The Grand Canyon

They don’t call it the Grand Canyon for nothing. it’s big, it’s bold, it’s spectacular. The problem with the Grand Canyon is that it is so big that it’s really hard to do it justice in a photograph. This is a dusk shot taken with a Linhof 612PC camera. Was taken around 1994 on a cross country photo trip. Rolled into the Canyon just before sunset and didn’t have much time to find a worthy location to shoot in the south rim. While I was shooting a man approached me and we started talking photography and in particular different makers of transparency film. Told him that I was using Fuji film and how I felt they had surpassed Kodak in quality. Then after it was all said and done the guy revealed he was an engineer who worked for Kodak in Rochester.           

Photo © Craig Brewer

Point Mugu

This is where Pacific Coast Highway cuts through Point Mugu in Ventura County, California. Shot this on film with a Galvin 6×9cm view camera.

Twisted the focusing standards in all the wrong ways to get the strange out of focus look that runs at diagonals across the image. Used a warming filter to get the orange glow and enhanced it some in Photoshop after scanning it with a Nikon 9000 scanner.

If you watch TV commercials you will see this spot used a lot, particularly in car commercials where they will drive the car with this rock formation in view.

Photo © Craig Brewer

Colonial Williamsburg

Another one of my favorite places. This is the wall outside the Governor’s Palace in Colonial Williamsburg, Virginia. Shot it with a Linhof 612PC film camera which produces a 6×12cm image on film. Just sold the camera recently to a collector. The original image is a transparency and was scanned with my Nikon 9000 scanner. The largest area it will scan is 6×9cm, so scanned this in two pieces and put it back together with the “merge” function in Photoshop and converted to black and white with the channel mixer.

Lotus Blossom

This is at one of my favorite places in Encino, California. It is a 5 acre Japanese Garden that is landscaped beautifully. The only problem is that it is next to a sewage facility and stinks badly. When you get home your skin and clothes smell of sewage, but if you come back with a picture like this it is worth it.

Basketball anyone?

This shot was taken in San Pedro, California at the site of the Korean Friendship Bell. Set up high on a hill above the Pacific Ocean it is one of the most scenic spots around for a sunset basketball game among friends. 

Have been to this spot a couple of times and never really noticed the basketball court. My visit was to photograph the Korean Friendship Bell but immediately set that aside when I saw these guys playing and the light behind them.

A light fog was starting to roll in which diffused the light and gave it a real softness to the sunset over the ocean.

Used a Nikon D3 camera and 85mm f/1.4 lens for this shot.

Photo © Craig Brewer

Sit down and let’s have a talk…

Figure I should post some photographs since I am a photographer.

This is from one of my favorite places, The Salton Sea in the desert area south of Palm Springs. This house had been abandoned but was attracted to the color of the chair against the wall. Didn’t move anything, I took the photo exactly how everything was left. 

You always seem to get a creepy feeling at the Salton Sea when shooting these abandoned places, almost like there is an axe murderer peering out the window at you deciding if you are going to be their next victim.

Used a Nikon D2x and a 17-55mm lens for this capture.

Photo © Craig Brewer

Well here goes…

Always thought blogging was kinda lame, but here I am on my 55th birthday starting a blog. Guess you can teach an old dog new tricks after all. Will be interesting to see if I stick with it or not. So feel free to make any comments along the way. 

Here is a picture of me from 1971…

I’m 18 and I like it!