​The less than salubrious backside of a building in Chinatown, San Francisco.

​I encountered this Street Zorro early evening walking toward me in Hollywood, Los Angeles. He told me he was on his way to work, posing for tourists for a few bucks. I was his first customer for the day and he kindly waited while I changed my lens. The Carl Zeiss Jena Sonnar makes a very fine portrait lens but it was let down here somewhat by my over-enthusiastic use of fill-in flash. Blown highlights are one of my pet photographic hates. The Praktica BD36 TTL flash throws a strong beam, and definitely needed a diffuser. 

​The famous jazz mural by Bill Weber on an apartment building above a restaurant in North Beach, San Francisco, featuring Benny Goodman blowing his clarinet, Gene Krupa pounding the drums and Teddy Wilson tickling the ivories. The work is in colour but I've always thought it was better suited to black and white. A win, in my opinion, for the Sonnar 135 and Delta 100 combination. 

​I was walking down the main drag in Hollywood when this guy comes out of a hotel surrounded by a dozen or so photographers, all clicking away in his direction. I quickly got myself into the crowd and grabbed a few shots. I had no idea who he was. I asked someone and they mentioned a name I'd never heard before and very quickly forgot. So to this day, despite showing this image to numerous people and performing reverse image searches, I've still no idea who he is! 

​I wasn't sure what to make of this wild west upstairs, art deco downstairs place. It's supposedly a lawyer's office but looks more like a shabby film set for the Chandler-esque office of a down-at-heel private dick. And it's pink, well, salmon coloured. Then again, it is San Francisco.  ​