The USS Iowa was brought down to Richmond, CA to be renovated before heading down to its permanent home and exhibition spot near Los Angeles, CA. Though not much was open to the public because its very early on in the restoration process it was still a wonderful visit.

Just looking at the ship you can tell that its spent the last 21 years tied up and neglected. If you can believe it from these photos (and I can’t) the Iowa has been considered “in reserve” for the majority of its decommissioned time. Congress deemed that at least 2 Iowa class battleships be kept available in case the need arises but this ship has obviously been mothballed.

From what I understand the Iowa will be in Richmond until March or April of 2012. A lot about its departure date depends on the weather and how much work they can get done before sending it down to LA for a July exhibit opening (I presume they’re aiming for a July 4 opening).

If you live within driving distance of Richmond I highly recommend heading out to take a look. It requires a $10 per person “donation” to visit but its well worth it. Even though we only got to walk around the fore deck a bit we got to listen to knowledgeable folks share stories about the ship. The stories and history is absolutely fascinating and worth the trip alone.

I had a much harder time editing this than I did shooting it. Editing it, dealing with it up close and full screen on a large monitor, gave me a bad case of the heebie-jeebies.

I think this is just the first in a long line of foggy photos… We live in “Sunnyside” but that’s the misnomer of the century. We see the sun here about every 5th or 6th day.

This has probably got to be the most fun concert that I’ve covered to date. Violent, bloody, demented and, well, fun!

The Summit Music Hall is, on average, dark, but when their stage lights are actually on well there’s a decent amount of light at ISO 6400. Not the greatest, but decent. I took a chance and left the flash in the bag even though I was able to use it in there. I much prefer the “natural” stage lighting at shows. Flash is like a bright white splatter of goo in the center of the frame in situations like these and I didn’t want that. I had to shoot a lot, but it paid off with some nice results.

The strategy was to find a composition and shoot enough frames during the varied lighting (lighting that was almost flashing) to try and land some shots during the bright spots in the display. It worked. I threw out a lot of duds and lost a few when the camera would hunt for focus, but overall the number of keepers is good.

On top of getting the lighting right I was blessed with a very expressive couple of acts in both The Genitorturers and Hanzel & Gretyl. Its a lot of fun to shoot when the stage is active and enjoying themselves (even if enjoying themselves entailed looking tough and acting agressive). I’d shoot either one of these two again in a heartbeat.

Getting movement and energy out of every band member on stage is a rarity, but a rarity that is enjoyed when you encounter them. The Dropkick Murphys provided non-stop action on stage which proved not only challenging but fun. Especially with the addition of an 8′ wide box in the middle of the pit that allowed band members to interact very closely with the crowd and which provided on a small channel to shimmy through to get to the other side (as much as I would have liked to have jumped right up and jammed with the band, I didn’t).

Getting to photograph these two bands was a treat, indeed. Though I have to admit I was nervous and didn’t do as well as I’d have liked. While editing the photos after the show I realized that during the Dropkick Murphys there was a bagpipe player and a hot chick with a violin that I didn’t even get shots of. Shame on me! All in all, though, they’re decent and I had a good time to boot.

A quick tip to some of you new folks photographing shows: when the security guys tell you that you showed up too late and that the shooting period has ended for that set then you’re better off heeding their word. They’re not trying to be dicks (they didn’t set the 3-song policy, some weird-o somewhere else did), they’re just doing their jobs. But when you try to sneak up and take shots after you’ve been clearly instructed that you shouldn’t shoot you endanger access for all of us there. Like it or not we simply don’t make the rules. When you push your luck you’re pushing it for all of us. Please, show up early and respect not only the rules, but me too.

Yeah, another night of shooting in the deep dark recesses that is small concert venues. This one was well worth it, though. The Dum Dum Girl’s album “I will be” has been keeping me more than entertained since I was introduced to it late last year and seeing them in an intimate place like the Hi-Dive was great.

I did have a little more help for the dark environment this time though. I recently added a 28 f/1.8 to my bag of tricks and it worked out wonderfully. The length is just right and the speed was very welcome in this challenging venue.

The only thing that I didn’t like about them was the typical non-moving stage show that is so prevalent in today’s lo-fi, sub-pop, whatever-you-call-it scene. I much prefer an active stage, but at least the musical energy was up there. The image above is the only one I managed to get of anyone stepping away from a microphone. It happened a few more times but I didn’t get it.

I shot this one without a writer handy so I had to do the writeup myself. Sometimes I wonder how I get away with writing like that… Most likely its because no money changes hands.

Read the writeup and see the full set of photos at the Denver Post’s Reverb blog. (larger images here because the blog publishes the images pretty small).

The second image also appears online in the Spectrum Culture review of the Dum Dum Girls in concert.

Some nights certain things just pop out to me. Last Saturday night it was the bassists of Wovenhand and Git Some. My favorite pics of the night were of them.

At first the thought of a hard rocking band like Git Some pairing with the more mellow sound of Wovenhand was that they made an odd pairing for a tour but they both really worked out well. Both bands had plenty of musical energy and were pretty fun to watch. Best of all they sounded great.

Despite being small and relatively dark I enjoyed shooting at the Marquis. Well, aside from who I think was Wovenhand’s tour photographer who kept stepping right in front of me, knowing full well I was right there, and half the time bumping me as well. He was a jerk.

The night was also a great chance to put the new 28mm f/1.8 through its paces. Though neither of these pics was taken with the new lens I’m super happy to have it as it proved invaluable in the low light and tight quarters of the Marquis. While 28mm is no longer wide on a crop sensor it is a great length (~45mm full frame equivalent) to have at a concert.

For more photos of the night see the full sets: Git Some and Wovenhand.