Posts in Category: Las Vegas
1/22/2011: Vegas Segments 5, Cranes
Vegas is not only the city that never sleeps, it is also the city that is never finished. There are people on the streets and in the bars and casinos 24 hours a day, and every year when I go back I see at least one new hotel, or new hotel wing, and there is always evidence of new construction at the moment. Construction cranes over Vegas are as much a part of the skyline as the Winn or the Venetian or Cesar’s Place.
Canon SX20IS at about 75mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 80. Programmed Auto.
Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity. Perspective adjusted and cropped.
1/21/2011: Vegas Segment 4, Shadows
Shadows also speak of Vegas, or speak in Vegas. This is from the colonnade at the Venetian, where the stone screen casts shapes against the marble facade of the building itself. I totally confused about 50 tourists while attempting to shoot this. They could not figure out what I was doing, but they were polite enough not to walk into my camera line.
Canon SX20IS at 40mm equivalent, f4 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
1/20/2011: Vegas segment 3: curves
Vegas is a totally fabricated experience, and one in which each new fabricator feels the need to play with what everyone who passed that way before has done…adding effect to effect…until every juxtaposition is rich with intention. Or at least that is the way it can look. To me. I have the feeling that a trained eye should be able to trace the elaboration of form and light back to some essential center, to the original conjunction of two designing minds from which all this, over time, has sprung. Maybe somewhere around the Monte Carlo? I am certain it is all more random than that…but, being human, I will project order wherever possible, even if wildly unlikely.
This juncture of curves…and what the sun is doing with them on an early Vegas evening…arrested my eye long enough to record it with the little camera I had in my pocket, just in case.
Canon SD4000IS at about 105mm equivalent, f5.3 @ 1/1250th @ ISO 250. Programmed Auto.
Processed in Lighroom for intensity and clarity, and cropped slightly for composition.
1/19/2011: Vegas segment 2, reflections
Vegas is a city of illusions, and reflections are the stuff of illusions…as in smoke and mirrors…the stuff of Vegas. The architects who designed the newest hotels were obviously well aware of the power. The color contrasts and textures are no accident.
Canon SX20IS at about 240mm, f5 @ 1/320th @ ISO 200. Programmed auto.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom.
1/18/2011: Las Vegas in Segments (small) 1
Okay, I will admit it…I can only take Las Vegas in tiny segments…little isolated segments, taken out of context, and capturing intentional or accidental beauty (or at least some kind of striking pattern or texture or light effect). So, since I am in Vegas, over the next few days you will be seeing a collection of such small segments…of Vegas…Vegas in Segments.
This is part of the facade of the Venetian Hotel, taken from Las Vegas Blvd. I like the pattern of stone and carving…but I like the play of light across the façade even more.
Canon SX20IS at 190mm, f5 @ 1/500th @ ISO 80. Programmed Auto.
Processed for intensity and clarity in Lightroom, and cropped for composition.
1/17/2011: Mountains for Carol
My wife Carol asked for pics of mountains from my trip to Vegas…but the views from Vegas are not so much…so this is truly a snapshot, with the iPhone 4, out the window of the airplane. But it is mountains…and it is for Carol. 😉
I am not even sure what mountains these are…somewhere about 45 minutes short of Vegas. You can see the stripes of my shirt reflected in the window. Color is always problematic out the window of a plane, as the mulitple layers of Plexiglas do strange things. This is B&W conversion using the high-contrast blue filter effect.
iPhone 4.
Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity, and converted to B&W.
1/16/2011: Venice?
When you read this I will staying at the Venetian Hotel, and walking by this scene every day on my way to and from the Sands Convention Hall…deep in the elaborate fantasy that is Las Vegas, Nevada. The expensive fantasy, designed specifically to separate folks from their hard earned cash, by promises of cash unearned, and pleasures without price. Not a place for Sunday thoughts, but I am always amazed that if you look kind of sideways at Vegas, determined to overlook the whole “sin city” thing, there is a considerable amount of beauty there. Take the scene above. Consider the creative energy and the love of form and color…the attention to detail and design…that went into manufacturing this little slice of Venice inside a hotel. Extravagant? Certainly. Fantastic? Absolutely. But then consider…where this stands is a short helicopter ride from the north rim of the Grand Canon. If you want to talk about extravagance and fantasy, that is.
Wonder is wonder…it all belongs to the creator, no matter how deeply the hand of man is in it…what has beauty proclaims the spirit at its root. Or that is what I think anyway. And maybe thinking that will keep me more or less sane for a week in “sin city.”
Sony H50 and Sanyo GC10. Processed in Lightroom for intensity and clarity.
1/23/2010
Coins in the Waterfall
This is an impulse I have never understood. Pool, fountain, or in this case the head of the artificial waterfall at the Palizzo in Vegas. The moving water here adds what is perhaps an extra dimension.
Sony DSC H50 at about 55mm equivalent. F2.8 @ 1/60 @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Blackpoint right in Lightroom. Added Clarity and Vibrance. Sharpen landscape preset.
From Las Vegas 2010.
1/22/2010
Treasure Island Under Snowy Mountains
Another shot from an interesting dawn in Vegas.
Sony DSC H50 at 120mm equivalent. F3.5 @ 1/13th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Recovery in Lightroom for the sky and snow. Blackpoint right. Added Clarity and Vibrance and Sharpen Landscape preset.
From Las Vegas 2010
1/21/2010
Fog in the Valley, Snow on the Mountains, Sunrise, Vegas
A Twitter friend was apparently watching the weather channel and saw the report of a rare fog in Las Vegas and twittered me to ask if I was photographing it. I had not yet opened the drapes of my 18th floor room overlooking Vegas and a corner of the strip. When I did, the sun was just rising…the mountains behind Treasure Island were covered with snow and the valley was indeed filled with fog. I took many shots.
This one required a good deal of perspective and distortion correction in PhotoShop Elements using the Camera Distortion filter…after my normal processing in Lightroom: Blackpoint right, Fill Light, Clarity and Vibrance, and Sharpen Landscape.
Sony DSC H50 at 31mm equivalent. F2.7 @ 1/20th @ ISO 100. Programmed auto.
Not your usual view of Vegas.
From Las Vegas 2010.