[PDX] Downtown, Trompe l'Oeil and Church - The Corner of SW Park And Madison

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On Monday, yesterday night, we saw the talk that Jack Ohman gave at the Oregon Historical Society. That wonderfulness will be for the next missive. Before we entered the building, of course, the surroundings on the Park Blocks, at SW Park Avenue and Madison Street, caught my attention, and I was, of course, smitten.

Aw, you know how I do.

There are two sets of what we call 'Park Blocks' in Downtown Portland. The north wing starts at West Burnside and runs north between NW Park Avenue and 8th Avenue until one block south of the Main Post Office on NW Glisan. The south wing runs south from SW Salmon beween SW 9th Avenue and SW Park Avenue into the Portland State University campus.

The newbie to Portland would probably figure that the pattern of these skinny blocks, only 100 feet wide to the standard 200-foot Portland city blog, running to within a block south of Burnside then jogging as it crosses Burnside to continue north, meant that they were all meant for greenspace, and that newbie would be right. But early Portland business dynasties didn't always give stuff away, and as a result, the blocks north of Salmon and south of Burnside went mostly over to business. Some takeback is occurring; the space known as Directors Park used to be mostly parking. I don't expect to see a greenspace connecting to north wing to the south wing even within my lifetime, so this will have to do.

The history also makes the nomenclature a little tricky. When originally planned out, the South Park Blocks were bounded by streets called West Park Avenue and East Park Avenue. Today, north of Salmon, what was West Park is known as SW 9th Avenue. south of Salmon, both sides of the Blocks are bounded by SW Park Avenue, West Park apparently becoming 9th Street, then SW 9th Avenue, as development occurred.

So much for all that. Back to the pictures.

This is the South Park Blocks, looking north from SW Park and Madison. It's easy to see how the narrow block makes a green corridor. The two wings of Park Avenue on either side are very narrow, even for Portland downtown streets, so the area feels very cozy.

That edifice above is the First Congregational Church, whose construction was completed in 1895. A United Church of Christ congregation is  headquartered there modernly. The top of that campanile is about 175 feet straight up. It's an imposing building but not without a certain comforting weight and presence.

This is the east wing of SW Park Avenue between SW Salmon and Main Streets. Like I said, cozy. The blue-awninged building on the right just up the street is the Oregon Historical Society main building. The real architectural treat is here, though:

Between the new main lobby of the OHS and the corner of Park and Madison there's a courtyard, and overlooking the courtyard is the west side of a building called the Sovereign Hotel, a building that the OHS also owns and is on the Historic Register. The optically-illusory painting on this building face has entranced me for a long time, and it's so well-done that you really think it's a feature of the building.

The French have a word for it: Trompe l'oeil (pronounced, approximately-enough for the English tongue, trump-loy). Literally, 'trick of the eye' or 'to trick the eye', it is exactly that … it delights the eye by fooling it into seeing something that's not there.

In this case, by decorating up what would otherwise be a bland, flat building side into something that truly does delight the eye. It pulls a foolie on you … but you appreciate the joke.

[Unicorns] PDX, Land Of Unicorns. As We've Been Saying

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Now, the idea of Portland and unicorns is something I definitely approve of, in as much as here, east of 82nd, the idea of Portlandia is certainly a thing – of which even we, out here, are alternatively entertained and sometimes appalled by.

But somehow, it all comes together and creates something awesome, as witness this t-shirt (which had the tag of the T-Line company of notably unicorn-free Canby) we saw on sale at Powell's this last week:

Indeed, as we've been documenting for a while now, Portland is indeed built on an ancient unicorn burial ground (not to be mistaken with an ancient Unicron burial ground, which is not a thing that I think could possibly exist, but I'm no Transformer expert). And as the tagline I Believe  suggests, this is more than a cute pairing of unicorn and city, but expresses … a deeper truth.

I want to believe. And so do you. Shut up, you do. 

[bloggage] It's Good To Be Listed: I'm On The List At PDXBloggers.

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As I've hinted, I'm now part of the most recent PDX master blog directory: PDXBloggers.com.

So check that shizz out, yo. And thanks to the PDXBloggers crew for adding me.

[PDX] The View Down Sandy Blvd, The Hard Way

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I was in slight danger for taking this picture. This is looking west down NE Sandy Blvd while in the crosswalk with the WALK signal favoring us. The nearest cars you see down the road there.

We were in vague peril but not imminent danger. The Wife™ stood sentinel duty.

The nifty thing about Sandy is that, from its origin at SE 7th Avenue and Washington Street to where it meets Killingsworth in Parkrose at NE 99th Avenue, it's more or less a straight diagonal line (as it ascends the Alameda Ridge, between just west of downtown Hollywood and NE 57th Avenue, it kinks right then left ever so slightly. You can scarcely see this on a map).

And it's pointed toward downtown, and gives great views as you come closer.

That big domino against the hills is, of course, my beloved Wells Fargo tower. Just as far away and just behind that copse of street trees is the KOIN Center, and with KATU just a block and a half away behind us and to our right, I noted that if you stand at the corner of NE 21st and Sandy and look down the street, you can see it, meaning you can see one major Rose City TV station from the other.

KGW is not visible in this shot, of course.

Again I used sightlines to force perspective and creat a faux-telephoto effect. Cropping out parts of this photo would result in very nice abstract-urban bits.

[PDX] More Wildfire-Inflected Sunset Pictures, From Inner NE Portland

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Yesterday, when we were busy taking poses of the KATU studios, we did, in fact see the sunset.

I've been calling these Wildfire Sunsets and -Sunrises because the amber, gold, oranges, and reds I've seen in the sky really do seem unique and unusual, and the only cause I can logically single out is the Scroggins Valley Fire and the 36 Pit Fire. In this case, it's Scroggins Valley … these pictures are looking due west down NE Hoyt Street from NE 21st Avenue.

It's hard to resist taking the pictures when the clouds throw their shadows.

Certain similes including the names of some boiling precious metals seem not at all amiss here.

[PDX] The Studios of Portland: KATU, On Your East Side

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A few days ago I'd visited the surrounds of KGW-TV, Channel 8, over on SW Jefferson St. And I'd rhapsodized about the KOIN Center before that. But one of Portland's Three Sisters of Broadcasting had escaped my lens, and that would be that (former) Fisher's Blend station, KATU.

KATU Logos over the years.

KATU's studios occupy what was originally a five-sided city block bounded on the north by NE Hoyt Street, on the south by NE Sandy Blvd and a slivery piece of NE Glisan Street, on the west by NE 21st Avenue and on the east by NE 22nd. Its official address is 2153 NE Sandy Blvd, and the station has lived in this building since it was inaugurated in the early 1960s. It has also been an ABC station for all but about a year of its existence, and while the other major outlets in town have changed affiliations at least once or twice (even KPTV was an NBC station at one time), KATU has been Portland's ABC stalwart … though it is, it is said, the fourth Portland station to be an ABC affiliate.

The current look of the building dates from sometime in the 1980s, if memory serves. It removed the old logo (a big 2, shaped something like a top-heavy swan) from the building and went big for beige. The station ID gracing the SE and S sides of the building visible from Sandy Blvd date back to about that time. Earlier versions of the logo (including the classic swan-2) can be seen in the paragraph above.

The current facade of the building, oddly, is not where you find the front door. See the photo above. That corner of the building, including that white-stuccoed corner with the single grey door in it that holds the station's 2153 address in bold numbers was once the main entry. After the major remodel in the 80s, that entry moved to the other side of the building. But stay tuned for that, as they say.

The above shot is taken looking south on NE 22nd toward Sandy Blvd. The charming brick building was at one time a jazz club named E.J.'s; now it's the east wing of Silver Lining Jewelry and Loan. It's a pawn shop. That van is turning into NE Glisan St going east from Sandy and 22nd; it diverges from here to take you into the heart of Laurelhurst, Providence Hospital, and points east and east of that.

Moving to the NW corner of this block … NE 21st Avenue and Hoyt Street … is where the somewhat counter-intuitive actual-main-entry to the KATU studio is. I remember being here for that KATU blogger meetup a few years back,  still a cherished memory. And, while the logo on the other sides of the building recall a slightly earlier time, the ones over the main entry are up to date:

The current logo, the current On Your Side tagline, and the call sign of the Portland Univision outlet … KUNP. This is what they apparently call a 'duopoloy', which is a broadcasting thing.

Fittingly, the new logo and IDs are on the building's side (COMEDY GOLD! YOU'RE WELCOME, PORTLAND!)

Now I mentioned the five-sided block with a sliver of NE Glisan. Here's that side of the building today:

That long, flat side of the building with the landsaping in front of it, that landscaping used to be street. And that street was technically part of NE Glisan, though there was not enough of it to make a full-width street there. Out of shot on the left the not-so-busy part of NE Glisan Street continues nto the formerly-industrial neighborhood north of Sandy and south of I-84. Presumably this was done to make the intersection safer; Glisan and Sandy are both very busy arterials at this point, and the same thing about the diagonal of Sandy that creates those quirky little corners and interestingly-shaped blocks also make for dangerous intersections. And so that goes.

The part of the building that surrounds it like wainscoting is perhaps the part with the most visible history to it. Remember how I told you that SE corner of the building used to be the main entry? Well, check this out:

Note how the stone tile has a certain change of tone from just the other side of the CHANNEL 2 metal type there to the white pillar at the corner? That was part of the original entry way. And the addres numbers appear not just once on the building, but twice …

… on that metal flag that shows about fifty-odd years worth of wear. I find it sweet that KATU has left those old address numbers there. Makes me smile. I like anyone and anything that appreciates its own history, and KATU, being a broadcast station, and especially with its Fisher Broadcasting roots, knows how to do that

The motif here is along the west side of the building and I took it before we left to get some other pictures of the neighborhood because it's the only side of the building you'll find that on. And it's an interesting one, which suggests nature or canoes or something. It's really hard to say. But I like seeing it there.

[liff] Outer East Portlandia Wildfire Afternoon

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As posited in an earlier missive, the 36 Pit and Scroggins Creek Wildfires have, at a remove, given us amazing skies.

SE Stark at 117th Avenue, looking west.

The smoky cast t the clouds isn't always evident, but it stands right out when the sun peeks through those clouds.

Now, we're at SE 114th and Stark, still heading west.

Last afternoon the skies out here in Outer East Portlandia were decidedly amber.

God Loves the Denny's

And the effect overall was not unlike you walking into a room and seeing a filmy pall of the smokers within, clinging to the ceiling overhead.

Except that it wasn't nearly as obnoxious. At least, not this far away.

[#RCTID] The Portland Connection To The New MLS Logo

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As it seems to happen in cases like this, Soccer City USA, RCTID and all, there's also some sort of Rose City connection.

Love it or hate it, Major League Soccer has a new 'crest'-style logo meant to evoke a more universal soccer tradition. Divided into upper and lower halves by sinister (it's a heraldic term) diagonal line that extends from outside the shield, the letters MLS rule in the upper left corner supported by three stars, the three supporting 'pillars' of the brand, the three C's … Club, Community, Country.

But why those? What caused MLS to create those three concepts as core to the brand?

Well, because Portland, that's why. Brian Straus writes at SI.com:

Before the U.S. and Belize opened the 2013 CONCACAF Gold Cup in Portland, Oregon, the Timbers Army and American Outlaws unveiled a massive series of banners that featured ‘Cascadia Sam’ and the words ‘Community,’ ‘Club’ and ‘Country.’

So, now you know. 

[#RCTID] BREAKING: Major League Soccer Unveils New Logo

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(h/t Jeff Fisher at this tweet hyar) I, for one, didn't see this coming.

I've always been charmed with the cleat-and-ball logo that was MLS's identity … but, apparently, MLS wasn't all that down:

We are not like other leagues, whether in North American sports or other soccer. Our situation is different, our history is unique, and how we express soccer is decidedly North American. We have goals and aspirations that are distinctly MLS. As a result, our brand and crest visually reflect the type of business we are.

As of 2008, the MLS logo appeared thus:

It was in colors until 2008; since, this was the official version of the design.

MLS has decided that it was time for a design that was different, soccer … but all-American. The result is thus:

The organization explains it this way:

The new brand's design is intended to say “soccer: without the literal ball and cleat. In the end, we decided that the inclusion of a ball and cleat is unnecessary as it dates us very quickly (due to the fast pace of innovation in our game) while many other ways exist to signal we are a soccer league. Our new brand will build meaning over time so that our new crest signifies soccer in North America and has a unique place in global sports.

I get what they're going for. That slash extending beyond the shield though, on the lower left there … I'll be honest, I don't get that.

The new logo (which they call a crest but, as every self-respecting heraldic professional will tell you, is a 'coat of arms' … whether or not a College of Heralds recognizes and protects it is actually issue altogether) is designed with an ulterior purpose. The blank half of the shield is meant to give room to the team's personal logo or device and is intended to be cast in the team's colors. For instance, here's the #RCTID version:

The other teams' versions, plus all the whalesong-and-joss-stick logo talk you could possibly take unless you were a graphic designer (note; I love logo whalesong-and-joss-stickery) can be found at MLS's new rollout page … here:

http://www.mlssoccer.com/NEXT

#RCTID, baby!

[PDX] The Studios Of Portland: Retro-cool KGW-TV

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I have said it before, and I'll say it again; TV stations are temples to me.

I'm sure it comes from too much Saturday morning TV and game shows and too much TV news when growing up. Once I saw pictures of Portland over the TV … well, it was game over for my sentimental heart.

Now that I've been a Portlander for more than half my life, it's surprising to realize that some things never get old to me. Like driving past TV stations … the technology, the energy. TV stations to me are like those purple lights to bugs. Irresistible.

I'm fortunate that I've gotten to tour some. Not all the ones I've wanted, of course; the day of the regular station tour … if ever there was one … is loooong past. But so far, KATU, Channel 2, KOPB, and KGW's Studio on the Square. KOIN, despite my love of its building, I've still not seen into, and the KGW main studio, still nada there too also. Hope springs eternal, at least within the limited bounds of a human's life.

But, as I said, I've never gotten tired of pulling past TV studios. And, if KOIN's is a mothership, then KGW's is Moonbase Alpha … kind of what you get if you let all the architecture in Gerry Anderson's TV shows collide and merge, but in the good way, totally in the good way.

You reach the KGW studios by travelling west on SW Jefferson Street going out of the city core. The two streets, SW Jefferson and SW Columbia, form an important legacy 1-way couplet; these two streets carried US Highway 26 before the Sunset Highway was built and connected to the inner I-5/I-405 freeway gauntlet. The streets still merge at SW 18th Avenue and proceed under the Vista Bridge to merge with the Sunset just west of the Vista Ridge Tunnel.

But I digress and get away with myself, and pass by the building just like you might, because it cleverly slots into its surrounds. The facade almost seems too small to contain a TV station. But it's there, on the north side of SW Jefferson Street, between SW 14th and 17th Avenues, just as you start to go downhill into the bowl of Goose Hollow.

The first thing you notice is the cowlings over the windows. When KGW's studios were built, they were obviously designing for a then-futuristic look. Well, it's gone through a futuristic phase through various fashion changes without altering, and now, it's come back around … delightfully retro-futuristic, riding the Ouroborous of architectural fashion.

This is one cool-ass building.

That mast at one time held a lit sign bearing the station's call-letters. The place you'll find station ID from street level is on a modest sign in front:

The new Gannett empire style has not yet trickled down to the sign in front, but I'm sure it's set to soon. It holds all the just-superceded logos, including the old KGW.com and a digital subchannel I must say we quite miss … KGW 24/7, kind of a super-local weather channel, cycling beautiful Oregon views from KGW's many remote cams with the occasional weather report and news-show recast. This was a good, great thing, and we miss it. Seriously.

The front of the studio has a classy touch no other broadcast center in Portland has … this wonderful semi-circular drive designed to drop anyone, in any limo (or personal car, even) in style, at the front door to the station. It really is quite hip, and moreso in person.

Did I want to walk up and look in that lobby? You bet! Did I? No! I respect boundaries. But I'm hoping that someday KGW gives a studio tour. I would so be there.

Now, I mentioned that it seemed a brief facade for a TV studio. It's what I've heard call a 'sleeper' … a little front leads to a big back side. In this case, the building is shaped like a reversed "L", with the tip of the base of the L peeking out onto Jefferson. The building extends back and then turns west. The back door is about a block north of Jefferson on SW 17th Avenue:

… which you can tell, because there's the window cowls up there.

Each edifice has things to recommend it. KGW's is just totally cool, because it has this funky futuristic design that became retro-future, and it wears it with cool self-confidence.

KGW doesn't need your approval. KGW just is. 

[PDX] Yay, But Just For Green Arrow

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In Portland, we like our superheroes, true.

But only one counts, really:

The only superhero we love.Right on … Green Arrow, ONLY!

So, you go boy … but just Green Arrow, ya understand?

The rest of you are on your own. 

[PDX] 36 Pit Wildfire Morning From Portland

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Over the past several days, something has come to the west side of the Cascades that not many of us would ever have thought to see: A wildfire.

They're calling it the 36 Pit Fire for reasons I'm hoping they'll eventually explain (on the edit: a commenter in my GooglePlus stream, +Merrilee Gilley, posted a link to a KOIN 6 News report explaining just how this wildfire-and others-got their name), and during the last few days, the prevailings have been blowing it down into the Willamette Valley, casting a dull pall from Portland down to past Salem. It's located, more or less, just east of the end of the North Fork Reservoir, which is about 5 miles southeast of the town of Estacada, which is about 30 miles southeast of the city center of Portland.

According to a Google Map-based estimate, the nearest part of the sprawling fire is about 27 miles from Home Base's front doorstep.

What residents there are in that area are being evacuated, and people in the town of Estacada itself are feeling a bit nervous. The Governor has invoked the Emergency Conflagration Act, which allows the State Fire Marshal to draft more structural firefighters to help. So, yeah … shizz has gotten real up at the end of State Hwy 224.

Down here, in the valley, at a safe remove, we who have healthy lungs and are out at just the right time get a show. Sunrise today was exquisite …

These were taken with the Canon simply pointing in the direction of the light.

The only processing was done to bring them into a size more appropriate for posting.

It's like shining a very bright light through nacre. And, if things stay lucky, there's not too much of this left to go.

So, if I can be allowed a soft'n'corny sentiment, I wish those who fight the fire and those who have property in harm's way well. 

[logo] KINK's New Logo: The KINKtrix, Reloaded

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This was actually pointed out to me more than a couple of weeks back, by Ben. And, by way of explanation, if not exculpation, whenever I tried to write about it, I found myself having to restate my words over the first few paragraphs.

Or, as, the say on FB, It's Complicated. 

KINK, Portland's legendary FM station at 101.9 on your dials, goes back a hell of a long way; 1968, an eternity in broadcasting, and an infinity in todays furiously format-flipping radio landscape. I don't think I'm unsafe in saying that Portland's radio landscape has gotten a lot more dreary since the the late 1990s, but fortunately we still have outlets such as KINK who, even if music has diverged and become richer in tone and substance, still approach it the same way … literately, with thoughtfulness and style and an awareness developed over nearly 50 years of taking the music they play seriously.

I was impressed by how seriously when I discovered that KINK is using the TuneGenie online service to provide its Listen Live function. This is more than just a simple stream. Each song is listed at the time it played, and gives links to online clips, the lyrics, and even to iTunes purchase links. Song you just heard caught your ear? Go ahead and buy it right now.

It's pretty nifty. This screenshot (from http://kink.tunegenie.com) gives you an idea (you might have to go through the main website at http://kink.fm to get there tho):

Classic Bowie, The Verve, and three or four bands I never heard of. All of that fits in with the new tagline … but I get ahead of myself.

My history with listening to KINK goes back to the mid-80s. It was the days where apartments in NW Portland were still affordable on the minimum wage; 1-room with a kitchenette on NW Flanders between 21st and 22nd with a shared bathroom in a very clean and well-maintained old mansion were $150/month. The meagre choices of jobs I would ere be offered was well on its way toward evolving me into the night owl I seem to have become, and KINK was the only station I ever listened to. I knew the late-night velvet that was Lights Out, which was nice because that was just enough jazz for my day. Steve Winwood ruled the airwaves and his songs won my heart. And there was else and other.

The 1970s.

The KINK format and approach has remained consistent and so, up until recently, has the logo. The original logo, legend has it, had block caps and a mountain and a bird, but that didn't seem to sit with the image the organization had for itself, so it's said, so in the early 70s, the wordmark that would serve in various versions for the next 40-odd years was created: the minuscule 'kink', in handwritten script. Relaxed, informal, yet erudite and smart, it neatly embodied the KINK vibe.

In those days, of course, radios didn't do any of this nancy-poncy decimal point frequencies. Sure, it's always been at 101.9 on the FM dial, but our Dads and Moms tuned to "KINK, FM One-Oh-Two", and they liked it.

The 1990s-2000s

Times changed but, as I said, the logo … not much. By the first decade of the 2000s the kinky script had moved out of the old square pad and into a newer and more modern oval with a yellow background. But the True-to-the-music spirit of the old logo was still there in its casual script, and the tagline was still True To The Music, even though the glyphs underlying the design boasted of its precise frequency and its web address as another place to tap into that KINKy goodness.

Scarcely a year ago the logo evolved again, as I wrote about in this blog here: http://zehnkatzen.blogspot.com/2013/11/logo-kink-fm-true-to-logo.html. And here's what I wrote at the time:

Today's KINK is much the same as the 1980s version. But they've ventured more into live acts and similar promotions. The new logo, which boasts the terrestrial frequency as well as the legendary tagline, encourages you to think of KINK the way a lot of stations do these days - frequency-name, so it's going with the fashion in a fashion, but in some ways you gotta change with the times, even if your content stays timeless … as the script logo, which I've always enjoyed, does.

This was the then-new version of the logo:

Circa 2013, November

… which I was a little mixed on but I did enjoy the fact that they remained true to the logo.

Well, if you've seen any of the commercials they've been running on TV latterly, you'll know that the look is all-new and rather cool. And this is it (screen-capture from the website … no high-def available, unfortunately) …

My feelings are decidedly mixed about this. And they revolve around two poles. The first one being: I didn't think the old look was old, or dated, or needed to be particularly fixed in any way. But that's why I maundered prolix about what KINK has meant to me; you don't get to know someone for that long without learning the contours of their face. I grew up an inveterate radio-listener. A favorite radio station for me was part of my daily survival kit; you go to a favorite stream to get just the right kind of water – well, your mind is the same thing. You go to a favorite station to hear the music you want to hear, and KINK's eclectic, unafraid mix of what's new and what's classic is just the right soundtrack for late lights over a drawing board, noodling around in sketchbooks or writing in one's diary … or just grooving on the late-night air.

The second one is … this logo is pretty good, actually. There's been a trend in making inspired type choices carry the design water, and this sticks that landing pretty well. A note I enjoy is the way the callsign is in minuscule … the tagline, Discover Music (which is always delivered with a strategic, pregnant pause in the TV commercials between the two words) is in mixed-case. The strictly lower-case display of the call-letters, though, recalls the older 'handwritten' logo in a subtle thematic way. 

So, the logo works and works well. Kudos there. 

But to, all of a sudden, find that my old friend is gone and won't be coming back? I has teh sad there, folks. Sorry, I can't lie about my feelings here. 

So, good on KINK for coming up with a good, solid logo, easy on the eye, in fashion and current with the type. I do sincerely think it's well-done.

But, if you really must know, KINK's left its script signature on my heart, and that's exactly the way it'll stay there. 

[pdx_TV] KOIN 6 Brands the Mothership

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I've said it before: edifices matter. Especially when you're a media company that has an electronic side (The Oregonian has forgotten this, and will be consigned to the netherworld of has-beens for it).

KOIN TV has one of the best emblems that a media company can have: A remarkably beautiful building, the KOIN Center, which, at 509 feet in height and 35 floors, is the third-tallest building in Portland (and, thus, the state of Oregon). It stands on the block surrounded by SW Columbia and Jefferson streets and SW 2nd and 3rd Avenues; this was KOIN's home since before the construction of the KOIN Center, and the station thus became its signature tenant. Its tapering profile, topped with a blue pyramid, remind one of a rocket ship from classic SF movies, if nothing else.

The mothership, ready for takeoff.

During the KOIN Local 6 days, they didn't take advantage of this symbol, and that, I thought, was a missed opportunity. Identity efforts before that did, but the were kind of bland, I thought. But then, a few months back, KOIN rebranded. Now, I don't know who was responsible for putting together the new look of the opens, but someone finally got it right. These are opens I can't get tired of looking at.

The graphics open with dynamic layered chevron shapes in blue chasing each other from the left to the right. Glossy music strikes up, with a technological edge, arresting the viewer's attention. The chevrons part momentarily long enough to let a voice-over intone "Live, from the KOIN Center, in downtown Portland …" and we are treated to really-awesomely well-done aerial shots-in-motion, gliding over the south part of downtown, and given an atmospheric feel thanks to colored lens-flare effects. These are great shots. They really draw in and almost make love to the most photogenic major downtown in America.

This YouTube video, posted by a user monikering themselves Portland TV, compiles all the major opens. Just goes to show what happens when you pair the beating heart of a beautiful city with dynamic opening music and graphics … something memorable and successful.



I've taken the liberty of screencapping the four variations on the approach. The source is the original poster's video.

The first one seems to be used for the morning and noon newscasts. If you paid attention to the video, you also noticed the tone of the morning news theme is more chipper and upbeat; there is a grimmer, more minor-keyed approach on the other three.

The morning and noon 'casts use the above, as I mentioned. The view is from the south and the flying view point is approaching it going north. Other notable buildings include the Edith Green/Wendell Wyatt Federal building (the one with the 'doffed cap' just behind and right) the Portland Building (behind and to the left) and the Wells Fargo Tower (left edge of frame).

The next two are used for the flagship 5-6 PM broadcast hour:

Above, the viewpoint is looking north-northeast as it moves from west to east toward the Willamette river. The ramps to and a bit of the west end of the Morrison Bridge can be seen at the top of the frame; the red brick building on the right edge of the view is the Umpqua Bank Plaza, which started as the Benj. Franklin Plaza; the chevron shaped building at the extreme right is the Waterfront Marriott Hotel, and, of course, the Wells Fargo there on the left. The building with curved roofline is the Mark O. Hatfield US Courthouse.

This one pivots about the Wells Fargo Tower, on the right this time, as we travel again from east to west but this time north of the KOIN mothership. In the upper left, boats can be seen plying the RiverPlace marina; in the extreme upper corner of the shot the Marquam Bridge carries I-5 over the Willamette.

And this is the 11 PM shot. Same general area as just above, but an approach more straight on. Very TRON-esque.

Edifices matter. If you have one use it, but make sure you use it well. This is doing it right. 

[Out 122nd Way] Reach Out For The Sunrise

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The early day's sun and clouds once again captured me on my commute home from making sure the world stays open for y'all's … so I returned it the favor and captured it back.

The morning sun in the distance, shining under the clouds, found gaps and cast divergent rays under the deck. It's not the amazing display others were fortunate to capture some months ago, when the sun illuminated the east side of Mount Hood who had her tip int he clouds and case the most amazing shadow, but I still think it's something.

I'm fortunate in that the Rossi Farms are still working and give me this wonderful, clear spot to pull over and shnap the shutter.

That's life Out 122nd Way.