I paid a quick visit to the Fort Wayne Railroad Historical Society yesterday. Their locomotive, Nickel Plate 765, traveled by my house when I was growing up and I always like to see it when I can. On this day they were working on the frames that support the wheels of the locomotive’s tender. I walked away with two shots that I really liked of the work being done, although the depth of field could have been bigger. It’s always challenging to shoot pictures in their shop since it is very dark. You can see some of my other shots of 765 and other trains by clicking here.
Sparks flying
These two gentleman were grinding bits of steel that they had welded onto the trailer trucks. The steel they were adding was of greater strength than the original steel in the trucks. This will hopefully be more resistant to wear and tear. In these pictures they are grinding down the welded on pieces.
Recently I was up in the area near Redmond, Washington for a friend’s wedding. On the last day of the trip, we stopped in on Chateau Ste. Michelle Winery to walk around the grounds and take a tour of the bottling facility. Fortunately I had my camera with me and took some shots of the beautiful surroundings as well as inside the winery itself.
The tour mentioned that the original owners of the winery had a fondness for planting exotic plants and trees on the grounds. This tree caught my eye almost immediately.
I loved the views looking up at its trunk and branches.
Beautiful colors in the leavesJust a gorgeous tree
And here’s a quick not very exciting look at the tree from afar:
The copper beech from afar
This tree was not the only sight that caught my eye.
Mushrooms and greenBeautiful lawn and garden
Soon it was time to go on the tour of the winery. Since we were there on a holiday, no one was working to bottle any wine that day. This made for some fun shots of the empty industrial apparatus that makes up the winery’s bottling operations.
Wine tanksWine tanks detail
We later encountered a series of tanks which I think were steel but reflected the copper colored lighting and maroon walls in spectacular fashion. The rivets made really awesome patterns.
Tanks and copper lightRivet detail. Really beautiful patterns.Tank study in black and white3068 gallons each - that's a lot of wineGiant wine barrelBarrels of wine in the showroom
Three years ago a fire swept through parts of Griffith Park in the heart of Los Angeles. On this day for whatever reason I had brought my camera in to work. I was glad I did. From the rooftop of my workplace, we could see this during the day:
Griffith Park fire from a rooftop in Santa Monica
This looked big, and it was the first time I had seen a fire this close. Usually area fires had been far away in the San Gabriel Mountains or elsewhere away from the center of the city. Borrowing a telephoto lens for the night, the view became much more dramatic. Tragically the buildings and smoke are slightly out of focus in the series of shots I took from the rooftop at night.
Griffith Park fire gives an apocalyptic glow behind the buildings of Century City
Having seen this, and knowing that the park was surrounded by the city, I decided that this would probably be the safest fire I could chase with my camera that I’ll probably ever see. So, with a friend of mine along for the ride, we set out to check out this crazy sight.
A surreal alien firey landscape
What we saw blew our minds. I had seen fires in the past on TV but to see one with my own eyes was something else. It was insane. Whole hillsides right behind residential neighborhoods were black with glowing red embers. It looked like a mountain of lava with dark alien trees growing from it (where there were some left).
A neighborhood's light and power silhouetted against the firey landscapeHotspot in a forest of embersView of a red planet
It was just surreal.
The fire and the freeway
Our last stop was on the bridge of Los Feliz blvd over the 5 freeway. Here thousands of people were just driving on by the burning hillsides going about their business. Dozens of local Angelino’s were hanging out on the bridge under a rain of ash watching the action unfold and taking pictures. Everyone was super friendly. In fact, I noticed during the Station Fire last year that everyone I encountered was super friendly and helpful, giving me tips on where to shoot from safely.
As we get into the hot summer months I am sincerely hoping that we don’t have a repeat of last years devastating fire season.
I’ve been searching for some time for a simple solution for presenting a web store for selling prints. The closest thing I’ve yet found is the service from bigcartel. I’ve set up a basic store with them. Basically, you select the size of print you want and it will set up the transaction through Paypal. You need to specify which picture you would like printed, and then I will carefully and personally print the requested picture and send it to you. Check it out and tell me what you think!
