All in a day's work

[adan]

(and on my day off, too!)

Noon (all times Mountain Daylight time): Decide I want to keep my hand in with film, playing Ansel Adams. Load 4 exposures into two 4x5 film holders, grab the Crown Graphic, Leitz Tiltall tripod, Sekonic meter and Digilux 2, and jump in the car, heading for Mt. Evans, Colorado, (14,264 feet - 4300 meters). Trip distance: 56 miles (90 Km) to summit.

2:35 Reach Summit Lake on Mt. Evans (12,700 ft. - 3800 meters). Set up camera and snap boulder and lake shore. Snap camera setup with Digilux 2.

3:00 Reach mountain summit (paved road all the way). Summit is socked in by clouds. Hear distant thunder. Start down (highest point for 50 miles is NOT the place to be in lightning storm!)

3:25 Stop at overlook at 13,000 feet - 4000 meters - see interesting thistle thingie against granite. Set up 4x5, make shot

4:15 Stop at 11,000 feet (tree line) to shoot 4x5 of bristlecone pine and incoming clouds. One neg wrecked by shutter sticking open - second exposure OK but (later) shows some camera movement (note to self - BUY CABLE RELEASE!) Thunder is louder and more frequent and CLOSER.

4:30 Leave Mt. Evans road at 10,500 feet for State Highway 103 - 14 miles to the Interstate (Autobahn, M-route, etc.)

4:50 Driving on highway when torrential rains begin. Start noticing small rocks falling onto road verge, and waterfalls where there ain't supposed to be waterfalls on the hillsides.

5:00 Turn corner 2 miles from Interstate highway to find 4-foot-deep mudslide and water torrent covering road. Mud full of rocks and branches and chairs and stuff. Pull over and let idiots in big 4x4s 'test' the waters. Lightning is striking the ridges all around. Dig out Digilux and start taking news photos. F/2 lens lets me shoot at ISO 100 even under heavy overcast.

5:10 Water flow subsides enough to try crossing shallow side of mudslide (Honda CR-V). Slow and easy gets us through. See couple clearing flood out of their front yard - stop and take some more news snaps with the D2. Borrow pen and paper from my wife (wrong camera bag - no notebook!). Interview woman and neighbors - collect names. Digilux 2 top plate is dripping with rain - no ill effect.

5:25 Cross ANOTHER mudslide 200 yards down road - deeper but narrower - just as highway patrol arrives to close highway. Note names on various official vehicles for story (cops, sheriff, fire trucks, ambulance). Get on mud-free interstate.

7:05 Arrive home - plug D2 into Mac and start downloading pix while I call newspaper webmeister to let him know what I will be filing.

7:15 begin editing pix in Adobe Bridge - choose 3 for transmission. Write 10-paragraph news story in Textedit.

7:40 Email story and 3 web-res jpegs to webmeister.

7:50 begin tray-processing 4x5 negs

8:45 log on to web while negs dry to see story and picture are already posted (RockyMountainNews.com)

9:15 first negs are dry - begin scanning and working on images

10:45 assemble sample images into file below.

11:15 begin writing this 'diary'

Midnight (or thereabouts) log on to LUF and post.

[stnami]

There is some extra sleep in those digitals....zzzzzzzzzzzzz

[stumac]

A real fun day!!

Regards, Stuart

[marknorton]

Gosh, busy day. It certainly knows how to rain there. And there I was thinking Andy was camping outside his Leica dealer to glean more authoritative "hands-on" info on the M8...

[uulrich]

The usual landscapes in Colorado, Mr Piper?
W... what? Here's a dime for yor worry about nothing!

:-)

What a story, Andy. You thought about no evil and suddenly it turned into a news story. You were part of it - on the stage while the happenings passed by. Lucky man.

No injuries of anyone, I hope.

[adan]

Imants: No, they are not "Gene Smith" quality photojournalism! I need to work on keeping the picture quality up while also conducting interviews, spelling names right, etc. OTOH, what the competition had was even more zzzzz - i.e. nothing. 8^)

Mark: No - FRIDAY I spent at the Leica dealer. No new info though.

Did get the DMR practice issue of LFI. OK, but mostly a few photo essays made with the DMR, plus explanation of RAW processing and other stuff we already know. Generally there is more useful info reading Guy and Andy and Doc Al's posts here.