Incendiary Intent by Moonlight
Date: 09/15/2009
Metal Lady
Date: 09/23/2009
35mm film scan - Ilford Delta 400, shot @ 800
The group that makes these giant figures has had at least one on the Playa every year I've been there. This one, like some others I've seen, has torches in her hands, but I never got over to her at dusk to photograph her while lit.
Caravan to the Gate
Date: 09/23/2009
35mm film scan - Ilford Delta 400, shot @ 800
At left: Adam Chilson
Atop camper: Miss Pixie
My first photo of Burning Man '09.
August 31, 2009, around 6am, with the sun rising over the Playa.
It was stop and go traffic from the Playa turnoff to the gate. We'd been driving since the previous evening, keeping to a slow pace for Adam's camper and trailer, not to mention detours and traffic jams.
By the time we hit dirt, and weren't moving very far, very fast, Adam had the food cooler opened up, the camper stove fired up, and was making us all hot dogs!
When traffic would start moving, he'd run to the driver's seat of the truck, I'd run back to my car, and we'd pull up a few feet. Then jump right back out to congregate around the trailer, eat, and talk with the Burners in surrounding vehicles.
Model of the Lady
Date: 09/23/2009
35mm film scan - Ilford Delta 3200
NevaehLleh poses in an intentional and near-perfect mirror image to the metal lady sculpture visible from the grounds of camp Incendiary Intent.
Temple Star
Date: 09/24/2009
35mm film - Ilford Delta 3200
View of the Man though the structure of the top floor of the Temple. Framed to catch the flare of the sun in the upper corner. When I saw the potential for the composition, I really wanted to shoot it as a companion to my favorite Temple shot from Burning Man '08, "Stairway to the Sun."
This image is actually a digital composite of the scans of two consecutive frames of the same scene, shot just seconds apart. In one, the row of light posts and the Man had subtly yet noticeably better clarity and detail. But the sun flare from the next shot had much prettier "star" points.
I didn't artificially "create" anything or add/remove anything that wasn't in actuality present. I just combined the "top half" of one frame with the "bottom half" of the next.
There was a little bit of extra structure at the left of the scene that I found distracting and cropped out, resulting in a slightly taller and narrower image than the original aspect ratio.