HDR Photography
New York was once famous for its oysters, grown in the harbor—a truly unbelievable number of them. Looking over the pier towards the still-glowing skyline of downtown Manhattan, I guess I’m not surprised they’d make an appropriate substrate for oyster growth.
From New Jersey’s Liberty State Park, the view of downtown Manhattan is unimpeded. The view extends all the way up to Midtown and landmarks like the Empire State and Chrysler Buildings. With nothing but the water’s reflections between me and the skyline, there’s an odd calmness to a multimillion-person city.
In the Berkeley Hills, above the National Lab’s Advanced Light Source, the view over Oakland’s twinkling night sprawl entrances. Look at all of those light-emitting objects! As LED lights have replaced sodium vapor models, I’m particularly fascinated in the shift as cities glow white, instead of orange.
On the trails of Berkeley’s Hall of Science, Bay Area residents watch the last light of the day on the Advanced Light Source and downtown Oakland. The area has multiple layers in physical and information space.
The Transamerica Pyramid is one of my favorite subjects, and I’ve lately enjoyed photographing it juxtaposed with older brick buildings.
If there’s one thing that Asheville, NC has it’s lots of breweries. If there’s a second thing it’s cool old Art Deco buildings.
My past couple of posts have been images of San Francisco, foregrounded by nature and suburbs—the style I like to call a “civilization gradient”. This image similarly presents downtown Oakland, California, past the hilltop homes and Cal fields of Strawberry Canyon and through the invasive alien leaves of Berkeley Lab’s eucalyptus trees. The HDR processing techniques that Brendan and I use are perfect for settings like this, with an array of light intensities across a broad landscape.
“Teenage” is a category that remains linked to California, and there are few places where the California/teenager overlap occurs more than in an older-model car jammed full of your best friends on a sunny Saturday afternoon in downtown Berkeley. There are plans to be made! We have to pick up that guy from the BART! What about hitting Grizzly Peak? Time to drive!
Like many East Coasters, I hadn’t heard of the marine layer until my first visit to the West Coast. The odd, damped mornings in coastal cities seem so at odds with the view of California in popular culture. Even sunny San Diego is matte and dull under a blanket of morning clouds.
Time zones are a source of confusion and consternation (seriously, they’re insane to deal with). Jet lag can be surprisingly disruptive. There are some temporal challenges to transcontinental (not to mention intercontinental) travel.
But sometimes the time zones align and travel makes waking at dawn trivial. To get a view of the San Diego skyline with the perfect mix of lighting and color, and with minimal sleep deprivation, was a treat.
Sunlight of late summer maneuvers through the Seattle skyline, and I can’t help but enjoy the way reflections and the impossible geometry (one of my favorite clichés) of Rainier Tower’s slender base stand out among the more “traditional” shapes of the surroundings buildings.
When it gets hot out (or hot for Seattle, at least) many will head for the beach, in this case Alki beach.
“Downtown” has a very different meaning in a small town. I love the repeating pattern in the second-floor windows of the buildings. Bright reds and blues will soon be covered with snow, but then perhaps I’ll take this same shot again.
Decaseconds 