Ten Years of Roadtrips - So long 2006

[CLKunst]

I went on my summer road trip this year looking for pictures for my Roadside Attractions series and too shoot a friend's wedding in CO. But this year was also the 10th anniversary of the first big cross country road trip my husband and I ever took together back in 96 before we were married. He had a 1967 VW Beetle and I worked in a Volkswagen shop, it was a natural fit and a good thing too as we went through some serious car repairs along the way.

I am hoping to sum up this decade for us with two pictures that say it all, at least to me.

The first is from 1996, taken on a disposable camera, for our first sunset on the west coast. (I busted my old Pentax early in the trip and kept Kodak in business for the rest of it with box cameras).

The second is from the Badlands in South Dakota this year, which was really more like the halfway point of our most recent trip.

Sorry for all the preamble on this one but, it's all about the back story with these.

Comments and critiques welcome but please don't edit these. All suggestions will be cheerfully explored.:thumbsup:

[drg]

Two great road images. Hope you have many more great trips! When you do Route 66, let me know.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

[starriderrick]

Excellent story, The images bring it home.

I was born, raised in N.Dak. The second photo is a sight I remember many summers[Usually as the thunderstorms were building up.]
There is a saying in the dakota's "If you don't like the weather wait 5 minutes" Thanks for posting this.
Rick

[GB1]

The skies are excellant here, Cindy. Not bad pix at all from the disposables. I've also gotten a few good shots over the yrs with them, but find that you can never predict their quality. So now i use Nikons and Mamiya

The shots sure show the wide-open landscapes. I suppose that is your greatest impression of the wild west. Sounds like a fun trip. You ought to do another one in the late Spring as part of a 10 year reunion.

GB

[Loupey]

Awesome images, CL! The first one is great - regardless of what you shot that with. Love the dark sky. Perhaps a smidgen crop to reduce the amount of blackness in the bottom?

On the second, I love the size of your hubby in relation to the sky. Implies the smallness of our existence. My only wish on that one is that I'd like to see more of that path without adding much more of the ground (i.e. an angle more from your right to make the path more diagonal).

Nice ones. Thanks for sharing.

[gahspidy]

These are both good photos with lots of mood, and they both somehow have a "closing" feel about them. Sort of like summing it all up. I really like the framing with all the "negative"space that is the sky in the second image. Great story and meories, I'm sure.
Happy holidays

[CLKunst]

Thank you for the nice comments CD, Rick, GB, Loupey and Gary! They are my favorite pictures from each trip and I knew what they'd print out like the moment I took them. I just had the 2006 image printed for Christmas for husband to hang in his office at work. I had it printed on Kodak Metallic and boy does it look awesome!:thumbsup:

Loupey ~ I agree I would like to see more diagonal from the path as well but I was framing out a trash can on the other side. Next time I'll just take the shot and PS out the offender.

[Ronnoco]

Way too much dead space in both shots. You should have moved in much closer and made the most of a wide angle lens and in the first one a graduated neutral density filter.

Ronnoco

[CLKunst]

Ronnoco ~

I appreciate your taking the time to critique my posting; please also take the time to read my introduction to said posting more carefully.

The first image was taken with a disposable camera which, among its other deficiencies, totally lacks a place with which to mount a grad ND filter or a wide angle lens. The camera which would have accepted such tokens was broken earlier in the trip. Sometimes you have to use what is available to you at the time or miss the shot entirely.

As for the second image, taken on my current DSLR, I do have closer images with a wide angle lens which are from this same day. They do not speak to me with the same impact as this one. We felt very small and many miles from home at the moment when this picture was taken and this one image says that to me most. This is what I am trying to communicate to you, the viewer. I'm sorry to hear that, in your case, you do not find it effective.

Thank you for your input.

Regards,

[GB1]

One of the draws of the west is the wide-openness of the land.... There just arent as many trees etc, nor clouds in the sky, in comparison to the east coast. I think the pix exemplify that. (Even a collage of several shots connected (whatever that technique is called) would be an idea too? )

Gb

[CLKunst]

Great idea GB, thanks! That sparks a couple of different ideas! Thanks for coming back to this one.

[readingr]

Cindy,

Sitting here with pint in hand and I'm thinking wow how did you find clouds with your logo in :idea: then I realised it was your logo - used to seeing it in the bottom right I guess.

As far as the bottom one goes it speaks volumes of the tiny specks of life we are on this huge (well not so huge planet). The sky is wonderful and having the man with the dirty grin standing there sums it all up for me. Excellent.

The sunset is great considering the camera and because of that I think its wonderful capture.

Roger

[GB1]

Great idea GB, thanks! That sparks a couple of different ideas! Thanks for coming back to this one.

Cindy - Something like this, but w/ more sky. This is a single cropped image btw.. have not figured out the trick with multiple connected images yet

-GB

[CLKunst]

Roger ~ Thank you! I'm glad you liked them and could enjoy them with a pint!

GB ~ Yes I did some set up for some panoramic stitching that day. I've tried to put it together once but the changing light values from one picture to the next keep defying me once it's all put together as the light was changing so fast. I'll take another stab at it this week if I get some time and will post my results.

If anyone has some suggestions about how to manage that please share. I'm eager to learn how to better blend my overlaps, as PSE's automatic stitching program has been doing a butcher's job of it. :mad2: