I was rummaging through my slides the other day, looking for the original slides of some of the pictures I have hanging on my walls. ; I found them, and a few others from 1986 that I thought I'd scan and share. In July of 1985, my employer sent me to Folsom, California for a three month contract programming job. ; Well, that three months ended up like Gilligan's "three hour tour", as I was there for two years. Folsom is an eastern suburb of Sacramento, and yes, it's home to the prison that Johnny Cash sung about. ; It's also in a great location - two hours to the west is San Francisco, and two hours to the east in the Sierra Nevada is Lake Tahoe and, beyond that, Reno. Needless to say, every weekend I managed to use up a tank of gas and a roll or two of Kodachrome enjoying the sights. Here's the definitive San Francisco shot: ; a cable car climbing Hyde Street in the Russian Hill neighborhood with Alcatraz in the background. ; The only thing missing is the Rice-a-Roni ad on the front of the car. ; When I look at this, I always hear Groucho Marx singing "And on a clear day you can see Alcatraz; you can learn a lot from Lydia." ; (That thing up in the sky that looks like a hair is actually a kite being flown down by the waterfront.) Going the other direction, here's a shot of some sailboats docked on the western shore of Lake Tahoe. ; A heavy snowstorm over Presidents Day weekend meant that the ski areas were still open on this Memorial Day weekend. ; That's Heavenly ski resort in the mountains in the background. In June 1986 I took an Amtrak tour of Yosemite National Park. ; This required taking a bus from Sacramento to Stockton, a train from Stockton to Merced, and a tour bus from there to the park. ; The place was absolutely beautiful. ; Here are just two of the shots from that day. This is an overall view of the Yosemite Valley, with El Capitan on the left, one of the many waterfalls on the right and Half Dome in the background. This view of Half Dome hangs on the wall beside my kitchen table. Whenever I traveled between Folsom and Sacramento, my route took me through the suburb of Fair Oaks and past a Ferrari dealership. ; Late one night I set up my camera and tripod across the street and took this shot of their sign. Later that same day, I came across this sign stating the blatantly obvious. ; This area is called the Yolo Bypass and is normally dry. ; Whenever the Sacramento River nears flood stage due to heavy rain or snowmelt from the Sierra, they route the excess water around Sacramento, with obvious consequences. Click on the pictures to go to their Flickr page.
Those are excellent- nice stuff. ; I am in the process of scanning a bunch of old slides my father gave me from the 1950's when he was a kid. ; For the most part they look as good as new. ; Makes me wonder if my computer files will still exist anywhere 60 years from now.
that shot of half dome/el capitan, that's standing in the tripod tracks of the master himself, none other than ansel adams, the greatest pioneer of landscape photography america ever produced, everyone owes it to themselves to read some of his books, don't worry about totally understanding the zone system it's enough to be exposed to that thinking, follow it up with "mountain light", the seminal work of galen rowell groovin to the beat of some jimmy cliff, diggin on the cali photos
Thanks, guys. ; I may try to convert the Yosemite Valley shot to black & white to get that vintage Adams look. I also need to look at filters or scanner software to correct the color cast on these Kodachromes. ; They look great projected on the wall, but they lose something in the scanning process. And Jeff, I share your concern about digital longevity. ; I don't think anyone has come up with a perfect long-term storage option for digital photos. ; You'll be happy to know, however, that the digital audio problem has been solved: ; http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=1216161
I converted the Yosemite Valley shot to B&W. ; Is it a classic, or should I repost it in the "How can I improve this shot" thread? No fancy processing, just a simple desaturation and a duplicate layer in screen mode to try and eliminate some of the haze.
