AI in photography is just too useful to ignore. I mostly use it to remove objects that even Photoshop's Content Aware Fill can't handle. I almost never use it to add objects to photos. But … here's an exception. This is a gas station at the entrance to Niles, California, that the owner has redone [...]
I never tire of photographing San Francisco City Hall. It's a beautifully balanced, Beaux-Arts building that sits at the end of a long, tree-lined promenade. It's dramatic and impressive when photographed at sunrise, when it's front-lit, and just as impressive at night when it's lit by LED lights in a variety of color schemes, [...]
I live about a ten-minute drive from St. Mary's College in Moraga, and I go there often late in the day to wander around the campus taking photos. I especially like to visit during the summer, when school's out, and there's almost no one there. Cloudy days are the best times for photography, because I [...]
The MIRA building, at the corner of Spear and Folsom streets in San Francisco, is pretty irresistible for photographers—even if they're not into architecture. The twisty-turny facades make for striking images, whether you're photographing the entire structure (which isn't easy, given that you can't back up very far) or details. Here's the whole building: I [...]
When I have my monochrome camera with me, I'm always on the lookout for good black and white subjects. Heading to a meeting in Marin County, I passed the Larkspur Ferry Terminal and thought, well, there's one. These photos were taken about 9 in the morning. I put an orange filter on my camera [...]
I went with a couple of photo friends to the C&H Sugar refinery in Crockett this past weekend. Our intent was to shoot the refinery at the blue hour, when the building's sign is lit up and there's still some light in the sky. When we arrived around 5:30, the scene looked like this: Soon [...]
On a recent trip north, I photographed the Carson Mansion in Eureka, California. I'd been wanting to shoot it for years, having seen photos of it on the web. Built in 1885 by lumber baron William Carson, it's a Victorian in the Queen Anne style, and, according to Wikipedia, is "one of the most written-about [...]
I've visited Martinez many times because it's close, the downtown is picturesque and uncrowded (especially on a Sunday afternoon), and all the picture-worthy sites are within walking distance of each other. Incorporated in 1876 (!), the town has lots of history (birthplace of Joe DiMaggio) and well-preserved historic buildings, like the John Muir National Historic [...]
For my Sunday morning outing, I went into San Francisco to walk the Embarcadero. More and more often, I'm heading into the city, because it provides the most variety of subjects and the most photogenic environment. And I get there so early—at sunrise—that it's easy to walk around and come across very few people, which [...]
I'm not keen on photographing people wearing masks, and approaching strangers right now makes one even more apprehensive than usual. So, I'm foregoing street photography and instead am photographing buildings in monochrome. Here are four SF landmarks, taken over a couple of weekends. The Palace of Fine Arts is a good subject in just about [...]