Posts Tagged ‘usa’

Whoop!

I was just sent the above photo by my friend, model, and client Karla Adams.

She’s used the tearsheet (right hand window) from a magazine which featured one of our photos from a shoot in Las Vegas and got it printed up real big for one of the windows of her new gym.

The gym is in Riverside, California.

It looks great Karla! 

www.karlaadams.com

I enjoyed my ‘little’ 3000 mile / 10 day road trip from Las Vegas to Denver last year so much that I’ve been thinking ever since getting home in October just how I can better it and do something even more fantastic this year.

After weeks of thinking, I’ve come up with a cunning plan.

Currently my plan is to start in the Boston, and finish in San Francisco.  I’d take the more northern route across the USA, taking in New York, Philadelphia, Washington DC, Chicago, Denver, Las Vegas, Los Angeles and San Diego.  I did think about hitting up Florida, but the humidity there just sucks the life out of me, so unless I get some amazing offers it’s probably not gonna happen.

What about Canada I hear some voice cry?  Not this year I’m afraid.  As much as I love Canada and Canadians, it’s time to see some new places.

I haven’t quite figured out dates yet, but I’d plan to start the trip sometime late August / early September time.  It would be my aim to be in Las Vegas for Olympia.  I’d end the trip early in October.

How to fund the trip is the next challenge.  To make it a little easier I’ve come up with the crazy idea of trying to crash in as many spare rooms / sofas as I can on my way across.  You see hotel costs on my extended trip across Canada last year almost killed me, and I figure if I can drastically reduce my accommodation costs then I’ll have more money left for nice steaks, beer and cake.

So, if you’re interested in shooting, giving me a place to crash, joining me for a beer, being a tour guide, or even joining me for part of the road trip, then please drop me a note and lets see what we can make happen.

Now I love dogs probably more than I like most people, but this one scared the crap out of me.  It wasn’t aggressive in any way, it was just big, bloody big.

It was early in the year, around March or April and I was on a photoshoot in the Miami area.  I remember it being stupidly hot and humid even at sunrise when we started shooting on the beach.  It was so uncomfortable that we soon had to admit defeat and head back to the house where one of the models was living.  I had heard this beast of a K9 barking for the previous hour from a distant corner of the huge mansion like house.  I’ve seen smaller horses than this dog.

Does anyone know what breed of dog this is?

Yes I know it’s a poor photo, but its all I’ve got handy.

We also used him as a prop for the shoot – below is a photo of that mornings pretty girl with the beast.

You’ve seen pictures of San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge taken from roughly the same place as this hundreds of time.

Is mine any different?  Do I have an interesting story to tell?  Sadly no on both accounts.

It’s still one of my favourite view points, no trip to San Francisco would be complete without it.

Today’s photo was taken midpoint along the Redwood Highway in California, somewhere between Crescent City and San Francisco.

I’ve driven all across North America but the Redwood Highway is one of my favourite drives of all.  You can just about do it in a day if you don’t stop too often, but next time I’m in the area I want to have more time there.   I have driven it 3 times now and each time its magical.  There is something about the trees and the ocean that makes it all so special.  The smell of the forest is also amazing.

This photo, if I can remember correctly was taken at the long end of a 100-400mm lens with a 1.4x extender bolted on.  The car in the distance was probably a good mile away from me.

Whenever I look at my photos from any of my road trips, it gives me in itchy feet and I want to go off and hit the road.  This year I think I want to stay closer to home as I’d really like to make a return visit to the northern bits of the Scottish Highlands.

My road trip from Las Vegas to Denver came at the end of my 8 week trip to North America, and I’ll be honest, it was the part I was looking forward to the most since arriving in Vancouver back in August.

I’m going to do this photo blog in two parts – the first being with snapshots taken on my Blackberry 8900 phone, and then again with the real photographs from the trip. As much as I like the photos taken with my proper camera, I find the snapshots taken with the Blackberry contain more of the essence of how the trip progressed.

The Blackberry photos are almost direct from the camera. I may have cropped some a little, but essentially they are what came out of the phone.

So let’s begin.

Wednesday 30th September 2009.

After a false start the previous day I was finally on my way out of Las Vegas and the Stratosphere Hotel.

I was travelling alone in a large 4×4 vehicle, large enough to sleep in the back, and that’s just what I intended to do. Why had I decided to sleep in the car? Two reasons, firstly because I wanted a bit more of an adventure without the need or worry about where I might find a hotel, and secondly because I was on a rather tight budget.

After a brief stop at Walmart to buy an airbed and sleeping bag I was on my way to my first destination, “The Valley of Fire”. Captain James T Kirk died here don’t you know?

From the Valley of Fire I headed north on the I-15, stopped at the last In-N-Out Burger I’d see on this trip, and then headed into Zion National Park at dusk, and to where I’d spend my first night.

A couple of beers and a self lighting log later and it was time to try out my accommodation for the first time.  There was only about 50 centimetres of headroom but once I laid down it was surprisingly comfortable.

It was a rather warm start to the trip.

My last look of my home for the previous 10 days.

On the road out of Las Vegas and towards Lake Mead.

The Valley of Fire – it’s really rather impressive.

I had to stop and have my last In-N-Out burger of the trip.

Bad photo of the sleeping quarters of my 4×4.

Beer and a fake log fire.