The Mojave After Rain

The smell of wet creosote bush is in the air, and vast and ephemeral lakes dot the land. This is the first serious flight of Mojave Morning's new drone, The Beagle.

Desert Sky in Autumn

While camping at Red Rock Canyon in California's Mojave Desert last night, I noticed some clouds moving in from the west just at sunset. I had assumed they would ruin my plans to take a photo of the Milky Way setting over the red rocks of the desert badlands so I shot this as close to the end of astronomical twilight as possible, perhaps even catching the end of twilight. Soon after, the clouds moved in completely, and today it's raining there.

Balloon Ride

We're recently back from an amazing trip to northern and central New Mexico. We did a lot of things there, including visiting ancient Anasazi ruins and modern reservations, hiking in the Colorado Plateau and along the Rio Grande river, visiting old shrines and holy sites of the Spanish conquistadors, exploring Santa Fe, the country's oldest state capitol, and searching for wildlife on the eastern face of the continental divide. One of the highlights was taking an hour long ride in a hot air balloon in Albuquerque.  Points go to our great pilot, Murray, and World Balloon for a great flight. Here's what it was like:

Stephanie Time

Three headshots of Stephanie.

Her pic and bio are going to appear in the credits for an exhibition at the Gene Autry Museum in L.A., so it was time for an updated head shot.

Weapons of Another Age

What do you do when you want to take landscape pictures but the sky is a perfect, boring blue containing nothing but a piercing white sun? Take pictures of something else, of course! Here are four images of classic warplanes that were left to decompose on the smouldering late-summer tarmac of March Air Force Base.

A twin jet nacelle on a long range bomber looking very surprised. This plane was used by the Strategic Air Command to carry nukes around, looking for something to bomb. Never happened, thank goodness.

Smile! "How bad could it be," asks this Air Force bomber that once spent its time scattering cluster bombs on eastern jungles.

This is the rocket launcher on a Vietnam war era combat helicopter. The light at the end of the tunnel is the concrete landing pad. Though the tubes are parallel, the close distance to camera and extreme wide angle of this shot makes them look like they converge in the distance.

There is something utterly appealing to me about the esthetic of this B-29 and other WWII bombers like it. Although, I'm sure the people who lived and worked underneath them weren't as charmed.

Sammie in the Desert

It was a fun time shooting Sammie Simone (find her on insta: @yeahthatginger) at Joshua Tree National Park this labor day weekend. Thanks to John King for getting Sammy in on it.

Two Wildfire Views

I wasn't thinking about the wildfires raging away in north Los Angeles county, 100 miles away, when I drove down to the Port of Los Angeles to take photographs. But the wildfires were there in the light, in every picture I made. Smoke has a way of being ugly and beautiful at the same time. Call it jolie laide, but for landscapes instead of people. The smoke makes palpable in every picture the extreme summer heat we're having. Here are two examples.

Wasp/Hummer; Flying/Resting

Summertime is a good time for flying. It's also a good time for resting. And it's a great time for hummingbirds and tarantula hawks. Here are two of these animals doing both.

A tarantula hawk flits from flower to flower. While the females lay their eggs in living tarantulas for their larvae to devour later, the males prefer to eat milkweed flowers.

A female Anna's Hummingbird, just chilling in the summer heat.

The bright colors of the tarantula hawk are an example of aposematism, advertising to potential predators not to mess with it. This animal is said to have one of the most painful stings of any insect. I'm not eager to personally verify that claim.

I took a number of pictures of this hummingbird with the wings frozen in all different positions--up, down, forward and backward. But I picked this image because I found it unusual and I liked the shape the animal makes with her wings forward.

Eastern Sierra Road Trip with Tony & Chelsea Northrup

Last week, Stephanie and I were graced with a visit from Chelsea and Tony Northrup and their super nice producer, Justin Eckert. Together, we spent the week road tripping along California's Eastern Sierra, taking pictures, laughing obnoxiously, and having loads of delighted fun.

We don't know how we got so lucky, but meeting and spending time the the Northrup team was an absolute treat, one of the high points of my already very full and satisfying life. Both Stephanie and I feel like we have known and loved them for ages, and we know we won't find sweeter, more generous and honest people anywhere.

For readers who don't know about Tony and Chelsea, they are authors, publishers, educators and Youtubers who spend unfathomable amounts of energy helping people around the world learn the art and science of photography. If you're learning photography (and you are... we are always learning), you should check them out. I promise, you'll be delighted.  Here are a couple of links:

Click here to see their best-selling book
Click here for their Youtube channel
Their website

And here are a few snaps from the trip. I'm still going through all the shots.