On the Road is a weekday feature spotlighting reader photo submissions.
From the exotic to the familiar, whether you’re traveling or in your own backyard, we would love to see the world through your eyes.
Good Morning All,
On The Road and In Your Backyard is a weekday feature spotlighting reader submissions. From the exotic to the familiar, please share your part of the world, whether you’re traveling or just in your locality. Share some photos and a narrative, let us see through your pictures and words. We’re so lucky each and every day to see and appreciate the world around us!
Submissions from commenters are welcome at tools.balloon-juice.com
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It’s another wonderful Wednesday, so that means…well, a major hint (as we used to joke, back so many years ago) “like OMG, it’s full of stars”.
I still pinch myself looking at so many submissions like today’s. But terrestrial spirit, rejoice – tomorrow we’re going to Africa and seeing amazing things.
Today, pictures from valued commenter ?BillinGlendaleCA.
A return to Fantasyland…
A couple of weeks ago I posted some shots that cannot exist in nature for one reason or another(usually light pollution). Here’s five more…
Taken on Various
Grand Park, Los Angeles, CA
Grand Park extends from Bunker Hill on the west down towards Poundcake Hill on the east to City Hall. Both of the hills have been leveled quite a bit, Poundcake Hill is hardly evident anymore(it’s where the Criminal Courts building is now, for you Angelenos). This used to be a up-scale residential area(there was even a short railroad up the hill a block from City Hall), though by the 1920’s many of the grand homes had become boarding houses and the area had become somewhat less grand. All the old homes were razed by the late 1940’s and the current Civic Center was built by the early 1960’s. Even by the late 1960’s this view was a bit different since the old Hall of Records building stood right in front of City Hall. This quite impressive building was unfortunately torn down in the early 70’s. The park between the buildings has been redeveloped in the past few years, parking lots are now parkland, and it a much more inviting area.
Taken on Various
Echo Park, Los Angeles, CA
Echo Park lake was one of 4 reservoirs that were planned to hold water for the growing City of Los Angeles in the late 1800’s. Three of these reservoirs were actually built: Eastlake, now in Lincoln Park; Westlake, now in MacArthur Park; and Northlake, which is in Echo Park. The lake to the south of the city was never built. Echo Park Lake had a nice view of Downtown LA from the north part of the lake, especially at night when you get reflections of the light on the lake. The lake has two fountains in the center which you can see in the photo as two orange columns. You might notice that the Milky Way in this shot is more vertical than in the previous shot; this is because the direction of the foreground shot is more towards the south and while this is Fantasyland, I do try to keep a level of realism.
Taken on Various
Downtown Los Angeles
The last time I shot a traffic trace in DTLA, I tried to capture this in real life(it didn’t work). The foreground was shot on the 3rd Street overpass over the 110 freeway. There a pretty good traffic trace and I’ve lightened the shadows so you can see the red in the bougainvillea at the right. Again, the Milky Way is move vertical in this shot to account for the more southerly direction of the foreground shot.
Taken on Various
San Pedro, CA
This shot(and the next one) share the fact that I’ve never shot the foreground at night. I’ve taken a day shot and converted it to night and added lighting. The foreground was shot to the south and so the Milky Way is more vertical in the southern sky.
Taken on Various
Sacramento, California
I initially wasn’t going to do this composite since I believed that the Capitol is on a true north south axis, it’s not. Looking at the Google Maps after I returned from Sacramento, I noticed that downtown Sacramento is laid out on a similar axis to downtown Los Angeles, so a composite would be believable. Of course, I only had day shots of the Capitol so I had to do a bit of work in Photoshop(changing day to night for the photo and adding lighting), but I think it worked pretty well. The Milky Way shot is an early season shot from Lockwood Valley so it works with the direction of the foreground and the light dome from Los Angeles works as some light pollution at the horizon for Sacramento.
Thank you so much ?BillinGlendaleCA, do send us more when you can.
Travel safely everybody, and do share some stories in the comments, even if you’re joining the conversation late. Many folks confide that they go back and read old threads, one reason these are available on the Quick Links menu.
One again, to submit pictures: Use the Form or Send an Email
rikyrah
Oh Bill,
Love all of them, but that first one for me . ??
Quinerly
?
JPL
Beautiful!
?BillinGlendaleCA
@rikyrah: Thanks, the first one has a foreground(that was actually taken at night) with lots of color. The last time we shot there, they told us we couldn’t use tripods.
@Quinerly: ?
@JPL: Thanks.
Amir Khalid
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
What is the reason for not allowing tripods?
debbie
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
Love that last one, but why no tripods?
Dorothy A. Winsor
Very cool pictures.
arrieve
This is the kind of Fantasyland I want to live in! Gorgeous shots Bill.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@Amir Khalid:
@debbie: My guess is they don’t want professional photographers taking pics with out a permit, even though it’s a public park. Laws regarding still and video photography are a bit different here in LA.
@Dorothy A. Winsor: Thanks.
debbie
@arrieve:
The top photo reminds me of the movie “Avalon,” one of my favorites. To paraphrase, If I knew things would change so much, I’d have tried to remember better.”
?BillinGlendaleCA
@arrieve: Heh, where the laws of physics don’t apply.
I wanted to mention a couple of things:
The kid dropped off 300 pics that she took in Australia and New Zealand and she want’s to exhibit the good ones, so there will be an OTR featuring her shots(she was using my camera and I’m processing them).
I do try to keep this type of photo real, as much as possible. Meaning that I try to keep the Milky Way in the position it should be for the direction of the shot and add some light pollution to make the blend between the two shots as realistic as possible. I got into a bit of a disagreement with another photographer on a Facebook group we were both on a few weeks ago over this issue, he contended that an artist could do whatever he/she wanted and it was fine and any criticism is inappropriate. I’m of the opinion that you need to have enough realism blending the photo to sell the viewer on the concept and suspend disbelief.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@debbie: It’s about 40 miles from Avalon.?
MomSense
So cool, Bill. I think my kid is going to move out your way early next year.
Amir Khalid
@?BillinGlendaleCA:
That reasoning is a puzzlement to me. They must have been aware that amateur picture takers too use tripods.
Tenar Arha
@?BillinGlendaleCA: Wow. Love the San Pedro & the Downtown LA.
SoupCatcher
Gorgeous!
J R in WV
@Amir Khalid:
How about “Because I can, and you can’t stop me, because I have all the power, and you have none!” as a reason for not allowing something?
Because lots of times, that’s why we have stupid rules, a stupid person gets some power, and needs to show everyone how much power he has. it’s frequently a male, but women can also be like that, especially if they have to knuckle under to some man but have other people they can in turn abuse.
Mary G
Gorgeous pictures of places I know and love. The traffic on the 110 is my favorite, maybe because the cars are moving!
J R in WV
Bill,
Great “darkroom” work, I wish I had the knowledge to use GIMP that you have of Photoshop.
My favorite is the oriental temple under the Milky Way, in San Pedro, CA. That’s the best composition and the best execution, to me. Really good composition, also really well executed.
My next favorite is The Statehouse, which is pretty good, too. The building provides a good focus of attention, as does the temple, which is simple with the flat plaza around it.
Third is the one with the highway foreground, but it isn’t nearly as sweet to me as the one in San Pedro, which is stark, simple, and with the galaxy towering over it for a gazillion light years and as many real eons of been there… that one is just wow.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@MomSense: Thanks it sounded like his trip out here was successful.
@Amir Khalid: Rent-a-Cops being aware of something? Now that’s funny. It’s an arbitrary dividing line that alot of folk use.
@Tenar Arha: Thanks, I might try to get a better(night) pic of the Friendship Bell.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@SoupCatcher: Thanks.
@J R in WV: Pretty much.
@Mary G: Heh, it was a Sunday evening. That’s the only time cars move on the 110.
?BillinGlendaleCA
@J R in WV: Thanks, one of the reasons I use Photoshop is that there’s quite a bit of free support out there on the web since it so heavily used. I used to use Paintshop Pro and it was really hard to find any support save the help files. The same was true with GIMP, while free it has it quirks that made Photoshop worth the price.
Both the Korean Friendship Bell and the Capitol are day shots converted to night. The Bell pavilion presented an additional problem in that the pics I took to the south were not as good as the pics taken to the north, so I had some extra work there. I also wasn’t sure about it being lit at night, so I did a Google search on that, until Sunday the picture didn’t have lighting. I was happy to see that they light it at night, I think it turned out much better.
stinger
Lovely lovely lovely.