USS Iowa

I have caught a few of the news reports the past few days about the USS Iowa being moved from the mothball fleet in Suisun Bay, refurbished, and then eventually sent to Southern California to be on display as a museum. Yesterday morning, everyone in my area at work noticed the large ship being moved through San Pablo Bay down to Richmond.

When the news report came up again last night, I thought to myself..."hmmm...I should try to find it and see if there are any good timelapse shots." So, I threw on my hoodie and a large sweatshirt, and off I went. I eventually found the battleship docked along the inlet near Harbour Way in Richmond, just south of the railroad tracks and just north of Hall Avenue. There was a large transport vessel just north of the ship, and some dredging occurring just south.

I decided to see if there was a better shot on the other side of the inlet, but unfortunately, there are too many refinery or automotive staging areas along the inlet. This area was a vast port area in the past, and still maintains some of the shipping activity in this cove.

So, I went back to Harbour Way and lined up the best shot I could get. I parked right under the street light next to The Canery, dug out my zoom lens, and set up the parameters. Unfortunately, after getting home and looking at the series of shots, someone forgot to turn off the stabilizer. Thus, the camera appears to go through a 30 minute earthquake over the 5-6 second timelapse. It is quite an eerie series, but it was not quite what I was looking for.

I just shot off an email to the USS Iowa organizers in the hopes of gaining dock access, but until then, this will likely be my best vantage point.

Occupy Oakland Skyline

I had a softball game this evening.  We lost.  When driving along 880 on the way to the game, though, I noticed all of the aircraft flying over downtown Oakland covering the Occupy Oakland protesters.  After the game and a little pizza with the team, I decided to check out the view from the other side of Lake Merritt.

I drove along the lakefront for a little bit before noticing an enticing outcropping with a good view of downtown and the lake.  I parked and walked out to the spot.  There was one other photographer there, along with a small group of people.  I walked a little to the east just to see if there was a better view, but the outcropping had a great view of the skyline.  There was a bright light on the other side of the lake that was obstructed, so it provided the best shot.  The small group of people noticed my desire to photograph the skyline, though, and said they were leaving...so I had plenty of space to set up shop.

It was a little after 9:30pm when I showed up, and aircraft were already buzzing around.  I had the tripod up and was setting up the camera when I heard loud booms and flashes of light from downtown Oakland and the Occupy Oakland protests.  I asked the other photographer if he had heard the booms, and he said it was probably tear gas.  (The news later said that the police used tear gas and concussion grenades.)

I hurried to get the camera running and tried just a handful of shots before turning on the intervalometer.  I tried a 2.5 second shutter, but was afraid I was going to lose a lot of light on any of the aircraft moving significantly faster than the others.  There was one craft kinda doing circles, while most of the others were hovering.  The hovering craft is my preference, as their flight in timelapse looks sorta like a fluttering bug.  Instead, I switched to ISO800 and a 0.5 sec shutter speed.  I wish I had gone to a longer shutter speed, as the circling craft wouldn't have looked so jerky as it does in the video.

I compiled the video when I got home, but since I have been having trouble maintaining resolution using iMovie when adding titles, intros and the such, I simply threw this up on YouTube for now.  YouTube loses resolution as well, so it's something I still need to work on.

Thanks go out to William (the other photographer) for sticking around with me another 25 minutes for safety.  Check out some of his work in the link.