Tag: Mel’s Drive-In

Mel's Drive-In

Mel's Drive-In

Unlike my other photo of the Mel’s Drive-In sign near Hollywood and Highland, producing this was more involved.

I got closer because there was a billboard behind and to the left of the “Open 24 Hours” sign. Then, I took three landscape exposures (from bottom to top) to create a panorama.

After stitching the photos together, I used lens correction to reduce the distortion 18mm would make. Then, I cloned out the corner of a building at the lower left side of the frame.

Since I finally learned [non-destructive] dodging and burning, I used that technique to subtly brighten the darker areas of the sign.

Back in Lightroom, I square cropped the photo then used a few presets:

To finish things off, I slightly increased the exposure and fill light to my liking.

I hope you like it!

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Mel's Drive-In

Mel's Drive-In

While photowalking with Cody, this was the furthest south we walked down Highland Avenue before turning back toward Hollywood Blvd.

Short story: Some weirdos were greeting random people as they walked past. One of them did the same to us, but we didn’t acknowledge them.

She stopped, turned toward us and said, “You know, you really should greet someone if they greet you. You could get killed out here.”

And…that was it for us.

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