Ron Shoots

Here’s the behind the scenes video I mentioned in a previous post. First I’m driving through the desert searching for the right location, then I do the photo thing… (my apologies to the spirit of Bob Marley for mashing his wonderful music with this goofy video)

Click on the screenshot to play video.

I don’t try to plan all of my day if I’m shooting travel landscapes… a general direction and a few “must shoot” items on the list, and then I explore. (I do try to be in “prime” locations both early and late in the day for the best light.) Today, I found myself on Cottonwood Canyon Road, a dirt road, dustbowl actually, that wound back into the mountains. True to the name, the canyon and riverbed were filled with Cottonwood trees dressed out in their fall regalia of yellow foliage.

Taking another turn on a yet smaller road I climbed to the top of one of the hills for an amazing overview. (See snashot below.) I love textures. On either side of the vantage point, the earth looked like the heavens had dumped out their charcoal grill.

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Yes, I admit, I’m carrying a shopping cart around in my truck. Thought it might be fun to shoot a standard issue grocery cart in out of the way places… maybe an internet company will find a use for these images!

Here’s a snapshot of the location in the middle of nowhere, Nevada. You have to look real close to see the cart in front of the truck. I have some video I’ll post later.

Oh yeah, the first location I found didn’t work out so well. Let’s just say what looks to be dry may not be dry. The truck sank about 6 inches in grey muck. Needed 4wd and a few tense moments of rocking back and forth to get unstuck… just a mild panic attack since I was 3 miles from the nearest lonely road.

What does the road look like in Death Valley? Here’s some video from a “bumper-cam” that I hooked up! (Music by the Beat Farmers… heard them play in a NYC bar way back.) Click here, or on the video…

Here’s a snapshot of my studio on the road. I’m shooting with a Hasselblad H2D-39 camera which creates magnificent 39 megapixel files. The camera works best when tethered to a computer, or where files can be quickly downloaded and evaluated. Every click creates 80Mb of data! The cool part is you can set up the FlexColor application to make color adjustments on the fly so incoming files are automatically color-corrected. (Thanks to the fine RCS digital folks for figuring this out!) So I don’t really have a truck, I have a four-wheel drive firewire port!

The GPS gizmos are for collecting trackpoints during the day. We then download a GPX file and mash the data with the images based on image capture time for accurate keywording.

Spent high noon at the lowest altitude in the USA. 282 feet below sea level. Badwater, Death Valley. The concept of dry land being under sea level just doesn’t make sense to this non-scientific brain. Oh well- it was cool (a balmy 99 degrees) and I got to share it with a couple of tour buses filled with German adventurers.

Got on the road about 5pm which in Southern California is exactly the wrong time to go anywhere! After a couple hours in traffic on the 91 and the 15, I found some suburban scenes at sunset to shoot. Massive housing developments that have sprung out of the desert displacing whatever ground-burrowing creatures were the previous inhabitants. Bedroom communities for the greater Los Angeles area.

In Barstow now where I’ll leave early for Death Valley. Here’s the exit where I’m living tonight, not much going on… unless you like to window-shop outlet stores.

Leaving Orange County in Southern CA in an hour or so. Truck packed, cameras ready. Next post from points unknown at this point!

Today I’ll finish getting my truck and gear ready for a 2 week shoot. Starting in Los Angeles and heading north, then veering over towards Utah, Wyoming and the Dakotas. Lots of road miles, but this is a fun adventure. Looking for pictures that go beyond a classic scenic. Looking for moments that typify a love of adventure, travel and personal exploration. Looking to organize landscapes in a different way.