Historic Route 66 in Williams

Author's Comments

Williams holds onto something most Route 66 towns have already let go of. The neon still works. That is the first thing to understand about photographing here, and it changes everything about when you should arrive. I shoot this main drag at blue hour almost exclusively. Not full dark, when the signs become pure light against pure black and lose all context, but that narrow window when the sky is still holding cobalt and the neon has just come up. Twenty minutes, maybe thirty. The signs read warmer against a cool sky, and you get the architecture behind them instead of just the glow. Bring a tripod. The exposures want to be longer than you can handle handheld, and the long-exposure version of this street, with a car or two pulling threads of red and white through the frame, is the photograph worth waiting for. Walk the whole stretch before the light goes. Pick your sign. There are a dozen worth photographing and you cannot do them all in one evening, not properly. I tend to favor the older motel signs over the restaurant ones, but that is personal. The detail work rewards a longer lens and patience. The wide shots, looking down the street with the signs receding into distance, want the corner you can find at either end of the historic blocks. Winter is underrated here. The crowds thin, the air goes clear, and on the rare evening with snow on the ground the neon reflects off the street in a way that does not happen in summer. Whatever season you choose, stay through full dark and then turn around and shoot the other direction. The light changes character once the sky finishes going.

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