Thursday, October 25, 2007 – Storefronts

The day – the oppressively hot, smoke-filled air perfectly still, and it was ninety by noon. It was dry as a bone – you could taste the ash in the air. Nothing moved. The Santa Ana winds died, but the immense fires from the Mexican border to the tops of the mountains that separate Southern California from the rest of America burned on, so the high layer of smoke from horizon to horizon masked the dim sun.  It was pretty much a day of twilight. Joan Didion – "Los Angeles weather is the weather of catastrophe, of apocalypse…."  Some days it is.  Consider Sunset Boulevard between Sierra Bonita and Garner, down on Hollywood's Guitar Row.  Think Edward Hopper, jumped up a few notches, for Hollywood.

The guitar girl is quite still.

LA Aroma Therapy (forgive the heavy visual irony) –

Ominous doors –

If you wish to use any of these photos for commercial purposes I assume you'll discuss that with me. And should you choose to download any of these images and use them invoking the "fair use" provisions of the Copyright Act of 1976, please provide credit, and, on the web, a link back this site.

Technical Note:

Most of these photographs were shot with a Nikon D70 - using lens (1) AF-S Nikkor 18-70 mm 1:35-4.5G ED, or (2) AF Nikkor 70-300mm telephoto, or after 5 June 2006, (3) AF-S DX Zoom-Nikkor, 55-200 mm f/4-5.6G ED. They were modified for web posting using Adobe Photoshop 7.0.  Earlier photography was done with a Sony Mavica digital still camera (MVC-FD-88) with built-in digital zoom.

All text and photos, unless otherwise noted, Copyright © 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 - Alan M. Pavlik