Tacoma Micro-Type-Out

Equipped with coffee and tea from Tully's, longtime friend and typewriter pen pal Andrew and I walked to Fireman's Park in downtown Tacoma for a sudden micro-type-out. We caught up on some correspondence, enjoying the perfect weather--while it lasted.

Fireman's Park is by the waterside overlooking the Port, under the shadow of old city hall.

Mt Tahoma (Ranier) is framed perfectly by the Port of Tacoma bridge in this (mediocre) photograph.

My type-in-companion was my green Lettera 22. His device of choice was a Smith-Corona Skyriter. He typed a letter, whereas I didn't really write any correspondence. I rambled on about birds, typewriters, and the weather. This was my first time typing in public for any reasonable length of time. A dozen or so people walked by without so much as a second glance. You can be weird here and still not be noticed. XD

The clouds started to roll in during our time there and within a few hours it was raining, hard (for Tacoma at least). One lightning strike even graced the occasion. Of course we happened to be caught in the rain with Ned (typewriter dog) taking pizza back to the apartment! It was fun.

Black and white photographs don't have the use of colour to distract the eye from compositional error. You can see that some of my photos are hits, whilst others are glaring misses.

Adventure Typewriter Search + Mystery Typewriter (part 2)

You can find out the exact details of the mystery typewriter if you know what to look for. ;)

Colon Mountain: Notice how the fields and houses continue right up it...haha

Looks like that Hammond probably wasn't worth over $300. Such price inflation! It was beside a $600 Oliver though...and across from a caseless $150 Corona 3.

200th Philosophothought post, begun March 2011, sent from our new Smith-Corona Skyriter and Royal Safari.

Adventure Typewriter Search Results! (part 1)

The Adler cleaned up surprisingly well! In fact, it looks like not only did I clean off the gunk, but some of the scuffing went away too. I didn't expect that. All I did was scrub the plastic with an electric toothbrush--first with goo gone, then with dish soap. It did wonders.

But for once you finally see typewriters as I found them. Almost no cleaning has been done for these makeshift photos, aside from the Adler. I didn't have any time to clean them up before the sun completely set, and then I'd just have to wait until the next day to take photos. I'll show the cleaned up typewriters in much better photos when the time comes.

I photographed the typecasts once more instead of scanning them. Out of laziness, I guess. I didn't want to get the scanner out. XD I think the scanner does do a better job in these low-light conditions...

Sent from my new typewriters: Hermes 2000, Adler J5, Smith-Corona Galaxie Twelve, and Smith-Corona Skyriter.

War Correspondent Skyriter

1960 Smith-Corona Skyriter 3Y 275501

*Hence, I named it "War Correspondent Skyriter"

Interesting how it includes both the old and new logos.

*Hence, I named it "War Correspondent Skyriter"

I realised a day after I got it that it was missing the back Skyriter name panel by the bunny ears. If anybody has one they could spare that is in the beige colour, let me know! Also, I have found a new method to take better photos. I've set up a mini-studio with a grey blanket that helps my camera take better photos, somehow. They look pretty sharp against the darker background.

Typed adamantly with our new Smith-Corona Skyriter

Characters: Pippity Crumble

Inquisitively typed with the assistance of a new typewriter yet to be mentioned here

Also, I caved in to having blog-formatted paper, as I'm going to be doing typecasts on half-sheets of paper. I have a gigantic old Ingento paper cutter that's perfect for the application, and my normal 120ppi scans fit perfectly at full-res on my blog. ^^ No more clicking on images to read on a separate page!