DTLA
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As I have said countless times before you never know what you are going to run into DTLA. As it has happened so many times after a day of walking around and not finding much to shoot the best shot presents itself when you stop looking for it. I was on my way to my car, the sun was setting and the light was prefect and then there she was.
Seventy-two story U.S. Bank Tower--completed 1989 & designed by architect Henry N. Cobb--looming over L.A. Central Library.
Figueroa Terrace, Los Angeles, California
'Roid Week Spring 2016 - Day 4 #2
Pack Film Day #savepackfilm
Another in a series one will find all through the Los Angeles area, hugh artfully completed Kobe Bryant mural with his daughter.
Re-edit of an older pic. Still playing with colorization and tonal values. I don't usually go back to older pics but the folder from this flight has been on my desktop since I they were taken. I really need to print some of these already.
The long light trails of early morning traffic work their way along their lines. Downtown Los Angeles during sunrise on a weekend morning. The 4-level interchange, in DTLA, provides endless composition options. The best are from the air. The Mavic 3 and some color grading makes it pop. This is (almost) as South as the morning sun will rise. It ended up close enough to get some color in the sky near the buildings. New buildings here. New buildings there. Buildings building build.
Once in a while you are blessed with just the right set of conditions. It's the being in the right place at the right time kind of scenario. This spectacular sunrise was from a trip to Downtown Los Angeles just a few days after the Mavic 3 had its long-awaited first major firmware update. The one that released pano mode. This update, needless to say, was very much anticipated and very much desired. This would also, as it turned out, be a morning of learning a very valuable lesson in mourning. As the sky was turning these colors, I was snapping away panos. Aiming the lens, this way and that way. Wide-angle shots: Done. 180º shots: Plenty. I was so excited to shoot under these conditions with the new pano settings that I didn't even think to set up even just one regular photo. Smiling, I packed everything up as the show ended and headed home. I have been pretty busy lately, life gets like that sometimes, and I put the files on the computer and re-packed the drone bag for an upcoming trip to Mammoth. Fast forward to being in Mammoth, and for some reason formatting the SD card before shooting there. Loving all of the options that the new firmware had given me and being excited to start playing around with the files. I was back home and on the computer re-visiting the super-sunrise DTLA shots and wondering where the single RAW photos were from pano mode. I think you get where this is going. Long story longer: I now know that the pano shots are kept together in a completely separate folder. Only the merged jpegs are in the main folder. So, to sum up what a dutz I am. What you are looking at is the best single frame photo that I had available as a RAW photo from this morning. There are plenty of beautiful, fully composed, pano shots. In Jpeg. Ouch.
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Another shot moments before sunrise in Downtown Los Angeles. Heavy cinematic toning and maybe too much sharpening. It's a little crisp. The vibrancy is impressive. As with most of what has been coming out of the Mavic 3. I have been inspired to be more creative with the color grading. I'm starting to get the hang of it. There's a world of possibilities out there.
* Thank you all for the comments and faves *
After all the press the new 6th street bridge has received this week, I decided to revisit a much older shot of it. This area will forever be nostalgic to me as it played a huge roll in my first few years of living in Los Angeles. This shot required so little editing as the sunset conditions were just so good. That was not, however, my initial take on this when the photo was first put out. But I did a lot of things differently back then. I was honestly a bit underwhelmed with the new bridges designed, and although I haven't yet seen it in person, I'm sure it will grow on me. I called this area my home for a few years and part of me wanted to see it left alone. No individual as any say in progress. I can only hope things get better here for future residents.
Another early morning rooftop shot from a few months ago. DTLA at sunrise. Always a beautiful sight. The morning, shown here, had very few clouds but enough to spread some color across the sky. At a slight cresent, the moon hangs over the shoulder of the skyline. The long light trails visible on the 110 Freeway, as commuters begin (or end) their day. Good morning Los Angeles. Good good morning.
** Thank you all for the comments and faves!! **
This is looking West, towards the sunset, into Downtown Los Angeles. It's been a little while since the last helicopter ride. I'm going to need to do that again, soon. DTLA at sunset. The lights of the buildings are just starting to appear as well as the headlights from the cars. The city is so pretty, from up here. Next time, I think I'll bring a wider lens. The 24-70mm was good, for what I did, but I's like some wider shots too. Then a longer 70-200mm. I'm really digging the long lens look down shots. I need to get some of my own.
On approach to Downtown Los Angeles. The weather forecast, the day before, was for cloudy skies and rain and that's why I booked this day to fly. Usually, the day after rain the skies are crystal clear and you can see for miles. This was not the case. The rain never came, which is not a big surprise around here, and the skies were not clear. It wasn't a total loss, as you can see in the previous photo, but it didn't look nice until we got up close the city. The brown air of Los Angeles makes for some interesting textures and gives us some beautiful sunsets (gross, I know). It also reminds us of the current conditions of where we choose to live. Is it all smog and pollution? Is it just dust blown in from from the desert? Most likely a little bit of both, I'm guessing.
* Thank you all for the comments and faves!! *
Downtown Los Angeles at the golden hour. Been working on getting serious about color grading and color theory and color balance. It's been a lot of fun. It's really giving new life to old pics. I, for whatever reason, still can't get behind the sky replacement stuff that's been clogging the social media circuses. I'll have to play around with it some more. Maybe I'll come around to it.
A reworked shot from a slightly different angle of a previous post. Downtown Los Angeles from a helicopter at sunset. I still have dozens of pics from this flight that have been sitting on my drive for the last almost year now. This flight was so epic I haven't even thought about going up again. Until recently that is. Such a busy and this close to the Holidays it might as well be after New Years already. C'est la vie.