For many, many years, Thom and I have had a tradition of going out on backpacking trips that doubled as photography expeditions. One of the things I enjoy about our time together is that either one of us can suddenly say to the other, “Hey, let’s stop here– I see a good shot.” And we’ll pull over to the side of the road (if we’re driving), or stop on the trail for a few minutes, or hike over to a viewpoint, or whatever, because there might be an interesting angle for a photo. Sometimes it works out, and the photo is pretty cool; other times it turns out the angle isn’t really that interesting. But it’s fun to have the opportunity to experiment.
Anyway, a few weeks ago my friend Woody said he occasionally drives out “into the Valley” to take photos. He has an old Canon EOS DSLR and enjoys watching birds and just looking for those “good shots”. I told him I’d love to join him sometime, and yesterday he asked if I had some time today. I did, and we grabbed our cameras and headed out together.
My “real” camera is a beautiful Canon R6 that I absolutely love. Last year I decided not to bring it on our mission, because I didn’t think I’d have a lot of opportunities to really use it. We wouldn’t be backpacking, and in fact we haven’t even hiked much. Since then, I’ve had several times when I kick myself for that decision… it wouldn’t have taken much space in the car, and it would’ve come in handy. Bother all. But I picked up a used Canon Powershot S110 on eBay, since it has manual controls, raw capability, and is a nice little portable camera that I’d owned many years ago. It’s not quite the same, of course, but in a pinch it’ll do.
We spent three or four hours driving all over the Imperial Valley, passing fields and power plants and even bird sanctuaries. Since Woody enjoys the birds, we made several stops so he could photograph flocks. And, just like my trips with Thom, several times I asked him to pull over because I saw something interesting. It was a lot of fun, and admist all the driving and shooting we had a chance to talk about all sorts of stuff.
Interestingly, when I looked at the results, many of them had a sort of post-apocalyptic wasteland vibe. There are plenty of fields full of crops– this is, after all, one of the most agriculturally productive areas in the world– but pictures of crops didn’t seem compelling so I’d taken pictures of other things. Here are the results.
Yeah, these aren’t going to win any contests, but I really enjoyed time with my friend.
