Sometimes your life can change with a clunk! Last spring, Donna Johnson, 72, of East Porterville, a small community at the eastern edge of the Central Valley, ran out of water. She hoped it was a problem with the pump or something a few feet of digging would fix, “it’s a hard issue to admit to yourself that your well has gone dry” Donna told me. She brought out someone to look at the well, but when the pipes went down and Donna heard that clunk, she knew the awful truth.
Read MoreA few weeks ago I was up in the Central Valley shooting some drought stories and from all the parched earth and empty fields I saw it seemed like we might never have rain again. This current storm here in LA is a very welcome relief, but long term we need a helluva lot more and most importantly we need it in the mountains of the north and the Sierra to seriously replenish the reservoirs and water system that provides for California agriculture and cities. But I’m not complaining! Yet!
Read MoreA few weeks ago I went to shoot some fill-in material for a story on the drought I was doing for Landscape Architecture magazine. I thought the juxtaposition of the two subjects really told the story of how bad it is and how far we need to go before all of us out here in the southland start to take some responsibility ourselves for improving the situation.It is pretty clear that we may be in this for a while. A report last week from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Prediction Center indicates a poor forecast for rain and more importantly the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada for this winter.
Read MorePhotographing political events and photos ops are pretty strange. It is always a challenge to try to distinguish the “op” from the real, and more often than not there ain’t much real. Last Saturday I found myself down at Marsh Park along the Elysian Valley surrounded by a large fuzzy Lion, a cadre of cheerleaders, a bunch of political handlers all buzzing about along with various groups of helpful citizens there for a river clean-up.
Read MoreI’ve been wanting to go kayaking down the LA River since about 2008. That was the year I stood on the shore of the river along the Sepulveda Basin and watched as kayaker George Wolfe emerged from upstream and the dense foliage and shore his craft just in front of me.
Read MoreIf you have spent any time exploring even a bit of the LA River, you have no doubt seen its many different landscapes and incarnations, I have found and stumbled upon many of these in my journeys to photograph it. Last week I was shooting for a client who needed some printed photos of the Sepulveda Basin to display in a nearby housing development. Most of the river throughout the Basin is pretty calm and flat-watered as it runs a fairly straight course to the Dam at the southeastern end of the Recreation area.
Read MoreLast July I wrote about the start of construction of Ed and Rachelle Begley’s new home in their attempt to build one of the Greenest homes in North America. The steel framing had just begun and now these months later the sheathing is being laid over that frame. Recently two new water systems started to be installed that will help Ed and Rachelle save on water bills as well as recycle much needed water back to the aquifer.
Read MoreThe LA River is a River. As obvious as that may sound, the truth is most people don’t really think of the Los Angeles River as an actual river. They are probably more familiar with the river’s movie roles such as the Governator barreling down its corridor on a motorcycle in Terminator 2 or the cast of Grease singing, dancing and racing along its flat bed and beveled sides.
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