The Flower

This photograph was taken in the desert garden at Huntington Gardens, Pasadena. I was trying out a macro lens that I had rented for the week. This was a pretty small flower that the macro lens managed to make look a lot bigger. The part the photograph that is in focus is called the "Depth of Field". By setting a large aperture, which confusingly is the smaller f-number the lens aperture can be set to (in this case f2.8) as opposed to a small aperture which is the larger f-number (this lens goes to f22), you can decide which part of the image is in focus. This technique allows for some creativity by blurring the background and the foreground to make sure that the eye is drawn to the part of the image that you want a viewer to see. If you were photographing a landscape scene the desired effect would be to have everything from front to back in focus, this would mean setting the lens to use the smaller aperture, which is the larger f-number. That all sounds very confusing and believe me I was for years, but after some practice and viewing the results it began to all click into place and change the way my photos look.

I have a different version of this photograph that I processed with a different piece of software, click here to see it.

Evolution of A Radio Site

I decided to make Tuesday's a work related day and to kick that off I would document the evolution of a raw piece of land into a radio site.As a recap I work for Riverside County on the Public Safety Enterprise Communications project or PSEC as we know it. With our contractor we will be building 60+ new radio sites throughout Riverside County for our first responders.

The piece of land photographed above is at Arlington in Riverside. The two gentlemen in the photo are doing the surveying work prior to the site construction starting. Over the coming weeks I'll show you how the site grows each week into a big grown up radio site.

Quack Quack

One really positive thing that taking up photography again has done for me is that it gets me out of the house. Janet and I would waste our weekends just doing nothing except watching tv, going to the movies or spending money on more junk we don't need around the house. Posting a good photograph everyday on here is a way bigger challenge than I thought. I go through my photos constantly trying to find good and interesting images that I can tell a story with. So we both decided that now that we have every Friday off work we would make a list of places we would like to visit and for me to photograph. So far we have a list of 16 very varied places, some local and some not but at least we have a plan for our lazy days. I look forward to every weekend now as a photo opportunity and time for us to spend together.

Last Friday we decided to go to Huntington Library and Gardens in Pasadena. One of my friends from work had taken hs wife there and recommended it so we got up and went. Henry Huntington purchased a ranch which was to become the library and gardens we know today. The gardens have a variety of different themes including The Desert, Japanese, Chinese, Australian and Lilly Ponds. This duck was photographed on one of the lilly ponds in the gardens. Over the next few weeks I will share with you some of my other photos I took there of some of the plants in the gardens.

He's A Dam Engineer

One of the many people that have been a part of my life at some point in time that I found absolutely fascinating was my ex-wife's father Myrle (or Cliff as I knew him, because I cannot pronounce Myrle). Actually, most of the women I have dated or married (now on my second marriage) have had parents that I just enjoy spending time with and a couple of them are still part of my life and my dearest friends. Anyway, Cliff was a Dam Engineer for Los Angeles Water and Power and I loved to have conversations with him about engineering stuff. Once Cliff and Sue's dad Les (Sue being my ex-girlfriend and Les being one of those dearest friends) went on a tour of Hoover Dam together. It's always more interesting going on a tour of some place with an expert, as you have your own private tour guide who may not know the history of a place but they know how it works and can explain the details to you. Unfortunately I have been told that Cliff has Alzheimer's now and doesn't always recognize or remember people. I haven't seen Cliff since Stephanie and I split up, but I still remember the things Cliff used to tell me about his work and I will always have very fond memories of those conversations. In fact one day at work I had to go up to Mount Leigh (location of the Hollywood sign) and when I looked down I saw a lake. It was Lake Hollywood which provides Los Angeles with most of it's water and is held back by Mulholland Dam and instantly it made me think of Cliff as it is an LA Water & Power dam.

As for the photograph I picked for this post it's of Big Bear Lake Dam. The history of Big Bear Lake is long and interesting and the dam is now nearly 100 years old having been built in 1912. Cliff enlightened me to the design of the dam comparing it to Hoover Dam. Hoover Dam is an Arch-Gravity dam and holds back the water of Lake Mead by it's pure weight and size. Big Bear Lake Dam on the other hand is a Multiple Arch-Gravity dam and holds back the water of the lake by the design of it's structures. The thin multiple arches allows the weight of the water to compress the dam into the ground and canyon sides making it even stronger. Big Bear's dam appears very lightweight and open (due to it's thin walls) compared with Hoover Dam and yet it was obviously built well as it survived the Big Bear earthquake (magnitude 6.4) in 1992.

My Bath Tub, I Wish

I so wanted to jump in this bath tub so bad, it looked so inviting. While touring Arsenal's Emirates Stadium we were taken into the home sides changing room. Talk about a high tech place. There was a medical room were first aid is administered and preventative care given such as a pre match massage. This bath was across the hall from the medical room and is some sort of hydrotherapy spa with all the latest technology. According to our tour guide the players just love this tub after a hard fought match. All I know is I could live with a bath tub like that, but I would not want to share it with 10 other men at the same time.

A Night with a Joshua Tree or Two

So as the story goes I am sitting at work Tuesday afternoon minding my own business and I hear a conversation going on between some coworkers about going to Joshua Tree National Park to watch the Perseid meteor shower. This meteor shower comes around every August and this year is best seen on this particular Tuesday night in an area away from city lights. So me being me I poke my nose in and get asked if I would like to go along. At first the thought of a 1 1/2 hour drive and a really late night does not really appeal to me, but then I thought "Hey, I need some photographs to post on my site, so what the hell". So after a quick dash home to change and get my camera gear we were off to Joshua Tree. The 12 of us get there at about 9:30pm and get comfy for a long night. Someone brought along her car cigarette lighter powered Margarita blender and so some alcohol flows and eases the wait. The shower was really set to kick in at about midnight, so I used the opportunity to try and figure out how to take photos of stars in complete darkness. That wasn't as easy as I first thought, not only because I could not see a thing to change the settings on my camera. The tough part was figuring out the right exposure time to get the desired effect and a whole lot of trial and error and luck. Well eventually the meteors started to appear at a fairly regular rate and we got to see some amazing streaks across the night sky until we all got tired at about 1am and headed home.

As far as I was concerned Joshua Tree was always the title to the first U2 album I really liked when I was 17 years old. I had no idea it was a national park until a few years later and now I live just over an hour away. It's not what most people would call a pretty national park like Yosemite or Yellowstone but it has an appeal to many because of it's desolation. By the way we are upgrading a radio site in Joshua Tree, so the next time I'm there I will get some daytime pictures to show you it's desolate beauty.

For those of you wondering about the two streaks across the top of the photograph, no unfortunately they were planes and not meteors.

Another Train

Yes, yes, yes I admit it I have a passion for trains and yes it started at a very young age. My grandmother used to live in a house that had the railway line run right past her back yard. I remember standing out there one day with my uncle Steve and watch a train go by and at that point I made a decision. I decided right there and then that I was going to be a train driver. Yep at four years old my career path was set! I left high school at the age of sixteen and I joined British Railways as a Youth Training Scheme Trainee. After a hiring freeze and a couple of interviews I finally got to be a Train Drivers Assistant, which was at the time the apprenticeship to become a train driver. After working at Waterloo and Euston I got my promotion to become a train driver at Colchester, one of the depots local to where I lived. I spent 6 months in training and I was there, I had achieved my childhood dream of becoming a train driver by the age of 21. I did that until 1999 when I moved to California. But in the 10 years I have lived here I have never lost my love or passion for trains, but now I just get to watch them go by. This photograph was taken at Hunter Park in Riverside where a club has a large model railway running around the park and offers rides for free a couple of Sunday's every month.

Hey Look Clacton Pier

Just kidding, it's really Santa Monica Pier here in California, as if anyone that knows Clcton Pier wouldn't be saying to themselves "Where's the Jolly Roger at the end of the Pier?" Mind you it is kind of uncanny how much Santa Monica is just like the seaside town I grew up close to, Clacton-on-Sea. Now take out the expensive house prices, the endless sunshine and the warm temperatures of California and you would have an identical town, honestly you would. Janet and I were walking around Santa Monica on Saturday and just like Clacton there were homeless people, very drunk people, loud people, weird people and lot and lots of tourists. Now tell me it's not just like Clacton or any other seaside town you have ever been to. It was just strange to me that two places 6000 miles apart could be so alike. Of course it could also be that Santa Monica has a very strong British contingent, with plenty of good pubs selling English food and beer (that totally works for me). I'm sure a lot of the Brits find their way to Santa Monica for two reasons:

    1, It's really close to Los Angeles International Airport

    2, It's just like being in an English seaside town

This also seems like a great time to answer a question that a very good friend of mine Lynn, has asked me twice over the past few weeks and that is "Are you missing home?" Well Lynn the answer is yes, very much, now is not the time for me to go into the details of why, as the answers I have are long and deep. For anyone that is concerned it's not of a personal nature, it's just this can be a strange place to live and doesn't always make sense. I promise to write some deep insights into what it is like to live here and hopefully you will understand why I am missing home. In fact one of the reasons I started this website was to write what it's really like to live here in the USA. I'll let you know when I post the first one. Thanks for listening, Martin.

The Lookout Tower

Let me start with a sorry for no picture on Sunday, I got busy and ran out of time cleaning up a room in the house for Janet's daughters visit. On Saturday I mentioned one of our radio sites that I visited called Red Mountain, that over looks south east Hemet and north east Temecula. I told you I would post a photograph of an interesting building, so here it is. Spread all over strategically placed mountain tops in California are fire lookout towers. They give such a great view that one person stationed in the tower can see smoke and signs of fire from miles away. Red Mountain just so happens to be one of those locations. It's quite a trek to get to the tower involving some substantial off road driving, so don't take your BMW, but if you get a chance to visit you'll really enjoy the view.

My Work

When someone asks me who I work for or what I do I give my official answer, a Communications Analyst for the County of Riverside. What does that mean, well really for me that means that I design, build, support and troubleshoot data networks for the County of Riverside. Right now though I am very fortunate to be the only data network engineer on the County's new radio system project being built for our public safety departments. The radio system will support not just voice but data connectivity for mobile users such as Fire personnel or Sheriff deputies while in the course of their duties. So why am I really fortunate? Well because I get to travel to places that a lot of people never see. I get to go to hill and mountain tops where current and future radio sites will be built. In some cases I even get to do some off-roading in our Jeeps to get to those places and when I get their I get to enjoy the view and take photographs. This photograph was taken at Red Mountain, where I spent the best part of Thursday getting sun burnt, after we escorted our contractors to the radio site. Red Mtn. overlooks the south east of Hemet and the North East of Temecula and Murrieta. It takes almost 2 hours to get there on some pretty rough roads but, when you do the views are amazing. On Monday I'll post a photograph of the strange building up at Red Mtn. and tell you why it's there.