Quake City
Earthquake Ruins
In 2014 and about 4 years after the main quakes, after-shocks were still rattling my home on a weekly basis and I wanted to make a photo documentary of our city. My camera was a simple Canon Powershot A460. To lend personality to my pictures and yet remain anonymous online, I decided to feature my favorite doll as the narrator.
While taking the background picture in the header it occurred to me I could merge an image of my doll in focus with one of the background in focus to get both in focus, and I gave it a try. Although it didn't last, this was the spark that ignited my passion for photography.
Ruins are all highly unstable and fenced off to prevent injuries. Above is Cathedral Square where on that occasion ladies known as the red hats happen to be congregating while I experiment with an ND filter to create time lapse exposure.
The tram continues to ferry tourists to the now dysfunctional Cathedral Square. There is a nice cuddly transwoman playing with her remote control Sony QX1 camera in the foreground, but alas, I somehow managed to motion blur me. I'll try find some pictures I took of the square before the quakes and add them when I do. There was a nice one of our iconic Christchurch Wizard and his customized red VW beetle, if I remember correctly.
More photography magic: Although we can't get up close, a wide enough aperture is quite effective at eliminating a wire fence from the picture. With such a large aperture I had to wait for the sun to go down to avoid over exposing the image as the shutter speed just wouldn't go any faster and I didn't have my ND filter with me. A bonus is that sunset illumination makes for a nicer picture.
The same building from a different angle. While most of us struggling to repair what we can, "investors" from elsewhere come snap up the demolition sites. They aren't investing in the rebuild... just charging us exorbitant fees to park our cars while they wait for the land value to go up as a result of surrounding rebuild work. The ultimate parasites, are they not?
The AMI stadium had not be open long, but ironically for an insurance company they evidently didn't have adequate insurance as some years later it's still an abandoned ruin. Wht what really pisses me off is that our government donated BILLIONS of dollars to bail out insurance companies and slum lords but NOT ONE CENT went to people like me whose insurance was alleged to be invalid
Quake City
We had about 30,000 significant quakes in just a few years but two major quakes did most of the damage. I wasn't into photography at the time, but I did take a few pictures. Sadly, unaware of the oportunity for some dramatic photography, I had my camera set to it's lowest resolution! (shakes my head).
Here we see liquefaction just a few doors down from where I live. The picture aims to show how solid ground can just turns to sludge when shaken. You can imagine a similar mess under the floor boards in my house!
Here, a mansion, built for a view over the sea collapsed with the cliff face. I do hope the occupants escaped injury. Down below the containers have been put there as barrier to stop rubble rolling on to the causeway at the base of the cliff.
Drone fly-thru of the Cathedral ruin inspires another branch of photography, but maybe not really that practical, or affordable for me personally, so this one is not one of mine.
Christchurch Red Zone
The Red Zone in Christchurch is land that proved unsuitable for buildings after the 2011 earthquakes. It's now like a park. It's not far from the sea and not far from city center. The river and cycleways provide recreation. I think it would make lovely city camping grounds that could encourage tourism at affordable prices, but I doubt the powers that be would wish to share them that way.
Nature returns soft color to life. Then the focus is in the distance. Flowers in the foreground are out of focus - we are here in a land that time forgot.
A man catching white bait and I decided to wait for one of the many rowing skiffs to enter the frame. Alas the fisherman had gone up to his car and the skiff was too long for the frame and my shutter speed far too slow. Bad planing on my part, but the moment was gone and I'll try to do better tomorrow.
