Category Archives: Bay Area

Marin Civic Center

This post comes as a single piece but it is a combination of different shoots. Marin County’s offices are located in San Rafael and are an impressive structure designed by the famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright. We saw plenty of his work in Chicago and my sister is a bit of a fan of his work. When she was visiting, I thought a trip across would be just what she wanted. We had actually been there once before on a trip we all made several years ago. On that day, it was raining heavily and I didn’t know exactly where we could go so this time we combined some research with a sunny day. It helped that it was a weekend so the parking lots were mostly empty.

For those of you that have watched the Star Wars movies and more particularly this recent ones, the building may look rather familiar. George Lucas is a local resident and I think there is a fair chance that the building influenced him when creating Naboo. The building is a long structure in two parts with a domed area at the join with a gold colored spire. It is quite something. Photographing it is, however, rather tricky. There is not a good location to get the full effect in one shot since tree coverage tends to block the views of one part when the other is in shot. However, a good wander around will allow a number of cool views.

To bring this up to date, I was on a flight back to Oakland recently that ended up coming down over this part of Marin County. Out of my window appeared the Civic Center. Shooting directly downwards through a plane window is usually not something that works well since distortion can be bad. However, on this occasion, I got lucky and so now I have some more shots that show the whole building from an angle most people don’t get at all!

Coast Guard Bell 47

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I always seem to find something aviation related when I am out and about. San Ramon is the next town up from us and it was having its Art and Wind event. This combined a bunch of art stalls with some excellent kite flying displays and was an amusing play on the more common Art and Wine festivals that many towns around here have. As we wandered around, we came across a Bell 47 helicopter. They are not terribly rare but this one was a bit more interesting as it was in service with the Coast Guard Auxiliary.

I had no idea that Bell 47s were still in government service. The crew were standing by and talking to a selection of kids that came to have a look. Our timing couldn’t have been better because just after we arrived, they starting moving people away so that they could take off. It would have been rude to leave at this point so we sat down close by and watched them start up and depart the field after a brief moment turned towards us to say goodbye. Nice!

Collings Foundation

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The Collins Foundation carry out a tour throughout the country with their vintage aircraft showing them off to many communities, sharing a message about what people did in the Second World War and providing an opportunity to ride in some historic machinery. I have seen them in the past while we lived in Chicago. Their tour this year brought them through the Bay Area with stops at Moffett Field and Livermore. Since the latter is close to home, I went along to see them.

The part of the collection that they bring on tour includes a Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress, a Consolidated B-24 Liberator and a North American P-51 Mustang. I headed over to Livermore ahead of their planned arrival time and plenty of people had already gathered to see them come in. We all waited for a while and then the B-17 appeared over the hills. It made its approach and landed a short while before the B-24 showed up and followed suit. The P-51 was last of the three making a nice pass before landing. What I hadn’t anticipated was a B-25 Mitchell was also following them in. A quick turnaround and the three main players were soon launching off for flights with expectant passengers.

At this point I headed off as I had other things to do. Later in the day I came back and managed to catch an evening launch of the B-17. The following evening I had more free time so came back again. Another evening launch and recovery as the light got better and better. Then, as everyone packed up, the Collings team was kind enough to let me take some shots around the ramp. A local P-51 was parked up while the Collings P-51 had disappeared somewhere. As the sun set, I shot around the various aircraft and included a cracking 1937 Oldsmobile that one of the volunteers had brought along. With the light fading, the ramp lights came on which gave me a whole new bunch of opportunities to get some shots. I shot a lot until it was pretty late. At that point I headed home. The following day they also departed moving on to the next stop on their tour. If they come your way, make the effort to get out and see them. If you have the money, take a ride and support the continued operation of these great aircraft.

Funky Cloud Processing

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Part of a run back into Oakland recently came across the bay but it was unfortunately covered in cloud. However, the cloud was sitting in very distinct locations with a clear edge as you headed down the bay and a similar edge near the shoreline on the Oakland side. Since we were not high above it, this looked pretty interesting. Even as I photographed it, I figured the shots would need something a bit different when I got around to processing them. Having a more contrasty look seemed the best bet and a black and white conversion also seemed likely. That is what I went with and I was quite pleased with how it turned out. See what you think.

Flying Out of The Bay Area

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I have been traveling a reasonable amount recently and on one of my trips we took off from Oakland and flew out over San Francisco Bay, past the city and the Golden Gate and up to the north. The first time, I had my camera with me but it was in my bag in the overhead locker. My phone was still to hand of course so I grabbed a few pictures with that. They were passable but nothing special. I also was fighting some reflections given the time of day and the position of the sun.

When I came to make the same trip again, I planned ahead and did two things. One was to have my camera with me rather than in the overhead and the other was to bring the Lens Skirt to try and cut down on the reflection issues. My methodology for having the camera to hand involves yet another camera bag but I shall leave the description of that to another post.

I should point out that on the first outing, I got interesting pictures both out and back. The second time, the weather was not so cooperative. On the outbound leg, the Golden Gate was shrouded in fog with the bridge just poking out of the top of the clouds. On the return leg, most of the bay was shrouded in cloud so the views of Oakland that I had got with my phone were obscured. Here is a selection of the shots. I will be making this trip again no doubt so will probably try and get a better selection. Shooting out of airplane windows is problematic and not usually the source of great images but airliners do get you in places that have views that are unusual and worth recording, even if they are not going to be published.

SFO Night Approach Time Lapse

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Many moons ago (pun intended), my buddy Paul was visiting and we decided to have a go at night light trails at SFO. However, we had not come well equipped so headed to Best Buy to pick up cheap tripods. They were very cheap and performed as might be expected. However, with Paul coming back, we decided to have a second go at this and to prepare properly this time. We also scoped out some locations that might be suitable to get good angles on SFO.

Two things conspired against us this time. First, SFO is having runway upgrades installed so the pair of 28 runways are the only ones in use. This cuts down on the possible angles for a while. Second, the great weather forecast turned out to include some low cloud over the location we had scouted out. The aircraft rapidly disappeared from view as they climbed. (It later turned out that they were still in the clear but above the thin layer of cloud which we were under.)

We went with a plan B and found a location along the lake-shore that would provide an alternative. It was not as good but it did work. I had actually brought a spare tripod in case Paul didn’t have his so I set up two cameras. One was running long exposures that I intended to blend together to get light trails. The other I point out onto the approach which was quite busy at that point and take a lot of shorter exposures for creating a time lapse. The blend is above and the time lapse video is below. Let’s hope for better weather next time. I shall also remember that warm weather does not include after sunset and bring something a bit ticker to wear!

Coyote

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A drive along the Marin headlands was about to come to an end when we spotted something unexpected. I was about to turn off on the road back towards to freeway when we saw a coyote strolling along the side of the road. A quick reverse and turn onto the other piece of road and we followed him. Interestingly, he seemed totally uninterested in us. We followed him along the road and he went where he felt and did not seem to care about the car following him. Eventually, he hopped off the road and on to the grass. This gave me an opportunity to get alongside him and get some shots that weren’t through the windshield.

We watched him for a while and a few cars came up behind us. At first, you could see that they wondered why we were stopped until they saw the coyote at which point they, too, stopped what they were doing and watched him. We stayed for a short while and then decided to leave the guy in peace. I suspect that didn’t really work out since it only gave the people behind us an opportunity to pull up closer. I guess we did them a favor instead.

Painted Ladies in Alamo Square

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My sister wanted to see one of the more famous images of San Francisco while she was here. While the term painted ladies refers to the buildings in the city that have bright paint schemes, it is often focused on Alamo Square. Here there is a line of houses that typify the style and have a backdrop of the city behind them. Alamo Square itself is a park and the area is a popular place on a sunny day irrespective of the famous vista on one side. (Indeed, some of the other buildings in the area are more interesting but they don’t have the same context.)

We stopped off to take a look. The area is popular with tourists and there is an ongoing problem with tour buses blocking up the area despite the fact that they are banned from coming into the square. We didn’t have a problem finding somewhere to park though so went to hang out in the park for a while. The middle of the day is not the best time to visit if photography is your goal but in this case it wasn’t. Unfortunately, a couple of the buildings had scaffolding on them which took a bit away from the image. They were on one end so could be ignored if you tried but it was a bit of a shame. Sitting under the shade of a tree in the park on a sunny day looking across at that view is certainly not a bad way to pass a bit of time. A guy came and sat near us and got out his guitar. We wondered whether we would be impressed or distressed by his playing. As it was, he seemed to be playing silently to himself so it was neutral for us.

Container Ships

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I was in Alameda recently and, as I started to head back towards Oakland, I came along the channel that separates Alameda from the container port. One of the large container ships was just making its way out of the port with some tugs in support. As a kid, I grew up by the sea and used to watch the container ships coming out of Southampton. Those ships looked huge at the time. Now, they are lightweights in comparison to the modern ships. The one I saw on this day was not big compared to the very latest mega ships but it was still pretty substantial. While it had plenty of containers onboard, I am guessing that a lot of them were empty as she was riding quite high in the water. Even so, it was still cool to appreciate just how big these things are.

Later, while we were up on the Marin headlands, I saw another ship making its way in under the Golden Gate Bridge. That was another comparison of sizes in which the ship suddenly looks rather insignificant compared to the bridge!

Treasure Island Air Terminal

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My sister is a bit of a fan of architecture so, as part of our travels around the Bay Area, we stopped off on Treasure Island. The old air terminal building which the US Navy inhabited until handing it to the City of San Francisco when they closed up shop is an art deco structure that I thought might be worth a look. As it is a city building, it is open on weekdays. I had only been there during the weekend so had not been able to go inside. This time we were able to take a look around.

Inside is a huge mural covering a historical view of Navy activities including some projections of the future which are still a bit ahead of where we are. The guard on duty was a very friendly guy who knew plenty about the building and its history and was happy to tell us all about it.

The interior is a good match for the exterior with a lot of art deco features. Most of the building is only for the access of tenants so we couldn’t check it all out but the bits we could see were very nice. As an aside, I used the restroom while there and it was a pretty stunning looking place. The corridor down which you went to reach it was very dull and had the look of many functional governmental decorational styles but entering the bathroom was like entering a movie set. Needless to say, I decided not to go taking pictures in there since that might have seemed a bit weird!