DMK Fine Arts
Vista Theater, Sunset Drive & Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles
My trips to Los Angeles are always slightly rushed affairs coming as they do a night or two after or before a flight to Ireland. This makes it difficult to get out and grab a blue moment shot, there are too many things to do and people to see. Add to the mix an overload of âstuffâ, and the fact that I donât make money from these shots, means that life gets in the way. As is often the case with photographers, we deal with the urgent stuff of life first, and hope eventually to get to the important stuff of photography later.
So I had yet to get an iconic pic of LA, one that was mine, but it must have been niggling on my brain. On a daytime drive around some of the local neighbourhoods, my travelling companion spotted an old neon sign above the movie theater in Highland Park, now thatâs iconic LA! I then started plotting a shoot, first by seeing what shots were already out there, and then seeing how I could put my stamp on it. I had two chances to grab it, 2 nights where I was free enough to give it a try.
But something was bothering me. As is usually my problem here in the USA, the streets are very wide, very straight, and mainly deviod of pedestrians; all of this makes it hard to add my special secret sauce. In fact I had tried just such a shot in my hometown of Hutchinson only a couple of weeks previously, and it was an unmitigated disaster for all of those reasons. The Highland has an interesting old neon sign, sure, but I was afraid it would not be enough.
These doubts essentially meant I lost the first night, why go to all that bother if itâs just going to be yet another âsameyâ shot, one just like I already have plenty of?
On the last day, as a friend was showing us some other interesting parts of LA, I spotted the Vista Theater, and I was hooked! Same kind of old neon, a lovely curved road in front, a wide crosswalk for pedestrians to loiter in the foreground, and a fascintating building to boot. All of my dream ingredients. I knew I had to have it.
We drove back at the appointed moment a little while later, and I set up my tripod. But the roof sign was not lit up! My travelling companion, not one too worried about asking a question, suggested she go over and see why. It turned out they had forgot all about it, were highly apologetic, and promptly turned it on. As she exited from the move theather, with the sign fully glowing in the irridescent dusk sky above her, bam, bam, bam⦠everything just fell into place. My previsualisation had become my actualisation, and I ended up with what I consider to be a beautiful image.
Now if only real life was like that.
Vista Theater, Sunset Drive & Hollywood Boulevard, Los Angeles
My trips to Los Angeles are always slightly rushed affairs coming as they do a night or two after or before a flight to Ireland. This makes it difficult to get out and grab a blue moment shot, there are too many things to do and people to see. Add to the mix an overload of âstuffâ, and the fact that I donât make money from these shots, means that life gets in the way. As is often the case with photographers, we deal with the urgent stuff of life first, and hope eventually to get to the important stuff of photography later.
So I had yet to get an iconic pic of LA, one that was mine, but it must have been niggling on my brain. On a daytime drive around some of the local neighbourhoods, my travelling companion spotted an old neon sign above the movie theater in Highland Park, now thatâs iconic LA! I then started plotting a shoot, first by seeing what shots were already out there, and then seeing how I could put my stamp on it. I had two chances to grab it, 2 nights where I was free enough to give it a try.
But something was bothering me. As is usually my problem here in the USA, the streets are very wide, very straight, and mainly deviod of pedestrians; all of this makes it hard to add my special secret sauce. In fact I had tried just such a shot in my hometown of Hutchinson only a couple of weeks previously, and it was an unmitigated disaster for all of those reasons. The Highland has an interesting old neon sign, sure, but I was afraid it would not be enough.
These doubts essentially meant I lost the first night, why go to all that bother if itâs just going to be yet another âsameyâ shot, one just like I already have plenty of?
On the last day, as a friend was showing us some other interesting parts of LA, I spotted the Vista Theater, and I was hooked! Same kind of old neon, a lovely curved road in front, a wide crosswalk for pedestrians to loiter in the foreground, and a fascintating building to boot. All of my dream ingredients. I knew I had to have it.
We drove back at the appointed moment a little while later, and I set up my tripod. But the roof sign was not lit up! My travelling companion, not one too worried about asking a question, suggested she go over and see why. It turned out they had forgot all about it, were highly apologetic, and promptly turned it on. As she exited from the move theather, with the sign fully glowing in the irridescent dusk sky above her, bam, bam, bam⦠everything just fell into place. My previsualisation had become my actualisation, and I ended up with what I consider to be a beautiful image.
Now if only real life was like that.