Pixley Tire Shop Revisited

 

Pixley Tire Shop, off State Highway 99

Pixley, California, July 2011

I always like to revisit places I've photographed before, particularly during different times of day, and even seasons, when the light is different.  In this case, I was able to photograph the south face of the tire shop in Pixley, California, which I had previously visited in November of 2009.   Using my Nikon this time instead of a camera phone, and some rather flat Kodak Gold 400, I got an interesting look for this shot I took around 9:00 am.

Camera Phone Heresies

Pixley Tire Shop, Pixley, California, November 2009

I pulled off California State Highway 99 to photograph this tire shop.  Tire shops and corrugated metal have always held a special fascination for me.

At that particular time, I was using my Nikon FM-3A (the last generation of the famous Nikon F/FM series professional manual camera bodies), which was loaded with Kodak Tri-X.  Having exposed the last frame, I was about to return to my car when this little boy happened by.  

Thinking on my feet, with no time to reload, I took my Motorola cell phone from my pocket and snapped this picture up.

Now, anyone who knows me will tell you my deep-seated loathing for digital photography.  To me, it's cheating -- damned if I'm going to just flush thirty-plus years of acquired knowledge of real photography down the drain just because somebody invented a way to mimic photography.

But, as Ralph Waldo Emerson said, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."  Which means, don't let a great photo opportunity pass you by just because you're a retrograde purist (such as I) standing on ceremony.