DEAR EDITOR

{dear editor} Celebrating Local Mythologies

I note that normally your December issue is the least informative and the most uninteresting one due to its heavy emphasis upon a local mythology. Please realize that a large number of your readers have no interest in this local religion, and especially in the blend of mythologies arising from a clash of native beliefs and this local religion. Your magazine is affiliated with state government, and your emphasis upon particular religious matters implies state support of this religion. Please return to the magazine's mission: travel in the physical rather than the mythical.

"Local mythologies?" Is that like Christmas? You have a point: We do love the holidays-but then so do a lot of our readers. Besides, I'm a fan of that whole gift subscription thing. And I have a confession: I often travel for reasons more spiritual than physical.

The Creator's Design

Thank you for your "All Who Wander" column (September '05), "For Want of a Fungus the Squirrel Is Lost-As Are We All." This is a beautiful example of the incredible intelligence behind the design of this world. It's not the wisdom of the creation (the fungus), it's the wisdom of our fantastic Creator!

I bet you and Michael could have a spirited conversation. Personally, I'm in awe of both DNA and the design of the cosmos. For instance, because water is one of the few liquids that expands when it freezes, icebergs float, the seas don't freeze and the planet remains warm enough to allow for the evolution of magazine editors who feel divinely inspired by sunsets and root fungi.

Do Photographs Lie?

Thanks for Director of Photography Peter Ensenberger's column "Viewfinder: Digitally Manipulated Photographs Don't Portray the Truth" (September '05) in which he said transparencies prove that "last light really does set sandstone on fire and turn the sky indigo blue before night falls." I am a photographer and know that just exposing the film enhances the scene, and film manufacturers use focus groups to see how much saturation people prefer. How often have we seen pictures of Antelope Canyon in which the bright and slightly overexposed areas show up fiery?

Underexposure can also produce increased saturation, and a polarizer takes enhancement to another level. I'm as seduced by saturated and contrasty images as any other landscape photographer. I just wonder how much the viewing public is aware of this. Maybe we should keep it as our little secret among photographers.

Excellent points. That's why Arizona Highways photographers prefer to nap and eat gorp in the middle of the day, saving their mania for sunrise or sunset. So setting the digital debate aside, do photographs tell the truth? Personally, I think they convey the emotional truth of beautiful places by manipulating the light.

Abandon the Digital Jihad

Ensenberger's column about digital photography has pushed me over the top. As a 40-year subscriber, I have serious problems with his thought processes as director of photography. So the distracting white tree has been digitally removed: big deal! If I found the tree had been felled by a lightning strike, could I sue for misrepresentation? What is "reality?" If Vishnu Temple in the Grand Canyon were [digitally] moved to the Salt River, whoa! But by removing the distracting tree, the "reality" is not essentially changed. You're just wrong in this jihad. No fear, no subscriptions canceled over this, just wanted to go on record that you're dead wrong.

Well, I agree on one point-Pete (the other Pete) has some pretty weird ideas. But in this case, I agree with him. It's a credibility issue. Velvia film and warming filters don't cross the line, but cutting out trees does. We have enough trouble convincing people Arizona's landscapes are real without any questions about computer manipulation of photographs.

A Vengeful Elevator

In the crackling, dry days of an Arizona spring, the air is alive with static. While down in Bisbee as you glide across the antique wool carpets of the Copper Queen Hotel, stop and consider the venerable elevator. It's better grounded than anything in town, and they say it's haunted. One evening I watched a waiter making room-service deliveries. Each time he punched the call button, he got a painful static jolt.

On his third trip, balancing his tray aloft on one hand, he lashed out at the elevator. Standing on one foot, he slammed the call button with the other hard enough to make me wince for the poor elevator. Snickering in triumph at having avoided a static discharge, he entered the polished metal car and reached out to select a floor. There was an evil flash of lightning as his hand neared the shining brass panel of the best ground in town. The closing door muffled his scream. The elevator rose, making that huffing, chuckling noise it does at times.That's the best Bisbee ghost story I've heard since the one about Ruby and the jilted husband who murdered the rooming house full of boarders.

ARIZONA HIGHWAYS