Just before dawn in Tianmu, Taipei, Taiwan, R.O.C.

When I am really jet-lagged, I tend to wake up early. I arrived here in Taipei a few days ago and woke up the next morning at 4:30am or so. I knew from experience that trying to go back to sleep was hopeless, so I went out and wandered around taking pictures. I wandered roughly from Zhongshan North Road Section 7 to the Shipai MRT station. The streets were pretty much deserted for the first hour or so. By about 5:30am or so though people began to emerge. I was pretty pleased with some of the results. For one thing, there were lots of brightly illuminated 24 hour convenience stores to photograph. Yum yum.

Here are the highlights:
http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/keyword/4070427-favorite

And here is the gallery...
http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/gallery/4070427

On a clear day in LA, you can see forever...

Sunday was an unusually clear day here in LA. We went to Griffith Park in the morning. I took some pictures. They aren't especially distinguished from an artistic perspective, but have some novelty value as examples of what is possible when the air here is reasonable clear:

http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/gallery/4042251

The UCLA campus at night...

I wandered around UCLA late last night. The school is on break now so it was pretty deserted, which I like. Here is the gallery:

http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/gallery/4015884

For me the most interesting were the catwalks in the courtyard of the recently opened California NanoSystems institute. This very interesting building was built so that it partly overhangs one end of Parking Structure 9. It has a big courtyard area -- technically not really a courtyard -- which is criss-crossed by walkways going from one side to another.

Here is one of my more successful shots, standing on the top deck of Parking Structure 9 and looking straight up:


http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/gallery/4015884#233719539

Here is another shot, looking back from a walkway leading from the top deck of Parking Structure 9 to the Bombshelter, skirting the north side of the building:


http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/gallery/4015884#233719610

The upper walkways appear to be accessible only from inside the building so I didn't shoot from any of them.

An early morning stroll around Westwood Village

I took a stroll around Westwood Village in Los Angeles starting about an hour before dawn. It was an ideal time, the streets were largely empty. I took some shots of the Chevron at Gayley and Le Conte which is the last gas station in the village. Also some nice shots of the In-n-Out on Gayley in beautiful predawn light.

I was shooting with the 17-55 EF-S f2.8 IS, my indispensable tool for low-light photography.

Here are the pictures:
http://canghuixu.smugmug.com/gallery/3958242