The Art of Photographing the Eaton Fire - William Karl Valentine

Jane’s Village - Altadena CA DSC_0281 01-25-2025 William Karl Valentine

When I started photographing the Eaton Fire on the night of January 6th I was just trying to document everything I could since I knew the event was going to be historic.  I obviously had no idea that fire would eventually destroy 9,000 homes and kill 30 people in a twelve square mile are of Altadena and Pasadena.

January 25th was the first day I could really get up into the hardest hit areas because the area had been closed before then.  It was obvious to document the scale of the devastation but as I was doing that I also was looking for forensic evidence of how the fire moved through the neighborhoods and the individual properties.  I also found that I was photographing with an artistic eye.  

At times I have felt a little bad about looking for beautiful or artistic elements in the frame because I am documenting the worst event in so many people’s lives.  But I know my intent isn’t to exploit their loss and I know it is good to look for beauty in the midst of something very ugly sometimes.  As a photographer I think I do that a fair amount, I like to work in hard areas.  The fire created a lot of dramatic images by how it destroyed things.  With trees and bushes the fire removed the leaves to expose the shape of the trunk and blackened it to create contrast.  With plaster walls the heat of the flames altered the hues on some walls and often created a split tone effect like what you can do with a silver gelatin print.  Burned out windows created frames within a frame and unique images.  Photographing after the rain came was also visually interesting because metal debris quickly rusted and turned bright orange which was another contrast.

A month or so ago I traded correspondence with a curator who I know, and she asked me about my editing process for the Eaton Fire Portfolio.  It was an outstanding question, and I hit her with a super long reply because I also wanted to answer the question myself.  I knew describing the process would have value at some point for others viewing the work or trying to better understand me as a photographer.   It was also good exercise for me to complete while building the portfolio.  To answer the editing question, I first had to think about the photography process.  Below is some of what I wrote in my reply:

I’ve seen the world in 2:3 rectangle frames for a long time now so when I started documenting the devastation I was conscious of the elements within the frame. The big difference with this work is that most of the subject matter is static (My cemetery portfolio is very similar).  So, I have been more methodical, I find something that interests me, tells the story, and I photograph it from multiple angles.  I look for ways to bring out the important information and I try different focal length lenses.  I also usually explore the general area for other images.  January 25th was incredible because I drove up to see the condition of Mountain View Cemetery where most of my family is buried and nearby there were lots of burned businesses.  I started photographing the businesses because the images were obvious.  A wall with “Western Fence Co, Since 1967” and everything else gone, that image was obvious I just needed to frame it properly.  Across the street the meeting hall which I later figured out was a Bible study, the burnt billboard, and the packed used car lot were all powerful subject.  When I was photographing the car lot I noticed the streams of melted metals on the asphalt and then really homed in on detail as well.  The shapes and forms of the metal were beautiful and so I worked with that.  But the melted metal also documented the power and intensity of the firestorm.

The car lot was on the edge of the Jane’s Village neighborhood and almost all the homes on the block West of the car lot were gone.  I walked into that area thinking the mass devastation would be the primary subject matter.  It was but then I found the concrete flamingos that survived and partial walls with window openings that created frames within the frame.  The burn patterns were interesting.  The plaster on many houses changed color in the fire and it is incredible how it resembled a “Split Tone”, usually in the complimentary colors red and green, or better described as a light maroon and olive.  The flames also left interesting designs on the plaster.  It left different markings where it came out of vents, versus when it was burning a material against the house.  The wood framing of some homes burned away but left black marks on the standing plaster wall that were very geometric.  There are beautiful aesthetics within the devastation.  The frame within a frame element from missing windows became interesting and I moved position to square my frame and also position elements within the background of the window frame.  I then had to deal with depth of field and focus issues often making numerous exposures with different focal points.

Documentary photographers photograph in a similar ways as Press photographers and Photojournalists but there are differences.  The Press photographer and Photojournalists are looking for impactful images that either complement or tell the story like documentary photographers do but they have more constraints.  They have less time, and their image needs to stand out in a way to quickly grab the viewers’ attention and to focus their attention directly on the subject.  As a documentary photographer I don’t have a deadline, I can revisit things again and again.  I can craft images with layers of detailed information because the goal for me is to share my photographs in settings where people have time to explore the image for all the information in the image.  Any type of photographer can and should be respectful when photographing subject matter like this.  I have had lots of positive interactions with people while photographing in Altadena because I explain my connection to the community and I am respectful of other peoples’ property.  I just felt it was important to author a post about this subject because I don’t want anyone to misjudge my intentions with this portfolio.  Foremost my goal is to document the devastation, so society never forgets the impact this fire had on thousands of people.

Example Images below:

Frames within the Frame:

Branches:

Rust: