The poem of the road is as old as the ages. The road beckons, tantalizes, leads us on. There are new vistas, new opportunities.

We flee from danger down the same road. Who know what lies beyond where the horizon meets the leading lines and curve of the road?

For good or for evil, the poem of the road is a siren nudging us ever onward, worrying us whether we are really satisfied, or whether there is more, better—or, here’s the real point, different—around the next bend in the road.

Yes, the poem of the road is seductive, dangerous, and powerful. Leaving the life you know for the unkowns of the road is always frightening. But ignore the pulsing of the possibility of adventure at your peril, for without time on the road, is it really life at all?

I have been in the Santa Barbara area making an online course about Photoshop Backgrounds and Textures for Linked In Learning a/k/a Lynda.com. A demonstration for my course called for the use of texture overlays in Photoshop.

Looking through the images I brought with me, I came across an image from the basins and ranges of Nevada in the haze of oncoming twilight. To take the photo, I had stepped in the middle of the road, not much of a risk as traffic is light in that part of the world. I liked the receding car, and snapped the photo.

The results pleased me as far as the road and telephone poles go, but not so much the sky, which was basically a light gray. I added a couple of textures, and in a few seconds in post-production made the image you see. This is part of my course since I was creating the image in real time, and it was being recording. So if you want to see exactly how I made this, it will be in my course!