by Sean Leahy

Be sure to read The Secrets of Grand Central Terminal, Part 1.

During a recent vacation, I was visiting some family in North Carolina for a few days on my way up to New York City for a photography work shop and to visit some friends. While sharing some prints I had made from my last trip to New York City and Grand Central Terminal, my aunt revealed that she worked for the company hired to restore the ceiling in Grand Central, and she was one of the project managers. It reminded me to call my contact at the MTA to see if I could get another special tour while I was in town.

“You’re not going to believe this,” predicted the voice on the cell phone, “but it just so happens that I have a special tour already booked on Wednesday for a photographer from some newspaper in England. If you want, you can tag along.” I said Wednesday would be perfect and confirmed the arrangements.

I emerged from the subway at Grand Central Terminal Wednesday morning a few minutes early, so I decided to get a coffee and make one last check of my gear. I know how my host for the day operates—once we get going, there’s no stopping or going back. I was traveling lighter than usual. Whatever I brought with me was going to be on my back until late that night, so I left my 70-200mm zoom and fish-eye lenses at the hotel. I knew from prior experience at GCT that the long lens had limited value and the fish-eye was an unlikely creative choice for what I expected to see… but what was I going to see?

When I got to the Station Master’s Office, I found out that the itinerary for the day revolved around the same places I had photographed on my last tour of the terminal. “No problem,” I thought, “I can go back and try to get some of the shots that didn’t turn out, or some of the things I missed. Maybe I’ll see the same things in a different way. At least I know what I’m in for this time.” But (to my delight) the other photographer didn’t show. So I convinced my guide to show me something new. And new I got.

 

“I’m going to take you to a part of the terminal that has never been photographed before. It’s been there the whole time, but it’s also new. You’ll be the first photographer to go in there.” I was lead through a series of doors, elevators and three different security checkpoints, until we arrived at Grand Central’s new (and unfinished) Operations Control Center. I pulled out my tripod and my trusty Sigma 10-20mm f/4-5.6 and took a few long exposures at f/16. Next I was lead through another set of security checkpoints and up a flight of stairs to what, I’m told, the press like to call the “War Room” (much to the dismay of the officials at the MTA, who prefer “Situation Room”).

 

From these locations, the MTA has communication with every train on the line and a view of every switch and from here can manage all public relations with the media. Sometime this month, as I understand it, there is supposed to be a Discovery Channel feature on Grand Central’s new OCC.

Along the way we took a detour and climbed up behind the clock that faces 42nd Street. It is the world’s largest example of Tiffany glass and it is linked directly, via satellite, to the atomic clock at the Naval Observatory in Bethesda, Maryland. I was told I’d have to go through some pretty tight places to get up there, so I left my camera bag and tripod behind and carried only my camera and a couple of lenses. Through an opening in the wall, not deep enough to be a closet, much less a hallway, an unusual door opened to a dusty space of concrete and brickwork dating back to the early beginnings of the building. It was warm and dark, lit only by a couple of tungsten light bulbs. We climbed up a couple of simple steel ladders, clearly fabricated for this location, through a crawl space, over some large pipes (of unknown purpose), and up another ladder.

 

We finally arrived at the platform supporting the gear-works of the clock behind the clock face, and I got right to work; but I soon ran into a problem: There was a lot of light coming in from the clock face, relative to the lack of light from where I was standing, and I wanted to get more detail out of the gears that ran the clock. I didn’t have my tripod, so HDR was out. I didn’t bring my hot shoe flash, and although my camera has a built-in flash, it casts a shadow on the floor when using it with my Sigma 10-20mm lens. Solution: I turned the camera upside down and shot with the onboard flash. It worked perfectly! I climbed back down from the gear platform and nodded to my guide that I was ready to move on.

 

“Wait.” He said, “I have one more thing to show you. Here’s what you’re going to do. I’m going to open this window, and you’re going to hold your camera outside—now, be very careful! Do not drop your camera—You’re going to turn your camera around and shoot backwards and up at the clock.” So I wedged myself into position, stuck my arm out of the window (camera strap wrapped three times around my wrist), and took a few stabs at it. In retrospect, I wish I had brought my fish-eye… Maybe next time.

After our trip through some of the more secure areas of the terminal building, I was taken down to the train platforms to get a few shots of the train and sign pictured at the top of this article. It is hot and humid on the terminal platforms, and very noisy. The day was wearing on, and I knew that my host needed to return to other functions, so I set about finding my locations and angles quickly. Sweat was already dripping down my face as I began setting up my tripod. The train and platform were to be briefly unoccupied, allowing me just enough time to get a few clear shots. To maximize DoF I used f/20 with a 2 sec. timer, MLU and a cable release. (Incidentally, the sign in that photo was backlit, so I used a couple of pocket-sized flashlights to “light-paint” the sign and balance the exposure.)

 

After I finished on the platform, we couldn’t think of anything more to go look at, and it was time for my escort to get back to work. But I still had about an hour left before I needed to move on to my next appointment. So I decided to get a few more shots of that famous ceiling. The flag that has hung above the information booth in the center of the concourse since 9/11 had been removed (something to do with some sort of promotion, I was told) so I was able to get a clear shot of the whole ceiling.

I stand by my statement in my last article, that you could spend a couple of weeks photographing in Grand Central Terminal alone and never run out of subject material. As I’m taking the opportunity now to review my photos from this and previous adventures into Grand Central, I realize there are still quite a few shot I want to go back and get. I guess that leaves me something to do next time!

More images from my forays into GCT can be found here.

Check out my related article Photographing the 7 Secrets of Grand Central Terminal, Part 1: Hidden in Plain Sight.

Sean Leahy is a vagabond musician and photographer who employs both as reason and means for traveling the world. Follow him on his blog, 43mm2creativity.

All photos: ©Sean Leahy.

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Related posts:

1. The Secrets of Grand Central Terminal