Barns of Petaluma

Here are a few of the barns I saw in Petaluma. I am sure you could spend a lot of time there shooting many others. This is just from a couple of days shooting. I just took off and drove around during sunrise and sunset. No plan just luck.

I wish I could of got the shot I saw when I drove up! I almost did't process this shot because the shot I missed. This is a single shot from a RAW file. I did it from a single file because of the movement. Thats why I always shoot RAW when I am doing HDR. You just don't have enough information when you shoot .jpeg files to process a single file.

This is the first barn I saw and could not wait to get a shot of it.

This isn't a barn, but when I passed it I could hear my wife Carol saying I want that house even though I was not in the same car. When we stopped she told me that she wanted the yellow house in the vineyard. I grabbed this shot on the way home. I did not spend enough time on it. I wish I would of moved in closer to the fence and trees and got another shot.

Al, a Binky, a Blankie and Bedtime

My daughter Emily was never attached to anything, but my son Jacob is independent but attached to many things. His alligator Al, a binkie and a blanket. He has slept alone almost from day one. He knows what he likes and that's the way it has to be. Its amazing how different your children can be! This post is about some of Jacobs favorite things.

Carol found a Linus shirt and I couldn't wait to take these photos. You can hardly see it because of his blanket. So much for plans it was hard enough to get the photos I got.................terrible twos...................another difference in my children. Emily was an angel when she was two. I just hope Emily is not saving it up for her teenage years.

Even though Jacob was facing away from the main light I thought this photo was interesting it showed how we had his hair slicked back like Linus. The light is not in the correct place for a profile, But it still looks good and shows how much he cooperated. Man is he already mocking me?

Boys and Their Toys (Fathers Day 2012)

I am not a Ford person but I have to admit I love the retro body styles all the car company's are doing especially Ford and Dodge. I would really like to test drive the new Challenger and Charger.

I have always been a Chevy guy but have owned four Dodges to date. The old Chevy's do look pretty cool though. Love the body styles around 55 or so.

Washoe House

This is the Washoe House in Petaluma it was built in 1859. I liked the bikes out front they made me think of all the changes that have happened. This building has seen stagecoaches passing and horses tied up out front. Also the bar was probably happy to get electricity when Nikola Tesla electrified the world. This brings up how we remember things our mind does not remember the power lines when we think of a building. In fact I remove power lines for aesthetic reasons in most of my images, because we don't remember them. We just accept them and ignore them. When I took this shot all I saw was  this cool bar! When I went to process this image that was all I saw was the power lines it drove me crazy. The same thing with a photograph all these years we have come to accept the deficiencies of the photographic process. I remember the first time I saw a HDR image I thought how did they do that?  HDR captures the full dynamic of the scene like our eyes.

Preston Castle

Preston School of Industry also known as Preston Castle or The Castle was built between 1890 – 1894 as a school to rehabilitate juveniles in Ione, California. The Castle stands on 230 acres bought from the Ione Coal and Iron Company at $30 per acre with 100 acres donated. The sandstone bricks were made at San Quentin and Folsom prisons and delivered via railroad at 6,000 bricks per car. The original plans consisted of five floors and seventy-seven rooms. It officially opened for business on July 1st, 1894 and remained so until 1960 when new buildings were built to replace it. The wards were taught two trades so they could survive after their release. Some of the wards went on to become famous and some infamous. Among the famous Eddie Anderson who went on to play Rochester on the Jack Benny show. Eddie Machen became a heavyweight boxer Pancho Gonzales was the world no. 1 professional tennis player for an unequalled eight years in the 1950s and early 1960s. Merle Haggard went on to become a country siger. He escaped several times on his last escape he stole the deans car and was sent to San Quentin. One of his songs is Misery And Gin. The infamous include Caryl Chessman who was a convicted robber and rapist who gained fame as a death row inmate in California. Another was  Joseph Paul Cretzer was killed in the bloodiest escape attempt called "The Battle Of Alcatraz". He and two other inmates and two guards were killed. Many television programs have filmed episodes at Preston Castle. The Travel Channels Ghost Adventures filmed an episode at Preston Castle. Other television programs include The Outsiders and The Amazing Race.

The wards were not housed in the castle they were only processed there when they arrived. The wards stayed in several small houses around the castle. The castle had offices, a school, kitchen, showers and the only hospital in Ione at the time.

The image below is the chemical bath they used to delouse the wards when they arrived.

In the image below the raised indentation to the lower right was for the gaurd (to stand in and keep his feet dry) to keep and eye on the wards while they showered.

The image below shows a hidden staircase they are not sure what it was used for, but some people think it was used so dean could use to get around undetected.

The castle had a water powered elevator shown in the next two images.

A fire hose reel, the part with all the holes is made of wood. There are several of these in the castle.

There is a lot of controversy over where Anna Corbin's body was found. This is one of the places that some people say she was found rolled up in a rug with a rope around her neck. Others beleive she was in a locked room that only staff had access to and that she was murdered by one of the gaurds. The gaurds were strict and Anna was very motherly to wards and people think the gaurds did not like that.

They are not sure if Merle Haggard carved the "Merle 48" in the wall or if it was done for a film that was filmed here. He has been asked to come back to visit, but he says that is not a part of his life he wants to revisit.

When Preston Castle closed the state came and took items because the castle was going to be torn down. Luckly it is still standing today. There is an effort to restore the castle and you can find out more by going to prestoncastle.com. If you would Like more information on Preston Castle visit Dreaming Casually. 

Bayshore Roundhouse

I don't know what it is about graffiti that makes a place look like a cool place, maybe its because of the bright colors and the creative and elaborate drawings. I wish I could create masterpieces like some I've seen. I don't know if I would feel the same if it showed up on property I owned. But you see it everywhere old buildings, trucks, buses, train cars..................the list goes on. This is the Bayshore Roundhouse in Brisbane, it was used by Southern Pacific it was built in 1912 and serviced steam and diesel until it closed in 1982. In 2001 a fire destroyed half of the 16 stalls the roundhouse had. There is talk of restoring it and making it a railroad museum. There is even a registration form for the National Register of Historic Places filed.

Most of these images were taken with a wide angle lens. they tend to distort towards the corners. Notice the bucket in the lower right in the image below it is from barrel distortion common with wide angle lenses. If you had straight lines around the edges of the image barrel distortion would look like this. I did not fix it because I think it ads interest to the image.