A Photograph On Occasion by Dave Wyman by Dave Wyman

A Photograph On Occasion by Dave Wyman by Dave Wyman

A Photograph On Occasion

By Dave Wyman
227 Photos

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Malibu Magic Hour (I've spent a few days exploring the bluffs above Pacific Coast Highway, trying to find some of the unique ways an iPhone - or any camera in a cell phone - can envision the world.

That vision includes capturing amazing beams of light and plenty of depth of field. I think those attributes were put to good use in this photo.

I've discovered the ability to capture these rays of light, and to make them go where I want them to as they stream across a landscape depends on the angle of the sun. Success can also depend, at least in the case of the iPhone, on whether the camera is in the vertical or horizontal position.

There's one more important element that can work for and against the photographer who wants to include these special beams of light. That element is time. It goes by quickly at the beginning and the end of the day. That's when the beams are easiest to see and photograph. But time early and late in the day seems to slip quickly away, and the beams slip away, too.)

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Beam Me Up! - An Alternate Vision of Reality (I recently pedaled my bike to the top of a paved road in Malibu, California, above the Pacific Ocean. I made a photo with the camera in my cell phone. I've discovered the tiny lens in the camera is good at seeing what I can't with my eyes: bright beams of light that peek out from the corners and edges of things, like trees and clouds and boulders. I decided to incorporate one of the beams into this photograph..

I'm sure some people will see these light rays as distractions. I think of them as another way to experience reality, similar to the way wide-angle and telephoto lenses change our view of the world. Now that I know they're waiting for me and my cell phone camera to find them, I'm on the lookout for these magical manifestations of electro-magnetism.)

Napping - Oceanside, California (Using the burst mode on my iPhone let me make 22 images, from take-off to landing, of an acrobatic young man. He made his amazing leaps look as easy as taking a nap. Actually, he made about a dozen leaps and this is one of my favorite photos of the dozens I made.)

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Present at the Dawn of Creation (Haleakala Crater - Island of Maui, Hawaii

Each day the world renews itself at sunrise. Nowhere is that more apparent than 10,000 feet above sea level at the summit of massive Haleakala, known as "House of the Sun" to Hawaiians.

I brought a fine camera with me to document the new day. However, I was lucky enough to make this image, with its unexplained bolt of light, with my cell phone.

The photograph has come to mean more to me than a photo of dawn. I think of it like life itself, which contains for each of us periods of light and dark and which can take us up to high summits as well as send us into deep valleys.)

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Ducks at the Hollywood Reservoir - Los Angeles (The Hollywood Reservoir is less than ten minutes from Hollywood Blvd. Yet it's and unknown by most Angelenos. On a Sunday visit, I had about 2 seconds to raise my camera to my eye, find and focus on the ducks, and press the shutter.)

Sunset Over Malibu, California (A night vantage point offered me a view of the Southern California coastline.

Many attributes define as as human. We can make tools, we are self-aware, we have language. Surely we are also human because of our ability to enjoy a beautiful sunset.)

Droning On Beneath the 6th Street Bridge (Sometimes it's quiet beneath the 6th Street Bridge, just east of downtown Los Angeles. Sometimes there are people just hanging around, with nothing better to do than climb the lampposts and watch themselves, as a drone records their derring-do.

That was the case a few days ago when two of us brought our cameras with us to see what was up – literally – below the bridge. I like this photo. Exposure and composition had to be made on the fly, so to speak. The look is monumentally urban, and the scene calls to mind King Kong atop the Empire State Building. (Actually, we'd happened upon a video shoot.) By the way, if you'd like a private tour of Los Angeles with me for a few hours or a day, or to join me on my next scheduled tour of the city, contact me.)

The Open Road (Photographed on a bike ride after I'd pedaled up several hundred feet above the Pacific Ocean, in the hills of Malibu, Southern California.)

Leader of the Pack (A great pyrenees leads a herd of sheep along Highway 395, along the east side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains of California.)

On the Brink - Big Chico Creek, Chico, California (The meaning of a photograph can be obvious to me before I press the shutter release. Here is the meaning I gleaned after, rather than before, I made this photograph: Aren't our lives like these leaves? Aren't we often, and perhaps always, balanced on the brink of falling into the unknown? Life, whether as complex as that of a human being, or something as simple as a leaf, is changeable, and in the scheme of things, emphemeral.
When I made this photograph, my camera was balanced on the railing of a foot bridge. The leaves in this photograph achieved temporary equilibrium on the edge of the dam at the base of the amazing Sycamore Pool. Filled year-round by the waters of Big Chico Creek, Sycamore Pool is an enormous, concrete, municipal swimming pool in the town of Chico, California. To me, Chico is paradise lost.
I'm not sure anyone else noticed these leaves; they probably caught my attention because I've seen leaves balanced like these on other occasions, in other places. This is the fir)

A Rose by Any Other Name... (Photographed in Orinda, California.)

The View from the Summit of Mount Diablo, California (Mount Diablo stands as an isolated, 3,849-foot (1,173 m) landmark, visible from much of the San Francisco Bay Area. On the day I made my trip to the summit, the view was impressive, although distant landmarks, such as Mt. Lassen, in the Cascade Mountains, and Half Dome, in Yosemite, were not visible.
I'm not sure why some humans - myself among them on occasion - enjoy "conquering" the summits of important mountains. I'm a little sorry, too, that a paved road winds its way to the top of Mt. Diablo. While the old visitor center on the summit is impressive, it would not be so without the accompanying view.
Considered, like many imposing mountains, to be a sacred place, Mt. Diablo has served in Native America mythology as a seat of creation. Perhaps making the journey in my little pick-up truck (with my pbase friend - Rosemarie ), rather than on foot or on my bike, made for a more mundane visit. Certainly I enjoyed the view, which here looks sou)

Alone, Not Lonely - Portland, Oregon (When I was a child I thought being alone was the equivalent of being lonely. Yet there is a difference between enforced and voluntary isolation.
Mike, whom I met as darkness fell over the city of Portland, does not fear being by himself, nor does he mind a lack of companionship. With his life stripped down almost to the essentials, he carries all that he owns on his back. His one luxury appeared to be a mini-boom box.
When we met, Mike was listening to the radio. "Do you know this song?" he asked with a smile. I did (in fact it has a rather special meaning for me.) As he headed into the night, his bedroll on his back, I did not know if Mike embraced the lyrics of the song or turned his back to them.
"Desparado"
Desperado,
Oh you ain't getting no younger.
Your pain and your hunger,
They're driving you home.
And freedom, oh freedom.
Well that's just some people talking.
Your prison is walking through this world all alone.)

Sneak Attack! (An annoyed crow dive bombs an unsuspecting eagle, in a residential neighborhood in Astoria, Oregon.)

Clammers south of Cannon Beach, Oregon (When a clammer spots a hole, or "dimple" in the sand, she or he will utilize a three-foot long piece of four inch diameter PVC pipe, capped with a handle, to help capture a clam. The trick is to then position the pipe over the top of the dimple and begin pushing the pipe deep into the sand. Placing a thumb over the tiny exhaust hole drilled into the top of the pipe creates suction on the trapped sand and water below. Pulling upward brings a column of beach sand trapped in the tube.
Removing a thumb from exhaust port allows the sand to fall free. With luck, a shiny brown clam shell will be extracted from the sand.)

A Dreamscape Near the Mouth of Tillamook Bay, Oregon

Ghost Boat (Sometimes we come to an understanding of something by a bit of indirection. Sometimes what we think we see is merely an illusion.
This is the "Maranantha," shown in reflection - and flipped upside down - while docked in Depoe Bay, Oregon.)

Harbor Seal at tide pools near Otter Rock, Oregon

Sea Anomone, Oregon Coast Aquarium (A large anemone, firmly attached to the glass, is illuminated by a shaft of sunlight.)

Beneath the Coos Bay Bridge (Many of the 1930's era bridges in the state of Oregon, USA, are triumphs of architecture. That includes the undersides of this bridge, which to me resembles a Medieval cathedral.)

The Magic Moment of Flight (I've been lucky enough to fly a few times - no, not with my arms flapping, rather on jets and small planes. For me there has always been that transitional, magic moment as the aircraft roars down the runway and begins to rise on a cushion of air, that magic moment when the battle with gravity seems won, when all things seem possible.
I made this photograph on the beach, at sunset, in Bandon, Oregon. I wonder what the seagull was thinking as it made that change from a somewhat awkward web-walker to an athletic acrobatic of the skies.)

Sunset from Coquille Point, Oregon (Harbor seals are hauled out on the rocks on one of the Oregon Islands, and children spend a few minutes in play. Soon, darkness will descend over the Islands and the nearby town of Bandon.)

Ready for his Close-Up (Making friends with this equine was easy. Making him pose for his portrait proved difficult.)

Multnomah Falls (We arrived at the falls, which are in the Columbia River Gorge, east of Portland, Oregon, early on a Sunday morning. For a while we had the roaring falls all to ourselves.
I made a similar photograph last year on my trip to Oregon, which is in another pbase gallery. Repeating the set-up for this photograph, which meant waling up to and down from the empty bridge a couple of times, was enjoyable. My thanks to Hal Grant, who waited patiently and positioned me - wich hand signals - on the bridge.)

The Sea Otter Who Made His Bed and Laid Down In It (A California sea otter, wrapped in kelp to keep from drifting too far from nearby friends similarly draped in seaweeed, lies in a bed of his own making on an early Sunday afternoon, near the mouth of Morro Bay, California.
Do you ever wonder about your own life, how well you've anchored yourself to the familiar, and what might happen if you let yourself drift away from your world? Unlike the human species, sea otters seem to be able to have their cake (or at least a clam, oyster, sea urchin or abalone) and eat it, too. They
stay put with ease when they want for as long as they wish, rolling over a few times with a strand of kelp clamped in their teeth until they've made a blanket of seaweed. Then, when the mood and hunger strikes, they can swim for miles to hunt for shellfish below the rolling waves of the open sea or in quiet coves along the central coast of California.)

A Sense of Community (Many people, young and old, for whatever reason - by circumstance of birth or by choice - have a need for a sense of community. Last year, I put down my camera and joined in the Havdalah service pictured here, the ceremony celebrating, with candles and music and song, the end of Shabbat, which is the Jewish version of the Christian Sabbath. This year I kept my distance and yet was able to enjoy the service, too, with my photography.
I think I grew up without a strong sense of my own community - my parents came from different backgrounds and our shared celebrations were few - so perhaps that is why I can enjoy, if only vicariously (and often with a camera) communities not my own.
This somewhat unusual Havdalah - unusual by nature of its location - was held, not in a synagogue, rather in the beautiful campground Point Mugu State Park, along the southern California coast. My purpose was to serve as chief cook and bottle washer, in addition to my self-created role as informal documentarian of)

A Couple of Friends at the Campfire (Two friends share some time - as well as at least a few other characteristics - at a campfire in the campground at Quaking Aspen Meadow, Sequoia National Monument, California.
Photographic note: I'm amazed at how well the extremely high ISO works, at least with this photograph.
)

The Night Sky Under Observation (Astronomers like to explore the stars in the heavens on nights when the moon puts in a late appearance, or fails to show at all. On such evenings, stargazers from Southern California arrive in droves, telescopes in tow, in the parking lot below the summit of Mount Pinos (8831 feet above sea level), north of Los Angeles, California. (Red light, which doesn't overwhelm the human eye, is used to mark and illuminate the 'scopes and their controls.)
For the Chumash Indians, Mount Pinos was - and is - the center of the universe. How fitting the slopes of the sacred mountain serve as an important site for those who seek new kinds of meaning found beyond our own world.
While I hoped to find new meaning to my own life, I found instead innumerable astronomers willing to let me share their views of the cosmos. Using a rolled-up serape I placed on the the ground to serve as a support for my camera, I was able to make my own vision of both the world below and the heavens above.
)

Packer, Tuolumne Meadows, Yosemite

Sunset over Tuolumne Meadows

Sunset Viewed Through the Mist, Tuolumne Meadows (An afternoon rainstorm washed the dust from the high country in Yosemite National Park, California. A few hours later, as the sun dropped behind a pine-covered ridge, Tuolumne Meadows was enveloped in a mist that softened the last light of day.)

A Curious Wolf (Rounding a bend, our photography group spotted what at first appeared to be a couple of coyotes trotting on the opposite side of the road. Too large for coyotes, we quickly realized we were overtaking a pair of wolves. We drove past them, stopped, wordlessly piled out of our van and quietly, reverently, awaited the approach of the wolves, whose ancestors trod the North American continent perhaps 200,000 years before modern day humans would evolve and began their slow march out of Africa.
Upon reaching the opposite side of the road, one of the wolves turned our way, staring at us with what I took as curiosity. This was no coyote, that lean and sly and highly adaptble predator. This was a massively powerful animal, with its enormous paws and long legs thicker than the trunks of the surrounding saplings. There seemed no hint of malice in the stare; no wolf on this continent, to my knowledge, has ever attacked a human.
A third wolf appeared from nowhere. As if on cue, all three turned from th)

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone (In the company of nine other photographers, I traveled to Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks for a few days. It was, I think, my 17th annual autumn visit, but I long ago lost the count. We spent a little while at Artists Point, where soft light revealed the Upper Falls and the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone.)

Starlings and Moon Atop a Church Steeple (Having a fair amount of experience with travel and nature photography, I'm often attuned to the nuances of objects both near and far in a scene. That was the case here, when I realized I could put the church steeple and birds in close juxtaposition with the moon.
When I showed some of those in our group what I had photographed, by letting them look at the LCD on the back of my camera, they found the image revelatory. They had looked out at what I looked out at, and then, simply for lack of experience, had failed to see what I saw. Soon enough, with a little practice of their own, they were learning to carve out their own vision of the world around them.)

The Wolf Killer (A Great Pyrenees guards the flock near the ghost town of Bodie, California. As large and as powerful as a wolf, the Great Pyrenees (known as the Pyrenean Mountain Dog in Europe) were bred into existence thousands of years ago. These wonderful dogs - calm, dignified, friendly - are examples of genetic engineering by humans accomplished thousands of years ago.)

Black Cottonwood Leaves in the Merced River, Near Residence 1, Yosemite

Clenched Teeth (A coyote, struck by a car along the June Lake Loop, at the base of the Sierra Nevada Mountains, lies on the side of the road.)

Ken Rockwells Night Photography (Ken Rockwell's camera takes in the view at Bridgeport, California.)

Stoneman Bridge, Yosemite

Boy, Acoma Pueblo (The Sky City), New Mexico

Sunset, El Malpais, New Mexico

Reflect on This (I managed to photograph myself as well as our Navajo guide, Ron, in Canyon de Chelly, Arizona, USA.)

Navajo (Photographed on the rim above Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Arizona.)

The Sacred and the Profane - Shiprock and Beer Bottles

My Kids (My daughters, Rebecca and Nora, are now 26 and 23. This is, then, a digital image (made with my digital camera) of a print made with my film camera more than two decades ago. I've always liked this photograph (it hung on the 'fridge for years) because it's a bit off-beat.
How did those two little kids grow up so quickly? Photography can save slices of the past, can't it? I'm not sure that's always a good thing - I feel a certain poignancy, perhaps better left unfelt, when I look at this photograph.)

Iconographies (The Virgin, incarnated in plastic and paint, surely watches over a home in the town of Chico, California.)

Moonrise, Winter - Chico, California (The sun begins to fade from the scene as the moon puts in its own appearance, rising behind a bare Sycamore, on a winter's day in Northern California.)

The Last Day of Autumn - Northern California (Each year, as December 20th comes to its dark conclusion, the calendar proclaims autumn once again to be null and void. Those in the town of Chico who rake seas of chlorophyll-starved leaves off thinning lawns and out of the gutters might take issue with that stop date. They know the leaves, which will begin to answer the call of gravity sometime in September, won't completely cease falling until the middle of winter.
Some might find the repetitive nature of the task to be a bore. For me, the act of creating giant piles of leaves in the street - where they are picked up weekly by the city - is both satisfying and cathartic.)

The First Day of Winter (Two days earlier, a storm surged across Northern California. The rain, draining out of the Cascade Mountains to the east, reanimated Big Chico Creek, seen here where it flows through Bidwell Park, in the center of the town of Chico.)

A Christmas Rose (I don't know much about roses. I didn't suspect they could survive nights below freezing. Nights in my neighborhood have dropped well below 32 degrees F on several occasions over the past two weeks.
True, the rose bush across the street from my home is almost devoid of roses in bloom. One rose, though, seems to have a tenacious hold on life. This rose is , to me, a beautiful gift this Christmas Eve, a gift I only had to look at to appreciate. There are gifts for all of us to enjoy, gifts of beauty and love and perhaps the gift of an occasional miracle, if we care to look for them.
Merry Christmas, December 24, 2007)

Royal, if not Presidential Treatment (Two cats, named for 19th century U.S. presidents, lounge on a bed, my bed, on a rainy day. It's rained a lot, lately. I haven't minded spoiling them and they have been good to me, most of the time.)

Desert Dweller (The woman standing in front of the faded Bagdad Cafe sign is comfortable in her own skin, at ease living in a remote and arid landscape. Like water, she has sought and found her own level. Most of us, should we find ourselves in similar circumstances, might want to desert such an environment. Yet don't we all, at times, wander in deserts of our making, in own minds?)

The Flag Raiser ("Do you want to see a real flag?"
Tom Lewis ran the flag up the pole at his machine shop in Barstow, California, not far from historic Route 66.)

Irrigation Machinery Ready to Take Flight? (Near Route 66 and the town of Barstow, California.
(I like the comments of JS Waters, below. I meant to write more than the brief, incomplete sentence, above, that first appeared under this photograph. I would have written that there is a "Industrial Age" look to this image, reminiscent to me of early versions of flying machines. The grounded wheels, the overhead pipes that appear to be wings, and the dangling hoses and nozzles that look like sleeping jets, are in silhouette a bit mysterious against the foreboding sky.
(That's what I would have written, but JS beat me to it, and I think she said it better the I would have.))

Anna (Our waitress at Peggy Sue's 50s Diner, in Yermo, California, was Anna. She was a good sport who agreed to pose for our photography group after we'd finished our meals.)

Ghost Bus (I suppose at first glance this appears to be a somewhat out-of-focus photograph of a two-toned bus.
For me, this is a photograph that calls into question the nature of photography itself, and perhaps the very nature of our understanding of reality. It's a photograph that touches upon certain tenents of science, yet it also expresses the near magical quality of discovery paradoxically based on empirical experience. And there's a question of whether it's still possible to have a free lunch, or at least a 'burger with both mustard and ketchup.
It is a fuzy picture of a bus. Or is it? I ask the question because, in the photograph, the top half of a derelict school bus (once owned by the Church of Scientology, and now taking up temporary residence in a junk yard in Barstow, California) was visible to me as a smeary-looking reflection. Put another way, the "bus" was no more than a ghostly, mirrored image of a real bus, which I photographed in a thin sheen of rain water on the hood of an old, o)

Two Track Mind - Casa Deserto and the Southwest Chief (Casa Desierto, the once-elegant and now semi-restored comfort station in Barstow, California, is reflected in the window of the dinning car of Amtrak's "Southwest Chief." Long ago, Casa Desierto was part of the chain of Harvey Houses that followed the rail lines across the United States. Instead of a hotel and dining rooms, the building houses the Route 66 "Mother Road" Museum, and the splendid Western America Railroad Museum.
The train makes a run from Chicago, Illinois, to Barstow, California and back again. Ordinarily arriving in Barstow from its eastern origin in the Windy City at 3 a.m. each day, the late appearance this day of the Chief - at a little after 10 a.m. - afforded me the rare opportunity to make a daylight photograph containing dual, if not dueling, subjects which would otherwise both be cloaked in darkness.)

Manhattanite (New York is both the quintessential American city and also one of the continent's most cosmopolitan of cities. Its residents, to an outsider, seem subject to continuous sturm und drang, and the only constant appears to be the need to keep moving. A resident - is she an All American or a international transplant stirred into the melting pot? - is momentarily held captive in the middle of the boulevard by a dangerous rush of traffic (and certainly not by the "Don't Walk" sign).)

Panned in New York (A bike rider zips through Central Park, in Manhattan.)

New York City Skyline (A reasonably mild winter's morning in Manhattan yields a photograph of an old skyscraper and bare trees.)

New York City Skyline (A reasonably mild winter's morning in Manhattan yields a photograph of an old skyscraper and bare trees.)

Skyscraper Reflection, Manhattan ("New York, New York, it's a wonderful town!
The Bronx is up and the Battery's down
The people ride in a hole in the ground,
New York, New York, it's a wonderful town!"
Talk about culture shock! A few days after my visit to the Mojave Desert, Route 66 and the little town of Barstow (see previous photographs in this gallery), I traveled to Manhattan to visit my daughter. Rebecca was my wonderful tour guide for a few days. I enjoyed being a tourist and my head frequently tilted up to view the massive skyscrapers.
At dusk, emerging from the lobby of the Chrysler Building - the iconic example of Art Deco architecture - I glanced up to discover the building as a reflection in the mirrored windows of the skyscraper across the street.
)

Raven - Yosemite (We could almost touch this raven - it seemed not to mind the presence of a gaggle of photographers.
I used a telephoto to narrow and put out of focus the otherwise easy background.)

Sea Otter With Snack (While working on the itinerary for an upcoming photography trip to "Steinbeck Country," I watched a sea otter make repeated dives for food. The otter made her dives next to a pier in the quintessential Central Coast town of Monterey, California.)

Piedras Blancas - Along the Central Coast of California (As I set up my tripod and camera, I listened to the sonorous voice of a massive elephant seal swimming just offshore. Across nearby Highway 1, a couple of coyotes yipped their own enthusiastic welcome to nightfall. Most of my attention, though, was focused on the lighthouse and landscape at Piedras Blancas (White Rocks).)

Wheels of Fortune (My attention was drawn from the larger landscape to take a close look at a disk machine. Sitting idly in a vast and empty field, it waited to carve long furrows into the rich earth of the Valley of the World.
)

Sandscape – Death Valley (Tromping out over the sand well before dawn, my friends and I chose a ridge with a commanding view of the dunes that surrounded us. The stars faded and the sun rose above a bank of clouds to reveal a golden dreamscape, full of sensuous forms created by the interplay of light and shadow. (More photographs from the same trip can be found by clicking on the "Death Valley 2008 gallery." ))

Whats in a Picture? (My friend Jane Roberts and I went out to make some photographs. We found a little cascade, just off the Centerville Road, not far from the beautiful Honey Run Road Covered Bridge and the town of Chico, California.
I can't count the number of times I've made similar photographs. This one seems at least a little different. This one exhibits a fair amount of color, and the lack of it. It shows amorphous and blurred shapes; there is texture, there is light and there is shadow.
Primarily this seems to be a photograph of water. It's also a picture of rocks viewed through the light-filtering effect of the water. There are grayish rocks, greenish rocks, blackish rocks, orange-like rocks. It's also, in part, a photograph of the sky - the blue portions of the photograph are the reflections of the sky on top of the water.
In a way then, what at first looks like a photograph of water is a photograph of everything that makes up our world - solids (rocks), liquids (water), gases (represente)

Dying Light over Lassen Peak (The dying light of a pleasant spring day fades from Lassen Peak, whose slopes still slumber beneath their blankets of winter snow. This still active volcano could wreak enormous damage should it erupt, which last occurred in 1917. Prior to that date, Lassen Peak (named for Danish-American immigrant Peter Lassen) had been quiescent for 27,000 years.)

McArthur-Burney Falls, Northern California (Water both pours over the top of the falls and leaks out of the porous rock itself. The falls - part of a state park - were named for Samuel Burney, an area pioneer, and the McArthur family, who donated the falls and the land around them to California. The falls are as impressive for their width as for their height, and here I've just sectioned out a small piece of the whole.)

The Leviathan (Scouting out locations for an upcoming photography workshop, I made my way toward massive Mount Shasta. An ancient and extinct volcano, the mountain rises more than 14,000 feet above sea level. A number of legends and beliefs are associated with Mt. Shasta, including stories about seven-foot tall creatures - the Lemurians - who live inside the mountain in caves lined with gold.)

Dawn Patrol (For the fifth time in eight years, I participated on the Wildflower Century, a 100 mile ride sponsored by Chico Velo, the bike club of the city of Chico, in Northern California. Almost 4,000 riders signed up for the event. Here, a few of the riders make their way up Humboldt Road, the first climb of the day.)

Along Ambrose Avenue (This beautiful garden of ferns and the house behind it are found in the lovely Los Feliz district.)

Morning View (A tip 'o the hat to my brother, Dan - coaster - for suggesting the Panasonic TZ5 camera, which I purchased for the Chico Wildflower Century bike ride. While walking with my dog this morning, I saw this beautiful flower and used the "Tizzy" to make the capture.)

Movers and Shakers of Los Angeles (One year ago, a massive fire spread across the landscape of Griffith Park, the crown jewel of open space in the city of Los Angeles. A celebration this morning in the park marked the heroic efforts to put out the flames. On hand, among many dignitaries, were the mayor, Antonio Villaraigo (on the left), councilman Tom LeBonge, and the director of city parks, Jon Mukri.
The public was invited, and a few, like me, showed up. Most of those present had a connection with the park or the city. Everyone enjoyed the speeches, the special guests, the display of fire engines, a flyover by water-dropping helicopters (the tanks were dry today), and the food.
I haven't made many photos of this sort since I worked as a newspaper photographer and reporter in the early 1970s. This was a pleasant moment in the life of a city, and I didn't need a press pass to record it.)

My New Bicycle (Specialized - Roubaix Expert - Carbon Frame - 18.5 Pounds)

Bear Encounter - Yosemite National Park (Ordinarily, point and shoot cameras aren't employed for wildlife photography. That was not the case this time. Although I had my Nikon DSLR with me, I opted to use my little Panasonic TZ5, both because it sported a long zoom. I didn't have to walk far to find this bear. It was quite close to the Glacier Point road and seemed unconcerned by my presence. When it slowly wandered away from the road, I followed it for a while.
NOTE: There have been a couple of comments about my close proximity to the bear, based on the exif data showing I employed a 47mm lens. That's 47mm on my digicam, rather than 47m on a DSLR. That focal length on a digicam, coupled with some electronic wizardry that cuts down the megapixels to give even more visual reach, is akin to using a DSLR with a very powerful telephoto lens.
I was a lot closer, though, than most people are willing to come. And long ago, in the dark, for several seconds, my nose was within six inches of the nose of a bear, but that's another story wi)

Water Colors (My friend Rosemarie asked if I am weary photography trips to Yosemite each year. I am not. Yosemite always has something novel to offer me. There is always something I haven't seen before, new ways to think about who I am, and a deeper understanding of my place in the world.
This photograph is a flipped and upside-down image of what I saw in reflection in the waters of the Merced River: the trees along the bank, Yosemite Falls in the background, a sense of color and movement. Some of me is in there, and now some of you, too.)

Wawona Hotel, Yosemite (Sit down in front of the lily pond and the hotel beyond becomes visible as a reflection.)

A Bear Ready For Its Close-Up (After making what I consider to be a lucky photograph of a bear (see the previous photograph in this gallery), I followed it for about two minutes as it ambled away from the road. The bear seemed unconcerned by my presence, although it would occasionally stop, scratch its claws on tree trunks, and look back at me, seeming to say, "Are you still here?" My subject finally made a little jump onto a tree trunk, and allowed me to make its official portrait. Then it jumped down and headed off at a faster pace, which told me that it was time to leave the bear alone.)

The Mayans Are Coming, the Mayans Are Coming! (Frank Lloyd Wright designed the Ennis House, which was constructed in 1924. With it's strange, Mayan temple-like appearance, the house sits on a narrow ridge-top above Los Angeles, and not far from the Griffith Park Observatory. It's one of four concrete block (or "textile block") houses in Los Angeles that Wright designed, and it's the most monumental.
I like this photograph for a couple of reasons. One, it's an unusual building, sitting in the middle of a street lined with more contemporary - and far smaller - homes. Two, I had to work to make this photograph, since I chose to ride my bike to the Ennis House, which sits several hundred feet up in the Santa Monica Mountains. It was worth the effort, with the weather, light, and my lungs and legs all cooperating with me.)

My Bike (My bike, atop my truck, in reflection on the side of a semi-trailer.
To see where I was going with my bike (and how difficult it - impossible? - it is to make good photographs from the saddle of a bike), go here for images and a story about the "Tour de Frog.")

Viewing the Heavens (Late light bathes the Griffith Park Observatory, which stands on the western flank of Mount Hollywood, above the city of Los Angeles. The open dome contains the solar telescope.)

A Day at the Races (Riders approaching at the Burlingame (California) Criterium, a circular road race around the center of the town, located a few miles south of San Francisco.
For more images of the races, go "here" .)

Reflecting on the Womens Race (The women race down the final straightaway in their event at the Burlingame, California, bike criterium, as my bike leans against the window in happy relaxation.
More images of the races are "here" .)

Earth Mother and Amazons (This is a sort of "Phil Douglis" moment.
I made this photograph at the end of the women's race at the Burlingame (California) Criterium. At first I found the figure at the left an unnecessary intrusion and I cropped her out of the photograph. And then I saw the juxtaposition of figures tells a story about the life history of one half of the human species.)

Tom and Lucy at the Family Breakfast Table (Tom and I were friends in college. I had had a pleasant visit with Tom, his wife, and some of his kids, in his hometown of Burlingame, California. Tom and Lucy (she would have been purring if she were a cat) are both wonderfully photogenic and the sunlight pouring into the breakfast room made for perfect portrait light.)

Iconography - The View from the Hollywood Sign (The old sign, on the southern slopes of Mount Lee, has served as a symbolic lodestone to those who have sought fame in Hollywood, the entertainment capitol of the world. I made my visit late in the day, when the sunlight was low in angle and warm in color.
The view here shows the top and back of some of the 40-foot tall letters of the iconic sign. Beyond and below are the Santa Monica Mountains (also called, in this area, the Hollywood Hills), and then the flat lands of the Los Angeles Basin.
Downtown Los Angeles is visible to the upper left, the Hollywood Reservoir is on the right.
(For the complete photographic story of my visit to the sign, click here. ))

Fire On The Water (I spent a week in the Tuolumne Meadows area, camping with members of the Yosemite Association, about 8,600 feet above sea level. On our last evening, smoke from a fire raging to the west of Yosemite National Parka slowly ambled east, spilling darkly past the surrounding peaks of the high country and out into the Great Basin Desert. The light from the setting sun, fuliginously orange, glittered in reflection in one of the creeks feeding into the nearby Tuolumne River.)

Returning to the Harbor (Sailboats return at sunset to Marina del Rey, California (just south of the city of Santa Monica).
We all have to come home at the conclusion of the day, don't we? No matter where we've been, what we've done, how much fun we've had (or how much pain we've endured), the day, sadly or mercifully, will end. The sailors bringing these boats back to the harbor presumably enjoyed their day, if only because they knew it would have to come to an end. It is that poignant knowledge, that our days, that our lives, are finite, that makes them so poignantly pleasurable.
There was only a little time to enjoy the view. And then I had to return home.)

Sunset Over the Pacific (Montana de Oro State Park, on the central coast of California.)

Unnamed Lake Along a Quiet Backroad (When I return from a trip on Interstate 5, I often make a detour to photograph this small lake - perhaps it would better be described as a large pond - near Gorman, a little community near the Tejon Pass. An emerald green oasis surrounded by the Tehachapi Mountains on one side, and semi-desert lands on the other, the lake sits in a depression along the famed San Andrea fault line.)

Day of the Dead (Without a flash, it was difficult photographing this slightly menacing wraith. If there's a bit of blur, though, perhaps that adds to the ghostly mood.)

Day of the Dead Dancer

Obama Victory Party - Los Angeles, California, USA (Outside, on the boulevard, pedestrians shouted and drivers honked their horns in paroxysms of unrestrained joy. Those who had wanted a different outcome to the day were silent.
Inside my daughter's apartment, her friends and friends of her friends became quiet, too, as they gathered around the television to watch a momentous event unfold. It was an event they had helped create with their votes, as they watched and listened to and applauded the words of Barack Obama, President-Elect of the United States of America.)

A Late Afternoon in Santa Fe

New Mexican Mythic (There are those places that we come to associate with myth and history, art and artifice, with spirit and power, with intellect and with intuition. Such places seem to abound in Northern New Mexico. Some are obvious: they are at a pueblo, or inside of an old church, and in a sweeping mountain vista. Some of these places, like the photograph above of a gallery and a reflection in the window in downtown Santa Fe, are less obvious, but just as fraught with meaning.)

The Chevy at Arroyo Seco (Our group traveled a few miles from Taos one morning, to explore the quaint little New Mexican village of Arroyo Seco. While we waited for breakfast to be served at Abe's cafe, some of us photographed the car across the street, where it sat quietly in an empty dirt lot.
What was the car doing there? What stories could it have told us, of where had it been, what had it seen? These were questions that would not be answered, and maybe it was best that way; some mysteries need or should not be explained, only savored.
Those of us who might survive as long as the car may end up just as rusty, just as colorful, and just as rooted to our final resting place. Perhaps in our perseverance we'll be judged rusty enough and colorful enough to be photographed in our own right. Perhaps that's one of the stories the car was trying to tell us.
In a way, the old car was there for us that morning, having long awaited our arrival with the patience of Job. Does it wait for you, too?)

Moonrise at Rancho de Taos (The massive rear buttresses of the St. Francis de Assisi Church have fascinated visitors, including photographers and painters, for almost two centuries. The old church is located just west of the town of Taos. In the late afternoon, the old adobe building glows with color.)

Still Life - Taos Pueblo

When Will We Ever Learn - The Taos Cemetery and the San Geronimo Church (The remains of an old church stand over the cemetery at the Taos Pueblo. The ruins are a reminder of the Taos Rebellion in January, 1847, when Indians and Hispanics rose up against the occupation of New Mexico by the United States.
The rebels - we might call them insurgents now - killed the New Mexican governor, Charles Bent, as well as several other prominent members of the Anglo community. Soon the U.S. Army marched its soldiers north from Sante Fe. The insurgents met the U.S. forces twice, and twice they were defeated, well south of Taos.
After their second defeat, some of the rebels sought refuge in the San Geronimo de Taos church in the Pueblo, and the soldiers marched unopposed through the streets of Taos by February 3rd. They surrounded the pueblo and bombarded the church. About 150 Indians and Hispanics, including many non-combatants, were killed, and later 20 or more leaders of the insurgency were executed.
Today, a new church stands inside the Taos Pueblo. The ruins o)

Ghost town Performance by the Cowboys For Christ (On a late Sunday afternoon, our little group of photographers made our way to a once-thriving mining community, Elizabethtown, in the Sangre de Christo Mountains of New Mexico. Now only a few old buildings remain, a couple of them visible from the highway, more as part of a museum on private land. The museum was closed, but gospel music eminated sweetly from the adjacent church. Someone invited us inside, to partake in the enjoyment of the music, cornbread and moose chili.
The music was a part of a monthly meeting of a local chapter of the nationwide evangelical Cowboys for Christ. Meetings consist of Bible study, a potluck meal, and perhaps the best gospel music this side of Heaven.
Their group was smaller by a few then the ten of us, and one of the Cowgirls exclaimed, "This is the most people we've had up here in a long time!" When I asked if the group would mind posing for a photograph on the front porch of the church, they not complied, they threw in a few extra gospel tunes.)

Winter at the Adobe Wall Motel, Taos, New Mexico

Snow, Taos, New Mexico, USA (An early-season storm coats the landscape, including a road leading toward the Taos Pueblo, with the Sangre de Christo Mountains beyond and above.)

The Old Pink Schoolhouse at Tres Piedras (The beautiful Pink Schoolhouse Gallery can be found, at least until late 2008, in the little community of Tres Piedras, some miles from the quintessential southwestern town of Taos, New Mexico. The owner, Ken Nelson, is threatening to close down the gallery - which once was a schoolhouse - and start a new chapter of his life somewhere beyond the horizon.
Although Tres Piedras (Spanish for "Three Rocks) was mapped on our itinerary, a planned stop was not. Serendipity, though, was our wise traveling companion who bade us explore the colorful old building that stands by itself, just off the highway.
This was one of the first photographs I made under stormy skies before Mr. Nelson invited us inside, which was as interesting to see as was the exterior of the gallery.
)

Ken Nelson Via an Imitation Holga (Ken is the owner of the Pink Schoolhouse Gallery in Tres Piedras, New Mexico. It's more than worth a visit to the gallery, and although he seems gruff, it's worth it to make Ken's acquaintance, too.
Just for fun, I decided to employ software which can emulate film, in this case Kodak ISO 32 Panatomic X. The software can also make it seem the photographer used the junky Holga, primarily with it's ability to add a mild vignetting effect; I added some edge blur via the iPhoto program.
Perhaps I should purchase a Holga and some film. And then I could set up a darkroom in the bathroom, as I did a few decades ago, and purchase an enlarger, a print flattener, safelight, developing tank, thermometer, trays, chemicals, etc., and install a vent to carry away the fumes and add shelves and extra counter space and....then again, no. I think I'll stick with my digital cameras and when I want the look of film, accomplish it with software.
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Roadside Portrait, Somewhere in Northern New Mexico (We had pulled into a little gas station/market that was a back road on a back road, as we headed from Hernandez to Taos, New Mexico. The two people here were standing in front of the store, enjoying an idle conversation. Suffice it to say that over the years, I've found it easier to meet people and ask them if I can make their portrait. Sometimes they say yes, as was the case here, and sometimes everyone enjoys the process, as was the case here, too.)

Hispanic Villge, New Mexico ("The priests were riding across high mountain meadows, which in a few weeks would be green, though just now they were slate-coloured. On every side lay ridges covered with blue-green fir trees; above them rose the horny backbones of mountains." - Willa Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop)

The Chimayò Badlands (After exploring the High Road, traveling from Taos through the Sangre de Christo Mountains, our photography group stopped at a viewpoint overlooking the deeply eroded landscape of the Chimayò Badlands. At first I thought I would not make a photograph of the badlands - it was too grand, I thought, to picture in one photograph. So I made two, stitching them together with the help of Photoshop.
)

40 Windows - One Reflection (We found this wonderful reflection as our photography group walked toward the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, in the historic central district of Santa Fe.)

The Golden Crane (A Sandhill Crane comes in for a landing at the Bosque del Apache bird refuge, in New Mexico, USA. The sun would disappear behind the mountains within the next few minutes, but for now, its fading light was capable of turning to gold the underside of the usually gray crane.
Superb at soaring, and apparently good at surviving, the fossil record indicates these elegant cranes have existed on earth as a species far longer than most living birds.
I was a bit short on firepower with my lens, which could only rack out to 200mm - I've cropped the original image quite a bit - yet I think I may have managed to capture the mood of the literally fleeting moment.)

No Vacancy! (The comfortable "Non-Smokers" Monterey Motel comes complete with a colorful neon sign that exemplifies some of what the historic Route 66 today is all about - the nostalgic quest for what never was, and will never be again.)

Fire - and Passion - Over Los Angeles (Passions ignite in a kiss while a chunk of Los Angeles burns in a fire of historic proportions, and the massive cloud of smoke, illuminated by the setting sun, drifts over the rest of the city. The view here looks west from the grounds of the Griffith Park Observatory; the city far below is covered in smog, coastal haze, and more smoke.)

Reflection Pool, The Getty Museum (A quiet afternoon, where my friend Bill and I viewed the Carlton Watkins photography exhibition, netted this photograph.)

Sandhill Cranes Coming in for a Landing (Sunset had fallen a few minutes before over the Pixley Wildlife Refuge, in the Central Valley of California. Perhaps a few thousand sandhill cranes, for most of the day searching for food, began arriving over and landing in several pools of water. The cranes would spend the night there, grooming themselves, visiting each other by striding somewhat awkwardly through the water, and making their silly high-pitched honks.
Conditions for photography were difficult, with the wide range in light values making exposure difficult. I think it would have been nice to have a full frame camera with higher ISO capability, or pehaps I need better post-processing skills.)

Sunset and Ground Fog at the Pixley Wildlife Refuge

Rice Silos (After photographing at the Pixely Wildlife Refuge (see the previous photograph in this gallery) with my friend, Jean Ray (who has here own gallery here), I traveled north, to Chico, California, to visit with more friends. Some miles south of town, just off of Highway 99, I stopped to photograph these rice silos, standing next to storage containers and rising above their reflections in a flooded rice field.)

The View from Dream Street (Visiting old haunts on my birthday, I rode my bicycle on a gorgeous afternoon that passes for winter in Los Angeles style. I pedaled up into the Santa Monica Mountains, on streets I hadn't visited in quite a while. On my return to the flatlands, I looked back to view some of the iconic images of the City of Angels: palm trees, red-tiled roofs, a skyscraper, and the near-mythic Hollywood Sign. The sign sits atop Mt. Lee, in the Santa Monica Mountains. A portion of the more distant and more massive San Gabriel Mountains rises, like a leviathan, in the background.
Everything in this photograph, with the help of my camera's telephoto setting, has been compressed into what appears to be a narrow, almost two-dimensional plane. Distances, though, range from several feet to many miles. The building, for example, is probably a half mile from the homes that appear to sit directly under it's base.)

The Hill Top Motel, Kingman, Arizona, USA (At the end of a long day, my friend Reid and I took a well-deserved break at the friendly Hill Top Motel.)

The Welder - Proof the Industrial Age Still Lives (Each year, on our annual tour of Route 66, we stop at a welding and machine shop that lies on Old Highway 58, which crosses nearby Route 66.)

Alien Commute (Even intergalactic visitors hate driving in the rain. This alien was photographed in Area 66, just off I-40, in Yucca, Arizona, where visitors can view the strange Dinesphere, and shop at the mini-museum dedicated to aliens everywhere. The museum is combined with a mini-mart, where basic supplies and hot coffee are available.
From the area66.com website:
"The region of Northwestern Arizona between Kingman and the Colorado River abounds with paranormal activity. UFO sightings are common, residents claim to have been abducted by aliens, and a UFO allegedly crashed outside Kingman in 1953. Since the construction of the Dinesphere in 1972, UFO sightings have increased and many believe that the mysterious sphere in the desert attracts extraterrestrial visitors. When driving along Interstate 40, people report seeing UFOs in the vicinity and strange lights in the sky. At night, the sphere glows like a beacon for alien visitors and reminds travelers th)

He Had a Thing Going with Marilyn (A wonderful pose by a patron of Mr. D'z diner, in Kingman, Arizona, on historic Route 66.)

Hualapai Native - Route 66 (On my recent trip with a group of photographs along Route 66, we met and photographed a Hualapai Indian. He had perhaps one of the most photogenic faces I've seen.
We were in the little Hualapi community of Peach Springs, between the Arizona towns of Kingman and Seligman, making photographs in the midst of the heaviest snowfall in northern Arizona in 24 years.)

Make Believe Indian (Compare this photograph with the previous image in this gallery to confirm that a living Native American is no wooden Indian.)

Motorcycle Jesus Loves You (For years, I've been on a mission to photograph this wall. My desire came to fruition on at the end of a photography road tour along Route 66, a few minutes after sunset. We missed the last gasp of the setting sun, but its rays reflected off the clouds, casting a soft and warm glow over the scene.
Over the years, the painting became faded, and Jesus, who was apparently going to fade into total obscurity under the harsh desert sun, has been resurrected into a Middle Eastern version of a divine Hell's Angel.
With a sense of peaceful submission to the true nature of the image before me, I realized one of our best locations had been saved for the last.)

From Nothing to Somthing - Hoar Frost (Frost - ice - will form from water vapor when solid surfaces - in this case pine needles - are cooled to below the dew point of the adjacent air. When that happens, water vapor turns into a solid, too. The size of a frost crystal is determined by the amount water vapor available as well as the amount of time available for formation. And it appears gravity has a part to play, too, dictating the direction the crystals will form.
In this photograph, there was both ample moisture in the air and a long, cold night that allowed ample growth of the frost.)

Cloud over Yosemite

Cycling Over the Brooklyn Bridge (View more NYC photos and a story about my ride here. My cycling blog is here.)

Death Valley Pupfish (A Cyrprodon Salinas, one of the surviving species of pupfish in the southern deserts of North America, at Salt Creek, in Death Valley. Pupfish average about 2.5 inches in length.)

At the Lumber Yard (Logs at the Roseburg lumber mill repose under a spray of water. Should they dry out, the logs could shrink.)

Fern Spring, Yosemite Valley, California, USA (How many times have I been to little Fern Spring ("Yosemite's smallest waterfall") over the past few decades? More times than I could ever recall. Enough times the one could imagine photographing the same location would become, not necessarily boring, but at least repetitive.
Each visit, though, offers a rebirth of my creative self. Somehow, on some level - from experience, from self-awareness, from looking at what others have done in the same place - I photograph, not a small spring, but the elements of the spring: water, air, light, color, as well as the way those elements react with each other, dependent on the time of day, the weather, where I'm standing, and my choice of lens. It's not the thing I photograph, it's the sense of a thing, via its constituent parts.
There is, for the time I am at Fern Spring, a submersion into the calming depths of the natural world. It's calming even as cars hurtle by on the road a just yards behind me, their occupants aware of their surrounding on a f)

Reflection in Ballona Creek (A row of apartments are reflected in Ballona Creek, which runs through Los Angeles, Culver City, and into the Pacific Ocean at Marina del Ray. I made this photograph while riding the wonderful bike path that runs along the (unfortunately) concrete-lined creek.)

Hualapai Indian at an Elk Antler Sale - Peach Springs, AZ, Route 66 (Follow more of the bicycle portion of this trip here. )

Butte and Badlands in Navajo Country (During the summer of 2009, I'll help participate on a one day, 100+ mile bicycle ride with the Rapha Continental team. (I'm not sure why I'm doing this - an attempted explantion may come later.) We'll glide past ruggedly beautiful portions of northeastern Arizona, including burned-out desert land, imposing sandstone buttes and badlands, and the heights of the mountains.
I made this photograph while reconnoitering the area recently. Follow the century ride when it happens on my cycling/photography blog, via my tweets (or via the blog-gallery I've created on pbase here , which is currently empty).)

The Daily Planet (Los Angeles City Hall is in the reflection of a bus windshield. The 1950s t.v. show, Superman, pretended
the building was home to the Daily Planet, the newspaper for which Clark Kent worked.)

A Cowboy - Alpine, Wyoming

Autumn Comes to the Tetons

Hayden Valley, Yellowstone

He Channels Johnny Depp Channeling Hunter Thompson (The afternoon of Halloween found me on my bike on the Ballona Creek bike path, a concrete channel running through the western portions of the city to the sea. Beneath the Overland Avenue bridge, a group of young men congregated in the late afternoon light. One of them, in costume, posed for me. "Who do I look like?" he asked me. He looked just like Johnny Depp, who played the part of gonzo-journalist Hunter Thompson, in the film "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," based on Thompson's book. The kid not only looked like Depp, he sounded like him. He had even read "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," portions of which he quoted to me.
I want to believe that Hunter Thompson himself - if not Johnny Depp - would have posed like this for me.)

Navajos Enjoy Dawn at Monument Valley (Carlos and Carl Philips were our guides in Monument Valley, taking us in at down. Everyone photographed the amazing landscape in front of us. I decided to turn around for a moment with my iPhone for a different view.)

The Road Ahead May Not Be Straight - Near Moab, Utah

Sunrise Over the Garden of Desert Delights

Fog in the Feather River Canyon

Culvert Off of Pulga Road, near the Feather River Canyon, California

Grandmother and Grandson (It is over three decades, and perhaps closer to four, since I first met Mrs. Pieper. It was nice to visit her and her grandson on a rainy afternoon in Northern California, where I spent a few days enjoying my past and my present.)

Disker on the Pieper Ranch, Northern California

Cactus, Living Zoo and Desert, Palm Desert, California

Beau (He is blind, he is deaf. And he makes his way through his life quite well, if only because of his still functioning nasal powers. There can be, at times, a certain dignity to Beau, which I think he shows in this photograph.)

Yosemites Natural Fire Fall (Yosemite has been forged by fire and ice. First came fire: magma, bubbling up from the interior of the earth, cooled to become granite, and rose to form the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Then came ice, rivers of ice: great glaciers flowed down out of the high country, to carve out incomparable Yosemite Valley.
In the latter half of February, when the low-angled light of the winter sun spins the frigid waters of Horsetail Fall into molten gold, the drama of fire and ice is reenacted for a few minutes at the end of each day.)

Pelicans Wait Out the Wind, Near Marina del Rey, California (A ferocious afternoon onshore headwind grounded scores of pelicans along Ballona Creek. Rather than flying and fishing, they spent their time grooming themselves or simply enduring the relentless wind.)

In the Heart of the Coast Range Mountains (A winding road leads into the mountains that rise east of the ocean, along the central coast of California.)

Motivation (A dozen mountaineers made their way to the top of Red Slate Mountain, in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, on a day early in September. The ascent required strong lungs and legs, and the motivation to walk and climb from our base camp at 10,500 feet above sea level, to the summit of the mountain, at 13,136 feet. The rewards included the 360 degree views and a well-earned lunch. The less tangible rewards included a sense of accomplishment, and the joy of conscious existence that came from working our muscles and minds to accomplish a desired goal.
For me, I don't climb a mountain, as George Mallory put it, "because it's there." I climb because I can, because it's a way to prove to myself I'm still alive.)

National Park Service Lock, Yosemite

The Horse Behind the Fence

The Guardian and his Charges (The nominally friendly Great Pyrenees was bred in Europe to kill wolves. This relaxed Great Pyrenees, watching over his flock in a spur range of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in California, is non-the-less ready to drive off potential North American predators, including coyotes and cougars.)

Sunset Over Los Angeles From the Baldwin Hills

Chili Chees Fries! (Part of my dinner at the iconic "The Hat" diner, in Pasadena, during the Route 66 photography workshop. We'll do it all again next year (only I'll probably skip the french fries if we return to the Hat).)

We had a great time at the Wig-Wam Motel, Wish You Were Here (Our photography group spent a night at the iconic Wig-Wam Motel, as part of our Route 66 tour. This old truck, which sits in rusting retirement at the rear of the motel, must have been a fine enticement for travelers back in the day.)

Morning at the Wig-Wam Motel

A Rainy Night in Los Angeles, Viewed from my Car

Winter at the Meyers Barn, Foresta (Yosemite), California

Abandoned Hudson Terraplane Near Planada, California

One Photograph, Two Orchards (Having left behind the mountains, which were still deep in the grip of winter and mantled in snow, our caravan of photographers made its way along rural Plainsburg Road, in the Great Central Valley of California. On the Plainsburg Road, we came across the beautiful almond orchard pictured above, in full bloom, sitting happily in its own irrigated reflection in the warmth of the sun, where spring, not winter, was in ascendency.)

A Most Unusual Apartment in the Sunset Hour (Three quarters of the way through a bike ride, I photographed this eye-catching apartment at sunset. The building sits across the street from Paramount Studios, on Van Ness Avenue, just north of famed Melrose Blvd.)

Dream Tower - Fargo Street, Los Angeles (Scaffolding surrounds a decapitated palm tree in Los Angeles. Together, the scaffolding and tree have become a large-scale art installation.)

Rebecca and Lee (My daughter, Rebecca, and her fiance, Lee, a few minutes before their marriage.)

1966 Caddy (This vintage Cadillac was parked on the street, one house down from mine. It belongs to a real estate agent who told me he collects 1950s and 1960s Caddies.)

In-N-Out (There is a veritable battalion of employees working the Saturday noon shift at the In-N-Out restaurant in Bakersfield, California)

Rice Silos, Artois, California (View more photographs and a story about my trip to the Great Central Valley here. )

Rainbow At Bridalveil Fall, Yosemite National Park (Each May, a rainbow appears at the base of Bridalveil Fall for a few minutes in the afternoon. As the sun drops, the rainbow works its way up the column of water, until it disappears near the top.)

Remembering Summer (Summer is a beautiful season in California. While its lazy days march off into the sunset, we can feel secure in the knowledge that summer, and its delights, will return next year.)

Prey, Join Me for Lunch? (My wife discovered this praying manits, which was more than two inches (well over 5cm) long, in our front yard, as she gardened. I made a lot of photographs to come up with this one, my favorite, because it's in focus, it isn't blurred, and I managed to recognize and work in a nice background to show the mantis off.
Unfortunately, it was definitely aware of my presence when I began making photographs with my digicam, which has an astoundingly good macro, but put me too close to my subject, frightening it. I switched to my DSLR with a macro lens, and I was able to keep a more discreet distance from my subject.
Over all the years I've lived in Los Angeles, I've never seen a praying mantis in my city. Quite possibly, long after all cities on earth have disappeared, the mantis will still be around. After all, it evolved into a terrifying killing machine 145 million years ago.)

An Especially Colorful Morning at The Los Padres Inn (Is this photograph representative of the Los Padres Motel? Yes and no. This is a photograph of the motel - and its reflection - when I was there one morning. The colors, though, are super-saturated. Does this matter?
For me, the answer is obviously no. I was not so much interested in using a photograph to show what the motel looked like, as I was in using the motel to show what a photograph can look like.
In other words, I'm more interested in the final product the photograph than I am in the original ingredients of the photograph. I set my camera on a vivid setting, and I added even more color saturation to the photo with an app I have on my iPad, where the photo is stored.)

Gently Rubbing the Toe of the Monster (At the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias, Yosemite National Park.)

Ghost Town (A knothole and a window patiently await visitors at Bodie State park, an amazing ghost town in "arrested decay," in eastern California.)

Rusted Car Along Route 66 (It was the end of a beautiful autumn day on our trip along Route 66. Our photo group stopped serendipitously, as happens often enough on a relaxed photo tour - at a cluster of rusting cars that sat slumbering between the empty old highway and busy Interstate-40.
In the few minutes we had to make our photographs, the magic light of the dying sun painted the old cars with a golden light, which brought each of them back to life for us.)

Stare Down in Santa Fe (This wasn't really a stare down. My subject was acting as a traffic cop, keeping cars out of the central square of Santa Fe, in anticipation of motorcycle rally for charity. When I asked his permission, he graciously posed for me, allowing me to approach him "up close and personal."
Making portraits of strangers is not easy for most photographers. Some try to make candid images - and do it well. I prefer to ask permission. For me, building a little repport can put my subjects at ease. There isn't always much time to do that, as was the case here. I simply walked up to the man, and said, "Hey, you look great. Could I make your photograph?" It worked, and I have a suspicion my subject was used to and enjoyed posing for anyone with a camera.)

The Oddest Couple (At Stewart's Rock Shop, Arizona)

Autumn in Los Angeles (I brought my camera with me today, on a bike ride, to photograph autumn in Los Angeles, an autumn which is especially colorful in some neighborhoods this year.
In earlier images I've posted to this gallery, I've written about the transitory nature of life. The fall season symbolizes that truth, that we are all here for a brief moment of time. The poignant knowledge that we are mortal is both our curse and our blessing, and it's what makes us human.
And nowhere is it a more revealed truth than on Hi Point Street, a few blocks from my home.)

Yosemites Natural Fire Fall (Each year, during the last two weeks of February, the natural fire fall puts in an appearance. Water from Horsetail Fall pours over the lip of El Capitan, which lights up for a few minutes with the help of last light of the sun. I've seen and photographed this remarkable event a number of times over the past few years. I missed it last year, so was glad my photography group and I had good luck this time out. It was a wonderful Yosemite experience, a great way to kick off the trip, and I'll try it again next year.
It does take some luck, because there has to be sun - only 4 days on average in late February - enough snow, and it has to be warm enough to melt enough snow to make the waterfall.)

Clothing Design with her Model

Gams At the Getty (Two women walk beneath – and echo in color – the poster for a Herb Ritts exhibition at the Getty Center, in Los Angeles.)

Earning His Daily Bread (I was accosted as I left the drug drug store.
"Can you spare a dollar."
"You'll have to work for it."
"What do I have to do?"
"Let me make a photo of you."
"Why?"
"Just for me. Here, let me show you some photos I have of people."
That did it. The panhandler couldn't resist the lure of my iPhone, which beckoned him to join the others who lived in my portrait gallery: friends and neighbors, Navajo guides, my gardener, workmen, hairdressers, waitresses, artists, etc.
When i made my one photograph, I paid my subject his wage, and asked him his name.
"Darryl," he replied. We parted. As I left, I saw him walk away, too. Maybe I'll see him again, maybe not. He will live for a while, though, in my iPhone and here.)

The Finite and the Infinite (An abandoned car along the backroads of Arizona sits beneath an endless sky over the entire world.)

Duck, Merced River Reflection, Yosemite (The bold colors of autumn are largely missing from Yosemite, because most of the trees are evergreens. By the time I and a few other photographers visited the park in mid-November, most of the aspens, black cottonwoods, and big-leaf maples had dropped their leaves.
Yet there was plenty of color to mine, and we found a a rich vein of it. The golden hues of massive El Capitan, rising thousands of feet above the floor of Yosemite, and the cerulean heavens, above the massive cliffs, were reflected in the slow-moving waters of the Merced River. When we arrived at the edge of the river, the reflection perfectly mirrored the scene above it.. When the duck swam through the reflection a few minutes later, the movement shattered the reflection, giving us an alternate view of El Capitan.)

Approaching Storm, Yosemite (Clouds, the vanguard of a comng storm, floated silently into the western end of Yosmite Valley on a river of cool air.)

Resting Comfortably (A family crypt at the Garden of Memories Cemetery, in Salinas, California (at the cemetery where writer John Steinbeck is buried).)

Climbing Mt. Agassiz, in the High Sierra of California (It was a long way back and down to camp, near the little lake at the top center, of the photograph. We carefully picked our way along a narrow and steep ridge, skirting snowfields, still several hundred feet from the summit.
For more photos, and a story about the trip, go here. )

Cyclops (This is a photograph of the headlamp on my bike's handlebar.)

Observing Los Angeles from Atop Mt. Hollywood (- Looking down at the Griffith Park Observatory and Beyond, From the Summit of Mt. Hollywood -)

Beau - the Center of Attention (This is just a snap-shot, made a few years ago with my iPhone. Our little dog, Beau, who is the son I never had, and my best friend, is very ill. He has made his last walk around the block, and in a little while it will be time to say goodbye.
I looked over some photographs of him and found this one, which I think represents a nice part of who he is. For whatever reason, almost every dog in our neighborhood, and all the people who walk with them, have always loved Beau.
Here he is, my wonderful dog child, the center of attention, as always.
It's not easy type these words; my eyes are full of tears.
We've been together, Beau and I, for well over 15 years. We have been on one hundred adventures and more together. He's traveled wherever I could take him, from the mountains, where he sniffed the flower in the meadows, to the beach, where he raced over the sand along the edge of the water. We've slept in campgrounds, and motels and lovely bed and breakfasts, which, afte)

Ted Awakens to Meet His Dream Girl

Heron with it's Dinner (This great blue heron at Point Reyes National Seashore sat motionless against the tall, green stalks, facing at a right angle from us, seeming to look into the expanse of Abbot Lagoon. Then it turned and walked just into the stalks, motionless again for at least a couple of minutes. Then, in an eye blink, it struck at something in the dark beyond it, and jerking back, revealed to us the prey in its beak.

Struggling mightily, the snake fought against its inevitable fate, coiling and uncoiling, wrapping and unwrapping itself around the beak of the heron. At some point, the large bird managed to tilt up its beak and swallow the head of the snake. Soon the rest of the slithery reptile followed.)

Two Pumpkins, LeDoux Street

Sign of the Cross (Although I'm not religious, I can at times experience a transcendent moment. Signs pointing the way to these experiences surround us, some of them obvious, some of them not immediately apprehended.
This photograph was made near the Santuariò church at Chimayò, New Mexico, just as the sun was setting over the old village. Understanding came to me, in those last moments of light, that a sign, even the reverse side of a sign, can mean more than we think it does at first glance.
)

Baptism by Triptych (The temperature at Malibu Creek State Park, located in the Santa Monica Mountains about 25 miles from the center of Los Angeles, was about 110 degrees, hot enough to feel a little like Hell on earth. That didn't stop the faithful - or me - from gathering at the water to witness the baptism of a new believer.)

Upper Palisade Glacier and Attendant Palisade Peaks (At 12,500 feet above sea level, the views of the Palisade Glacier and the peaks around it are literally breathtaking. No trail for the final 1,000 feet or so leads to this inner sanctum of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. A traveler must find a way up a gigantic moraine, which is the vertical field of boulders that was, in ancient times, the granitic edge of an enormous glacier ruling over a frozen world. Some of the surrounding peaks, including Mt. Sill, North Palisade and Thunderbolt, stand more than 14,000 feet tall.
Now, at least in part because of global warming, the glacier is in full retreat. This was my first visit - in early August - to the glacier in perhaps more than three decades. I have to go back again, while there is still time, while both the glacier and I still live, while we are at least both still capable of moving, however slowly, over the face of the Earth.
Photography Note: For this photograph, made in late July, 2007, I used the same camera, the superb Rollei 35S, whic)

Me and My Rollei 35, about 1974 (I'm not sure what happened to this camera. I know I have three of them, each a slightly different model, all black, and all of them wonderful instruments of photography.)

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