I have been trying to find the balancing rock in Joshua Tree for a while now. Not real hard, but just while I was out there, I knew it was behind a campsite in Jumbo Rocks campground. A friend and I had to pull an audible on plans one day so I decided to look up the rock and find it once and for all. After finding the rock, I realized I wanted to book the campsite below it. As I made the decision, someone rolled up and had already booked it for the night. So I made plans to book the site for a couple nights while the moon was still out this month to get some star trails of the tree and rock. I didn't want to bother the folks who booked the site for a few hours while I shot my trails... Or more so what I was expecting, they booked the site to shoot the rock and I don't want to get in their way. 

I guess I have a thoughtful mentality when it comes to other photographers because this trip was a disaster in term of interacting with others. 

First frame here is during a golden hour timelapse. I was impressed the dad mentioned my camera to his kids as they walked up to the rock. They then walked around my camera and he watched as his kids made faces into my camera and going as far as blocking the camera. Photoshop can only do so much, so that timelapse was a bust. The next frame below it was after that, I decided to try and set up a shot looking into the sunset. Just as the sun starts to dip below the horizon a couple show up and stand in front of me. After saying excuse me, followed by an expletive, I decided to set my tripod up next to the tree (I figure we are playing a game of who can get closer or something) and that triggers their "You're in our shot" followed by back and forth that leads me to say I'm over it and head down to the tent. Who thinks they can just show up at the prime time and just step in front of other people who have planned and timed out their shots, then gripe about THEM. 

The last frame is my favorite. The first night I set up my cameras about an hour after sunset. my plan is to just let the cameras run while the batteries drain. Fairly early into the shooting a couple of folks start to head up to the rock and I let them know there is a camera running on a tripod up there and to be careful. They proceed to walk up to my camera and shine lights into both my cameras that were shooting. At this point I assume my trails are garbage for now so I  don't have to worry about policing my light and turn on my lights to make myself a drink. They had the audacity to ask me to turn off my lights. I wanted to confirm "You guys are fucking up my shot and you are gonna tell me what to do? HA." As I was being a nicer guy than I should have and turned off my lights, one of them messed up and said he wasn't ruining my shots. I went off the deep end of the petty pool and turned on my photography lights and pointed them at the rock. 

I'm quite used to people walking through my timelapses. It's pretty hard to avoid it in some places as the attractions are just so popular, its damn near impossible to find time when no one is around. Most of the time I just go through and edit out the people in the frames that they end up in. It's not that big of a deal and doesn't "ruin" the timelapse. I wouldn't expect the average tourist to understand or even care about getting in my shot. However this trip changed my opinion on what I should expect from people. All it takes is a little consideration of people around you. Would you want someone showing up right before sunset and getting in your shot? Maybe look around and see if people are already set up where you want to shoot and ask where is a spot that isn't in their shot if you must shoot there. Shout out to the photographer I never spoke to because he was keeping his distance waiting for a specific shot. I hope he ended up getting what he was looking for.         

In the end I think I was able to salvage some of my star trails of the rock and the other trails I made later that night came out really killer. 

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