Photo: "Blast Lock, No.3"

Blast doors for Launch Silo No.3 - Beale 851-C Titan I Missile Base

To me, these types of images are really fun to create.  This space was pitch dark, so to get this shot, I set up an LED panel at the camera, shining towards the blast doors to get a composition. Once the framing was set, I took a LED panel and placed it beneath the walkway on the right. I also placed a panel behind the ajar door. Lastly, during the exposure, I light painted the circular section of the tunnel, near the camera, with a flashlight.

Photo: "Grand Prismatic Spring"

I took two steps and felt like I had been submerged into a living painting. 

My dry skin danced while being steamed by the heat of the spring beneath the dry summer sun. 

My eyes began to flutter one hundred miles an hour, faster than my heart could keep up. 

I had waited years to see this and it was more grand than I ever imagined...

Photo: "B-52E"

Night, full moon. 7minutes @ ISO 160, f/11. Canon 5D Mark III + 17mm TS-E

This B-52E aircraft was used by General Electric in the 1960's to test their TF-39 engine and was disposed of in the desert after the tests.

Fast forward nearly 30 years later to 1991 when the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) was signed and 350 nuclear bombers were being destroyed as part of the agreement. The Russians saw this bomber on aerial footage and soon after, the US destroyed the aircraft by placing explosives in the fuselage.

Photo: "Essex Cell Block"

 
 

The Essex County Jail in New Jersey was constructed in 1837 and designed by architect John Haviland, who also designed Eastern State Penitentiary. 

The building served as the primary jail until 1970, when a new facility was constructed. 

Most of the structures on the property were badly damaged during a fire in 2001, but many of the cell blocks were still in tact. 

Photo: "Antenna Terminal"

This tunnel, leading away from the launch silos, leads towards the  antenna terminals for the Titan I ICBM base. At the end of the junction are two 65 foot tall cylindrical structures that once contained the inflatable radome, responsible for tracking and guidance, for the underground site.

Photo: "Basking Rays"

Front facing office in the Administration Building of the Hudson River Psychiatric Hospital in New York

The wings of the Hudson River Psychiatric Hospital in New York have decayed and collapsed beyond compare over the last few decades, due to weather and a lightning fire, since the asylum was abandoned, but the roof of the Administration Building was properly covered when vacated, which has left that section of the Kirkbride building in tact.

Photo: "Admin Building, Hudson River Psychiatric"

I have wandered the lonely collapsed halls of the former Hudson River Psychiatric Hospital many times, but until last month, I had never seen the Administration Building from this perspective. Standing in front of this historic grand architecture watching the moon rise was really magical.

This gorgeous building was completed in 1871, on a piece of land along the river in Poughkeepsie, New York. Most Kirkbride buildings were constructed with symmetrical wings, but this hospital was not, because there was an expectation that more male patients would be submitted than female. 

The campus operated for over one hundred years before closing in 2003. The campus not sits abandoned, mostly collapsed from years of neglect and a major fire in the male wing in 2007. 

Photo: Titan Tunnels Are Peace

Tunnel Junction, Launch Equipment Terminal - Beale 851-C Missile Base, Chico

It's hard to describe the feeling I had when I took my first breath of the stale air inside the Titan Missile Silo. It brought back many memories of other locations that smelled very similar; stale, damp and toxic.

For the rest of the 8 hour shoot, I wore a respirator, which drove me crazy, but in the end it didn't matter because there's something so peaceful and relaxing about wandering around places like this, which I'm sure that seems so strange to most of you. This location in particular was a place that was saturated with war, a location that terrorized many, but when I was here, it was a place of peace.

What is your happy place?