This past Friday morning I went out looking for more opportunities on my way to work.  To my astonishment down on South Lakeshore Blvd, I saw this vehicle that had Eddie Van Halen's trademark red, white and black candy-striping just like his guitars from the the classic VH-era.  Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a HUGE Van Halen fan from waayyy back!  Well, when I saw this vehicle, I knew I had to shoot it!  I didn't have time in the morning as I had found other things, but I did go back at lunchtime to shoot it and find out what it is.  Turns out it is something called the "Jambulance ERuption."  For those of you who don't know, Eddie Van Halen's signature guitar solo is called Eruption and the owner capitalized the ER to make it fit with the ambulance theme.  Anyway, it's a DJ and limo service and I guess they were setting up for something to happen this weekend.  Unfortunately the guy who was there wasn't too talkative because he either didn't speak too much English or was just too busy.  He did let me take some photos, though.

This is an HDR of 7 brackets, tonemapped with details enhancer in Photomatix, and then processed in Photoshop CS6 using OnOne's Perfect Effects 4 with the grunge effect and Nik's Color Efex 4 lens vignette effect.

Speaking of vignettes, I noticed that I use them a lot in my photos recently and I'm wondering if I use them too much.  What do you think?  Do you like the look or should it only be used sparingly?  I guess I like the framing it does, but I don't know if I should use them as much as I do.  Let me know.

Oh and lastly, I hope Mr. Eddie himself doesn't find out about this vehicle.  He has trademarked his "candy stripe" and has cracked down on people using it.  Look here at a sneaker lawsuit he's filed against Nike...  I also remember a guy named Fernandez or something that made replica guitars and Ed stopped that.  Good luck, owner of Jambulance ERuption!  Hope you don't get in trouble! ;-)

Thanks for dropping by and I hope you enjoyed the picture!



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