Look closer... Closer.....CLOSER

Upon briefly pondering the importance magnitude of uploading a single picture by which to introduce myself to both my own teammates and all the rest of you players, it was pretty clear that not just any old picture would suffice. And since most - if not all - of the pictures of me taken any kind of recently are "just any old picture," I new I would have to take a new one specially for the task. But what? Me, obviously, but where? When? Why?

I mused over monuments, locations, lighting, times, what to wear... some ideas were of some interest, but they lacked the flavor, the creativity, the BANG that I wanted. Then it hit me. Inspiration!

1 picture. 1 player. 1 public transportation system. 1 day.

To be honest, most of my thoughts tend to pop up out of a thick murky soup much like the little purple and white triangle in a magic 8 ball. You don't know what it is until it gets to the top, but once it's there it's pretty clear what you have to do. But for those logic-based thinkers out there, I'll try to go back and recreate some logical steps to the final idea. Hehe.


The instructions of the task read "Take a picture of yourself." Thus the task has to be solo and include me and a camera. Considering the nature of my chosen team, I thought it only fitting to explore/visually document a recognizable area of our lovely City and of course get there by public transit. But what location is most fitting? And why should the location be the focus of my adventure? Instead I turn my focus to the transit itself. A picture in a BART station. No...not just any BART station - all the BART stations! In a single day! Can it be done? I'm willing to bet on it. And yet there is something that bothers me. A feat not many can say they've accomplished indeed, but as the end use of the task is to have a single picture to represent myself to the game... it doesn't do me much good to have 43 pictures stowed away in the proof if only one is displayed. So... one single picture that shows me at every single BART station. But how??? YES!!


My task clear, all that was left now was to prepare for the journey.....

Supplies and Equipment Roster

1 trusty backpack with more pockets, zippers, clips, and buckles than can be filled on any ordinary day.
1 pair durable, comfortable jeans
1 belt to prevent said jeans from showing my underwear everywhere (didn't work as well as I hoped)
1 long red tanktop - reads "I'm committed to perfection" Mwahaha.
1 wallet with all of the various accessories that come with it. Emergency use only.
1 scotch tape dispenser
1 pair sunglasses that won't hide my identity
1 beat up sketchbook (originally gotten for free)
1 pair comfortable shoes
1 pencil
1 eraser
1 pen
1 cell phone
2 meals - lunch and dinner (cheese-free pizza wrapped in foil)
1 BART system map
lots BART schedules
1 50 cent BART ticket
4 hair accessories
3 anti-boredom devices- 1 magazine, 1 book, 1 knitting project
2 Canon digital cameras (1 shown, 1 taking picture)
1 SD memory card per camera
1 battery back and 1 extra per camera.

The Plan

Set foot (ie. get off the train) in every BART station efficiently but not hastily. Self portrait in each location. Prove presence in each station by including station name in each self portrait. Further include items of interest in each picture as possible under the first two requirements. The journey begins at 8 am as I leave my house, or arguably at 8:10 upon my arrival in the Lake Merritt BART station. Head towards Fremont to avoid rush hour jam-packed trains going into the City at this time of day. Return from Fremont to transfer at Bay Fair towards Dublin/Pleasanton. Hitch Dublin/Pleasanton all the way through to Millbrae. Millbrae back to West Oakland to transfer towards Richmond. Richmond back to MacArthur to transfer towards Pittsburg/ Bay Point, and then the long ride all the way back to Lake Merritt.

Yes but how do you take a single picture showing all of the above information? Aaaahhhh, yes. The how. Simple. Daisy-chain through time and space using two digital cameras with interchangeable memory cards simultaneously. I begin my journey at Lake Merritt. I take a picture of myself with one of the Lake Merritt station signs. I hop on the next train going South and disembark at Fruitvale. Now, using one of the cameras to display the picture of myself at the Lake Merritt station, I again take a self-portrait, making sure the camera's display is in the current frame. As this second picture displays me at both the Fruitvale station and at the Lake Merritt station, I have effectively taken one picture of myself in both places at the same time. For the third station picture (Coliseum), I had to take the memory card out of the camera that had taken the second picture and place it in the camera for display. Of course, this meant taking the memory card out of the display camera and providing it to the taking camera so a picture could actually be recorded. So, the third picture not only spans space and time by displaying all three places simultaneously, but also makes the chain itself span recording devices and become an entity of itself jumping from card to card..... And so on and so on until the final picture - taken upon my return to Lake Merritt at the end of the day - displays my self portrait at all BART stations simultaneously. Now, given an astronomical resolution of said picture, one could zoom in through all previous locations until arriving at the original picture, then all the way back out again. Since such a picture would take an awfully long time to download and couldn't be constantly displayed as my profile picture in anything but an abbreviated form, and thereby y'all wouldn't get the liberty of trying it yourselves, I decided to also create and provide this film:



Movie


as a simulation of what that might be like. :o) Gggrrr... So much better before web compression. Hrrmph. I have further provided each picture for individual inspection should you please. The captions are location and time of photograph, all taken on Thursday July 19th, 2007. Don't be confused by the final picture being first. I had to put it there to have it show up as my profile picture, but from then on the pictures proceed in chronological order as they were taken. The final picture is also at the end.

43 BART stations
lots miles of track traveled
11:30 hours to complete task
$4.65 dollars charged to exit at the same location I entered. Don't know how that was figured.

-Beth