Shredded Wheel

I went to Southern California in January for business.  Having a half day off I went to Joshua Tree National Park.  While hiking to the Desert Queen Mine I came upon an abandoned car.  While the car as a whole did not present much inspiration, the right front wheel held some promise.  I really liked all of the color and texture in the wheel.  The other part I liked was the repeated curves of the rim.

Unfortunately, I took this image during the mid-day sun.  This resulted in harsh shadows and a large dark spot in the lower left hand corner.  To solve this lighting problem I pulled out my Cowboy Studios triangular reflector and used it to create instant shade.  I carry the small one wherever I go.  It folds up nicely into my pack and has allowed me to take many images that I would have otherwise bypassed.  The triangular reflector is probably one of the best $15 buys in photography.

The other thing I did to the original image was to turn the shreds on the left black and white.  The interesting part of that area of the image is the texture.  I created a layer in Photoshop, converted it to black and white, then used a layer mask to limit the black and white conversion to only the frayed tire area.  This allowed me to keep the rusted colors of the rim while stressing the texture of the shredded tire.

Desert Queen Mine location:  N34 02 13.79   W116 08 01.15 (you can see the car on Google Earth)