Treasure Island

So, no title slide, and no captions yet because I should probably edit this down a tad.

Here's a little summary of a project that is too ambitious for 2 days.

Treasure Island is a man-made island in the bay between San Francisco and Oakland. It was owned since World War II by the Navy who kept subs and sea-planes. In 1997, the Navy left and it has been slowly entering the hands of the city of San Francisco. A local division of Job Corps., a division of the US Department of Labor that is focused on helping youth get an education through vocational training in hopes of getting better jobs, is located on the island and is the only connection to government presence. That and the toxins left in the soil. High levels of aluminum and plutonium are said to be in the soil. People still live on the island, but everyone with gardens or plants keep them out of the island soil and in pots. There is a school there where Zach O'Donnell teaches biology and a horticulture/sustainable gardening course. The school uses kiddy pools in order to ensure uncontaminated vegetables. In the city's effort to "Go Green," the plan is to turn the island into a self-sustaining city consisting of 20 acres of farms, solar powered apartments and a business district. Currently, there is only one convenient business on the island, a café near the old Navy gate entrance. A scene from Indiana Jones And the Last Crusade was filmed there in the late 1980s. Kids have to walk through the old elementary school that has been closed and wait out front each morning to be bused off the island to San Francisco or Oakland. The bus schedules are on the school windows where drawings otherwise might be. A labyrinth of sidewalks cut between occupied buildings and vacant ones with radiation signs on the fence.

Basically I was interested in the transformation of this place. The idea of the man-made island being susceptible to liquefaction if another earthquake takes place. The current residents. The toxic soil and what will change from now until the organic farms. The idea that ideally, people will be residing there in the "new city" in five years. What the place looks like now. I barely scratched the surface, if even that. I just felt like throwing these up here for fun.

A place to be

San Francisco as seen from Treasure Island. I am gathering a bunch of photos taken over the couple of days in San Francisco for the Hearst shoot-off about a month ago. Check back in the next couple of days for a very loose, but possible final edit to a story I shot in 2 days but wish I could work on it for the next 10 years.

Metro

I think I'm going to make a coffee table book, AKA extra toilet paper with pictures compliments of mypublisher or blurb for my bathroom, from just stuff in the metro. Or maybe not.

Rain Delay

Nats v Orioles

It's been a while since I've shot baseball.

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9:30 AM

I was on my way into work when I received word that I needed to come up with a 6-10 picture photo page with text by 3 PM. So, I decided that I was going to try and have some fun with this and called up a local sailing marina I knew rented boats. They were in the middle of a weeklong sailing camp so I grabbed some underwater housing from the paper and took off.

Ralph Nader

I could listen to this man talk forever. A very smart guy.

Wowzer

A broken camera. A broken lens. A giant softbox with a broken strobe head. A really quick and demanding chef on a bike.

Ocean Beach

A few more from sunrise at Ocean Beach. I am the worst editor of my work. :)

San Fran

Now that I have about 5 minutes of free time, here are a few mumblings from San Francisco when we had some free time from the shoot-off.

Rising Costs

I recently finished a small portion of a huge story that needs to be told about the economy. I hung out with independent truck drivers Sean Russell, girlfriend Mary Carter and Carter's two children, Justin, 8, and Heather, 14. The two are continually on the move in order to make enough money to survive. Since I drove with them to Boston last week, they are en route from Boston to New Hampshire to Pennsylvania to Chicago to Wisconsin to Chicago to Louisiana to Georgia to the Bronx to New Jersey. The final product will be finished and published in The Washington Times on Monday, at which point I'll post it here.

Surreality

I'm not one to care about who is who and gawk over somebody with some sort of fame for any reason. I was walking down a street to a house party during the last night of LOOK3 (which was amazing) and David Alan Harvey and James Nachtwey walked past. I smiled kept going, turned, liked the light, saw them hug and say goodbye. That was that and the party was fun.

Trucking

My first assignment for the Washington Times was a story about the rising cost of diesel and its affects on the trucking industry. So, instead of photographing people simply pumping gas, I went to a truck stop and met Sean Russell and his girlfriend, two independent truckers who are owners and operators. For the next month, Mary's children will be on the road with them driving all around the country. I road with them from Winchester, VA to Boston, MA. They left for Pennsylvania, then Chicago and on to Wisconsin. This is an outtake that probably won't make the cut at a truck stop in Virginia.

San Francisco

Just a few pics I liked from San Fran. More to come in the next couple of days, along with a little blog change.

Kickin' It

I've been hanging out in San Fran the last few days. I took this last night on my way home to the hotel.