest that refuses to leave, winter [...]
A new bridge for Sauvie Island
The span for the new Sauvie Island Bridge sits jacked up on a barge at Terminal 2 in Portland, about eight miles upstream of its destination. The 1600-ton structure will replace the existing bridge that was built in 1950. According to Multnomah County, that bridge “is not adequate to meet the current needs of the [...]