Waves and gull

Will Rogers sunset

I went down to Will Rogers State beach near Santa Monica yesterday for my church's annual Beach Baptism. It was a great time of fellowship, singing and of course, some baptizin'. I might post some of those pics later, but for now, here's how the day ended.

Rails

Early morning roses

iPhone #7 Clouds with tree

Yellow pop

Just a little pop o' color to get your day started. Have a great weekend!

Sony sunset

As I was leaving work the other night I looked up to see the most spectacular sunset. I was in amongst the buildings so I couldn't get a clear view west, but the clouds overhead were awesome.

By the light of the moon

With great appreciation to several cars and the moon for making this shot possible. ;)

Morning moon

Took this during my walk around the Sony lot this morning. Have a great weekend!

Valley beyond

Night church

I've been on a bit of a night photography kick lately. I wanted to take some panoramas of the Valley the other night so I drove up, coincidentally, to the parking lot of my church. I did get some Vally shots but I'm not quite through with them, so I thought I'd put up an image of my church. This is two images combined; one for the church and its' lights, and the other for the sky and the shadows. More night stuff to come.

Night light

On Saturday night I went out to see if I could capture any of the remaining fires. I went down to the end of the canyon that I visited for my previous posts and found a little turn out area. There were just a few small fires still burning here and you can see the glow from them.

There were a lot of coyotes out and they were calling and yelping like crazy. I didn't see any, but I could hear them all around. It's amazing how quickly you can get to seemingly the middle of nowhere in this city.

Full circle

Ironically, the day I was at the Griffith Observatory to hear Buzz Aldrin speak was the second day of the Station Fire. It was clearly visible from the roof of the Observatory. The fire was still relatively "small" at this point. I don't think anyone had an idea that it would go on to be the largest fire in Los Angeles' modern history. I thought this image was a good way to tie together my last few posts and wrap up the week.

I hope everyone has a safe and fun Labor Day weekend.

Station Fire

The consensus from yesterday's comments was that you guys wanted to see some images from the fire, so here we go. Let me start by saying that I've never photographed an event like this and it was kinda overwhelming. The fire, the smoke, the sounds, and the scale of it all weighed on me. I have an even greater respect for those who put their lives at risk to protect others and fight to overcome this amazing force of nature. The winds have been mercifully calm lately, but the heat has been oppressive. I can't imagine what it must be like to fight this fire when the ambient temperature is 100 plus degrees. In short, mad props to those men and women.

I went to see and photograph the Station Fire over two consecutive days. The first time I was by myself and the second day I took my two boys because they kept bugging me to see the fire. Of course we could see the smoke pretty well from our house, but they wanted to get closer. Kinda like their daddy. I took them to the place where I had spent most of the previous day and I couldn't believe what I saw. Overnight, the fire had roared down the canyon and turned everything into ash. I couldn't get an after picture because the police were there to move folks along. Ironically, this is the same area I visited about a month ago and took this image. It will be very interesting to revisit that area when it's safe to go.

This was the view right off the freeway in Sunland.

This is Big Tujunga Canyon on the first day. When we came back the second day this same view was just white ash.


To give you some perspective on the size of the smoke cloud, here's a closer shot with one of the water dropping planes for scale.


I couldn't get over how the smoke cloud looked like some slow motion nuclear explosion.


It really struck me how this orange plane stood out against the gray tones of the smoke.


From the second day, further down the same canyon. The helicopters were actively trying to save homes.


When the fire reached a home or other structure, the smoke would turn very dark.


This is closer to where the original fire started, east of Big Tujunga Canyon.


The firefighters were setting up in a staging area to be on hand to defend homes.


As and added bonus, I've put up a video of several helicpoters defending a house set on a small hill in the canyon.

The Astronaut and the Observatory

As I mentioned last week, I went back to the Griffith Observatory to hear Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin speak. I started following him on Twitter and was excited to see that he was going to be there talking about his autobiography, Magnificent Desolation. I really wanted to see in person one of the men who walked on the moon. I didn't shake his hand or get his autograph, but it was cool to hear him speak wistfully about his time on the moon, even after all these years. There were amateur telescopes set up on the lawn aimed at the Sea of Tranquility on the moon. This is the spot where Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong set down 40 years ago. It was a beautiful evening and one that I'm glad I made the effort to be a part of.

Here's an eclectic group of images from my visit.

A question for everyone. I made two trips to see and photography the massive Station fire burning just east of here. I was going to make a post of some of these images, but I feel like there's been a glut of these and it might be too much. Gimme some feedback in the comments.