Watch the skies {New Braunfels Photographer}

Profound isolation is the most immediate sensation you experience when visiting the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Very Large Array. That's a far cry from what you might expect. The famous observatory has been featured in countless movies and documentaries for good reason--it's 27 antennas boast dishes 25 meters across, towering over the desert floor and dwarfing any human standing beneath one. Specially-designed rail cars move them along nearly 23 miles of railroad tracks laid out in a Y formation for precise observations of the heavens above. The antennas, operating in parallel, function as one enormous radio telescope. And that's the crux of it--even an 82-foot-wide dish, massive though it may be, appears tiny on the horizon when it's seven miles away. Approaching the VLA along U.S. 60, the remoteness of the site sinks in. The San Agustin Basin is flat and featureless, desert scrub as far as the eye can see, ringed by low, distant mountains. There are no people--saying the area is "sparsely populated" is being generous. The VLA is first noticed as a speck in the distance, distinct from the mountains, rising from the desert floor. As you approach, more become visible, spaced at regular intervals. Eventually, they resolve into great dish antennas, and you suck in your breath when you realize you are still miles away.

No other humans are visible when you drive up to the simple, unstaffed visitor center. Maps are available to purchase on the honor system. This is not, it becomes clear, a high traffic tourist trap. It is a working research center. The silence is almost tangible. Walking along the self-guided tour, the wind is steady. A tumbleweed rolls past, only to hang up against a fence. There are trees around the buildings, the only trees in the entire basin. Jackrabbits scamper away, startled by the sudden interruption of their privacy. They don't scamper very far, though. A lone pronghorn antelope grazes on the desert grasses that grow in clumps here and there. Suddenly--and so quietly you almost miss it--the antennas move. It's not a quick, jerky move, nor is it a ponderous, turtle-slow move. It's steady, deliberate. They rotate and lift smoothly, refocusing their collective gazes with a soft hum. For something that massive and metallic, a deep rumble, or at least a rhythmic banging would seem more appropriate. But no, the movement is accompanied by a soft hum. Wait a while, and they do it again. Finishing with one observation a hundred million light years distant, they pivot, lift, and find another piece of the sky worthy of their keen gaze.

As the sun dips below the horizon and the good light fades, you bid farewell to the array, the jackrabbits and even the pronghorn. You have not seen another person. The experience is humbling, hypnotic. This is what the world will be like long after humans are no more. Our creations will carry on our work, our studies, our explorations. They will not complain, or argue, or shirk. They will study and learn, because that is what they have been built to do. To these tools and servants of ours, at least, we have bequeathed the best parts of ourselves. And that, in itself, is satisfying.

Lisa On Location Photography

Meet Lisa on Location's 2012 Senior Rep for Canyon High School {New Braunfels senior photographer}

Taylor is one of the sweetest young ladies I've met. She's extremely bright, yet quiet and shy. She's one of those girls who is beautiful -- inside and out -- yet doesn't realize how beautiful she is. I really enjoyed photographing her the other night -- the first senior session for the class of 2012. I just shot my last senior session for the class of 2011 a couple of weeks ago.



Taylor's job as the senior rep for Canyon High is to promote Lisa on Location to her friends and classmates at school. Yes, I'm already talking about the next school year. I know you're groaning. Summer just started, you're saying. Don't worry, you're still safe! There are no back to school sales in the stores yet. Just give it another week, however and the back to school flyers will begin arriving.



There is still time to get senior portraits scheduled before school starts. Once it does start the time flies with sporting events, meetings, competitions, and homework assignments. I'm so excited to have Taylor out there representing me to her friends. Call soon Class of 2012! I'm ready!





Lisa On Location Photography

Jesse works the camera {New Braunfels Glamour Photographer}

If you're not already sitting as you read this, I suggest you find a chair. What I am about to tell you may come as a shock: I don't only shoot landscapes and macro. As hard as it may be to accept, I do indeed shoot real, live people on occasion. With all the weddings Lisa has been booking that call for a second shooter, I'd be pretty useless to her if I couldn't photograph people. I've no desire for her to put me out on the curb!

Last week I had a photo session in Austin with Jesse. She's a part-time model who loves creating different personas in front of the camera, but wanted to add some diversity to her portfolio. We met on location near Town Lake, and despite the sweltering heat, Jesse really gave it her all. The lighting was just about as close to perfect as you can get, and you can see from the rich, juicy colors that just pop in her shots.

I also got to play with Lisa's new 85mm 1.8 lens for the first time. I have to say, I am in love. I don't think I've ever had the pleasure of using any lens that focused so quickly or so accurately, time after time. It's extremely sharp, the colors it conveys are saturated and the background blur it creates is smooth and creamy. And as a double bonus, it functions perfectly on my infrared-converted camera, with no hot spots or shifting focus!

Jesse said she wanted something different, but she never expected me to photograph her in infrared. Have I mentioned I'm in love with the effect this type of photography has on people portraiture? Skin become smooth and flawless, the eyes get darker and foliage is ghostly white. The end result can range from stark to ghostly to ethereal, depending on how the image is handled afterwards. The image above is one of high contrast with an urban edge, while the image below is dreamy, straight out of faerie land. It's a whole heck of a lot of fun when the subject first sees themselves in such an unusual light, but that's usually all it takes for them to become fans of infrared glamour photography. That's what Lisa On Location is all about--always pushing the boundaries to bring our clients more!

Lisa On Location Photography

... and then we were probed by aliens. The final installment of our journey.

Well it's about time I wrapped up this vacation series. Stick a fork in it, it's done. Our final stop on the long road that would go down in the family history books was Roswell, New Mexico. I absolutely loved our trip to Roswell 15 years ago when the International UFO museum was just a small little space in an old corner storefront with fake aliens on lab tables and a research library that Fox Mulder would be proud of. Today it's a thriving big space in an old movie theater with fake aliens on lab tables and a research library that Fox Mulder would be proud of -- but it's also got a bigger junk shop. Not to mention the sign that says "the proceeds from the sale of all items goes to making the International UFO Museum bigger and better," or something like that. So we can feel good that the money we spend on the little green slimy "grow your own alien" eggs is going to a good cause.

Myself, I purchased a souvenir spoon and a T-shirt with an alien face on it and bought the kids an assortment of water bottles, pencils and bouncy alien balls with alien slime inside. We did our part for the good of the museum.

After we toured the prestigious International UFO Museum we made our way down the street to the less than perfect but quite campy Area 51 Museum. We paid a mere $3 a person (the kids were free) to look through what can only be described as a year round Halloween Haunted house without the drunk teenagers and cheap soundtrack. A retro diner with badly worn alien props greeted us next to a recycled McDonald's play area with alien faces painted on the side.

We took advantage of having the place to ourselves and set about posing with the adorable alien creatures.

There were aliens sitting on outhouse potties, aliens barbecuing in a backyard setting, aliens serving beer behind a bar, aliens talking on the phone, aliens crashing a motorcycle into a light pole. Those aliens totally had run of the place. And what was so great about this place was they had a groovy junk shop too and their prices were cheaper than the official museum down the road. Darn it, I'd already spent my cash at that place! Oh well, I thought I might as well help out the local economy even more and get more silly T-shirts.

We were all set with our moolah and hit the McDonald's down the street before hitting the road. It was a fun end to a long week of travel. The road to home was still more than 10 hours long. And we hit a snag in the home stretch with a blow-out just east of Comfort near midnight. But by the time we made it home, the kids were asleep and easily moved into their beds. They would wake the next morning with pleasant memories of the long road and an appreciation for just how big and great our country is. I hope it's not another 15 years before our return to some of the places we saw, but the truth is that there's so much more to see. Who knows what next summer may bring. Am I being called west again or east this time? I hear the Great Lakes are lovely in summer. Then there's that big mouse in Florida who loves to call our names. We'll see.

Lisa On Location Photography

Where there's smoke there's fire {New Braunfels destination photography}

After leaving the squabbles of Petrified Forest and enjoying the sanctioned silence from the backseat, it wasn't long before a plume of smoke could be seen on the horizon. We had passed some fires previously on our trip through Arizona and had seen a little news coverage of the problems Arizona was facing with wildfires throughout the state. But the fire that we were approaching in the Alpine area was one monster of a creature.

We passed about 20 miles to the north of this smoke stack but it seemed like it was breathing down our necks for a couple of hours. We have since heard that this, the Wallow Fire, became the largest forest fire in Arizona history and it continues to burn more than three weeks later (it had already been burning for almost a week before we came upon it).

We passed through the town of Springerville on the edge of the Apache National Forest. The people of the town went about their daily lives with the blackest sky I'd ever seen in the middle of the day to the south and the bluest blue to the north. I shot a photo of the statute of the Madonna of the Trail against that black sky.

The stretch of highway from Springerville and across New Mexico border was some of the eeriest driving we'd ever done. The sky got black with a ghostly red horizon all around us. The words "apocolyptic," and "spooky" were used. Logically, I knew for a fact that the road ahead us was clear and that we were getting away from the fire. Yet, there was still that thread of worry as everything around us turned darker and more ominous -- the five of us strapped in our seats as we, perhaps, unwittingly made a wrong turn onto the highway to hell.

The air finally started to clear as we reached the interior of New Mexico and were able to turn around and see the scary plume of smoke in our rear window. It was suddenly late afternoon again after our brief trip through midnight in the smoke cloud. The Very Large Array lay a couple of hours ahead of us and we wanted to make it there by sunset. We sat in silence for a while, fearing for the safety of the townspeople we'd seen in the little communities we'd passed. How big would this fire get? Turns out it got pretty darn big. It has burned 825 square miles of forest and forced evacuations of 10,000 people so far. It's only about half contained right now. Only time will tell how bad it really got.









Lisa On Location Photography

When are we going to get to the forest? And other squabbles from the backseat {New Braunfels photographer}

Most of you who happen to be parents have had moments like these. Your children are squabbling and picking on each other very loudly in a public place and you wish you could disappear and be anyone but who you are. You think "maybe if I look at them as if I don't know them" nobody will know they're mine. "Maybe if I just walk away and pretend I'm with those other children over there who are holding hands and being little darlings, people will assume those are mine instead."

"Mom," my child screams, "I was here first! She pushed me!" Yes, she was looking right at me, I'm afraid. My failed attempts at looking behind me to see who she might really be referring to as "Mom" weren't fooling anyone.

My children were having a meltdown in the middle of the Petrified Forest and there was nothing I could do about it.

The squabbling started shortly after we left Meteor Crater. The large crater in the earth seemed to me to be an exciting look at the reality of the universe that put into perspective just how tiny we all are. My children, however, only found joy in playing with the video meteor simulator that gave the impact of various space objects at various sizes. My daughters, being the disaster fans that they are, enjoyed upping the numbers to the point that they were able to virtually blow up the earth with comets time and time again. See photo below.

Once on the road again, however, it seemed the minivan simply was not big enough to contain the tempers and the egos of two adolescent girls and one pre-school boy. Nothing is fair and everybody hates everybody else. Welcome to Day 7 of the Great American Family Road Trip.

We had made several stops before we reached the Petrified Forest that I thought were amusing enough for the children along Route 66. We stopped for snow cones and ice cream in the little town of Seligman -- inspiration for the little town in the movie Cars. We stood on a corner in Winslow, Arizona. (Of course the children stared blankly at my references to the Eagles song and despite repeatedly forcing them to listen to the song on the CD player, they were still lost on the quaint significance of it and failed to see the humor in our experience). We took a tour through the Wigwam Motel and posed for photos with big flaking, plaster dinosaurs. I thought there was enough weirdness and old Route 66 campiness to entertain the herd that morning. But they were nonetheless, sick of being in the car and sick of each other. So when we got out to look at the petroglyphs during a tour of the Petrified Forest and found only one viewing scope, of course there would be a throw-down. Of course the unfairness of the fact that "she always gets to go first" or "I didn't get to look through it long enough" was going to ruin our tour. Curses to the federal government for installing only one stupid viewing scope at a national park roadside stop that clearly required two or three!

So, needless to say, our ride through the Petrified Forest National Park was not what we'd hoped it would be. My rants of "get in that seat and shut your mouth" are sure to blow any chance of me winning Mother of the Year honors and my refusal to purchase the overpriced Gatorade at the gift shop for the squabbling children will no doubt land me in trouble with the law. But I stand by my decision to be ruthless and callous and not allow any DVDs or MPs players for the rest of the day and force an absolute ban on any sound from the backseat until Roswell. Because I'm the mom and I said so.



Lisa On Location Photography

At least I didn't pull out a fishing pole -- A visit to the beautiful Sedona {New Braunfels destination photographer}

When I was a child we did the road trip of the west pretty much every year. I've been to Yellowstone National Park more times than I can count and I've probably stopped at every cheap tourist trap between Houston and L.A., and between Phoenix and Seattle. Sounds fabulous now, but not to a child in the 80s with no Nintendo to take along, no portable DVD player and no minivan with plenty of room. Nope we traveled in style in a Ford Escort with a kayak strapped to the roof, sleeping in primitive campgrounds and eating soggy lunch meat and cheese in a can.

I was determined to do things right by my kids and provide them with plenty of activities along the way. They were hooked up with D.S. games out the wazoo, DVDs, books, and only the finest junk food HEB had to offer. They had plenty of room to spread out in our spacious minivan and enjoy each other's company. Yeah right.

Times will change but the only thing that stays the same is children will never be happy with being stuck in a car with their parents for 3,000 miles.

Case in point, my father loved fishing. He packed his fishing poles and licenses and studied where all the best fishing spots were along our way. He'd find a fish-worthy stream of water and put everything else on hold while he pulled out that pole and set to work. Fishing, as most of you know, is not much of a spectator sport. Imagine if you will the scene. My daddy in his cowboy hat and fishing vest standing aside a stream in the deepest parts of Yellowstone National Park with his trusty Ford Escort parked nearby, kayak still strapped to the roof, and his wife and three children still sitting inside, waiting patiently (sometimes for hours) for him to decide that this particular stream of water was not the one he'd heard about after all -- where the trout jump out of the water begging you to feed them your game warden-approved bait so they can be humanely released back into the stream. Yes I spent many hours sitting in that car -- not allowed to get out because my mother was certain bears were within shouting distance and if anyone was going to be eaten by a bear, gosh darn-it it wasn't going to be us.

So I swore to not repeat the boredom of the fishing holes with my children. Easy, you might say -- Lisa doesn't like to fish. That's what I thought too. Until Sedona, that is. As I stood behind my tripod, aimed at the setting sun on a cliff overlooking this quaint Arizona town. I looked back at my children, sitting on the rocks, chins resting in their palms, shuffling their feet in the dirt and playing with the pebbles. They were bored out of their minds. Had the camera to them become what was the fishing pole to me? I was stopping an awful lot to shoot little images along the way. How many times had I said "I'll be just a minute." And I usually did take just a minute. I could have shot so much more. I held back, Jayme held back (although not as much as I did).

I put the camera and the tripod in the car and returned to the hotel with my children. I guess history is doomed to repeat itself each generation. No amount of D.S. games and DVDs will cure the boredom of the parental passtime on vacation. Our kids just don't get us. My hope is that they'll some day appreciate the photos I took and the places we saw on this trip.

And as I write this on Father's Day, I can't help but think about all those hours spent watching my daddy fish. He's been gone for a little over 3 years now, and I think I'd pay just about anything to spend a few more hours in that Escort with him in Yellowstone National Park. Watching him cast that line in the water, as the buffalo grazed in the field on the other side.

Lisa On Location Photography