Mojave Desert night photography: The Four Aces movie location

Posted on by joe

The Four Aces is a movie location in the Mojave Desert located east of Palmdale near Lake Los Angeles. This film rental set has a classic Route 66 style diner, gas station, and a 1950′s motel. As you can see from the photos, each portion of the location can be compositionally isolated. The 4-aces.com website has extensive interior photos and floor plans of each set. Thanks to JP for permission to photograph this cool location during the May 2011 full moon.

Related posts:

  • Mojave Desert Night Photography
  • Night Photography: Abandoned Mojave Desert Mining Area Gallery
  • Night Photography: Abandoned Gold Mill in the Mojave Desert

    • 14 thoughts on “Mojave Desert night photography: The Four Aces movie location”

    1. very nice. the wind must have been crazy out there – it was very strong here at the beach over that weekend.

      • Thanks. Weather wasn’t too bad other than the moon was hiding behind the clouds. The previous 2 nights were very cold for May – so cold that my friend fashioned an extra insulating layer out of a trash bag.

      • Thanks, Brad! Fun places to shoot and amazing clouds – turned out to be an excellent trip.

    4. Glad you went back and shot this place. It has a strange “Disneylandish” quality. Did you hit the other movie-set place nearby too?

      • There is an interesting tension after the desert does it’s thing on these constructed sets. I didn’t shoot Club Ed on this trip – the owner said it was OK to shoot from the road, but they don’t allow night access. I did shoot at another film set not too far away.

    5. Wow! What a great shoot. I really dig your lighting treatment to the first image under the Motel sign. Nice work Joe. Sounds like a killer location. Cool that you were able to get the access.

    6. Nice work, Joe. I was wondering where you were this past full moon. I actually like the clouded skies: it makes the light more diffuse, more subtle. No star trails, but it’s an odd lighting that I like.

      • Thanks, Kent. It’s like having a big softbox on your light source. Balancing the longer exposure times needed for lighting the foreground with the reasonably short 2-3 minutes necessary to keep definition in the cloud streaks can be challenging, but when it works there is an otherworldly quality to the light.