# Image credits and licences Every photograph on this site is a **public domain work of the United States government**, taken by the Bureau of Land Management. No licence fee, no attribution requirement, no third-party image library, and nothing that stops the client owning this site outright. **All three have been duotoned into the site palette.** That treatment is disclosed here and on `/about-this-demo/`. It is a colour grade, not a manipulation of content: nothing has been added to or removed from any frame. --- ## The rule these images were chosen under Tribal Nation 2 is a fictional Nation. **Its scenery must never be a real Nation's land, or a landmark associated with one.** On demo 1 this ruled out Badlands National Park, whose South Unit lies inside the Pine Ridge Reservation. In Southwest mesa country the risk is far higher, because nearly every recognizable formation belongs to a living Nation: Monument Valley, Shiprock and Canyon de Chelly (Navajo Nation), Black Mesa (Hopi and Navajo), Enchanted Mesa (Acoma), Mesa Verde (twenty-six affiliated Tribes), Bears Ears (a five-Tribe coalition). So the standard here is tighter than "avoid the famous one": - Anonymous rimrock and unnamed high desert only. **No recognizable silhouette.** - **No unit whose name carries a Nation's name.** - No people, no structures, no signage. Every page that shows one of these says on the page that this is scenery, not the Nation's land. ## Rejected, and why Recording these because the reasoning is the point, not the outcome. - **Sage steppe at sunset, Arapaho National Wildlife Refuge** (USFWS, public domain). Visually the best match found: silver sage foreground, lilac cloud, dark ridge. **Rejected.** The refuge is federal land in Colorado and not Arapaho Tribal land, but the credit line would put a real Nation's name against a fictional Nation's scenery. That is the Badlands mistake in a different costume. - **Sage steppe and the Wind River Mountains of Wyoming** (USFWS, public domain). **Rejected** on the same ground: Wind River is the name of a real reservation, home to the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho. - **Sage steppe in winter, Seedskadee National Wildlife Refuge** (USFWS, public domain). Beautiful snow texture. **Set aside** as a near miss: "Seedskadee" is a Shoshone-derived name for the Green River. It names a river rather than a Nation, so it is a weaker objection than the two above, but neutrally-named alternatives existed and were preferred. - **Oregon Badlands Wilderness entrance sign; wilderness boundary marker.** **Rejected** for BLM signage and a US flag in frame. - **Oregon Badlands Wilderness night sky panorama.** Genuinely violet, and tempting. **Rejected** for a lit orange tent in the frame that fights the palette, and because a Milky Way hero is the wrong register for a Tribal government site. --- ## In use ### `hero.jpg` (1600x898, 56 KB) The homepage hero. Ridge line under heavy cloud at dusk, high desert. - **Source:** Oregon Badlands Wilderness, Bureau of Land Management (BLM Oregon and Washington). Same frame as `horizon.jpg`, cropped and graded differently. - **Original:** [Commons, File:Oregon Badlands Wilderness (13999558928).jpg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Oregon_Badlands_Wilderness_(13999558928).jpg) - **Licence:** Public domain, a work of the U.S. federal government. - **Treatment:** cropped to 16:9, scaled to 1600px, duotoned, **with the highlights rolled off**. That last part is not a style choice. The original has a blown sun break through the cloud that measures near white, it lands dead centre once the hero crops it, and centred copy over it failed WCAG at 2.14:1. Rolling the highlight end of the curve down from 0.96 to 0.66 means a 0.42 scrim carries the text instead of the 0.65 scrim it would otherwise need, so the photograph survives. - **Content check:** no people, no structures, no signage. The ridge reads as an anonymous horizon. ### `horizon.jpg` (1400x560, 40 KB) Ridge line under cloud at dusk, high desert. Currently unused on the site: superseded by `hero.jpg`, and kept because it is the right shape for a slim band if one is wanted later. - **Source:** Oregon Badlands Wilderness, Bureau of Land Management (BLM Oregon and Washington). - **Original:** [Commons, File:Oregon Badlands Wilderness (13999558928).jpg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Oregon_Badlands_Wilderness_(13999558928).jpg) via [BLM on Flickr](https://www.flickr.com/photos/blmoregon/13999558928/) - **Licence:** Public domain, a work of the U.S. federal government. - **Treatment:** cropped to a 2.5:1 band, scaled to 1400px, contrast raised, duotoned. - **Content check:** no people, no structures, no signage. The ridge reads as an anonymous horizon. ### `rimrock.jpg` (1400x700, 244 KB) Canyon rimrock and high desert bench. - **Source:** Bruneau-Jarbidge-Owyhee Rivers Wilderness, Bureau of Land Management. - **Original:** [Commons, File:Bruneau-Jarbidge-Owyhee Rivers Wilderness (14937677299).jpg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bruneau-Jarbidge-Owyhee_Rivers_Wilderness_(14937677299).jpg) via [BLM on Flickr](https://www.flickr.com/photos/mypubliclands/14937677299/) - **Licence:** Public domain, a work of the U.S. federal government. - **Treatment:** cropped to 2:1, scaled to 1400px, contrast raised, duotoned. - **Content check:** no people, no structures, no signage. No named or recognizable formation. - **Name note:** "Owyhee" is an eighteenth century spelling of Hawaii, after Native Hawaiian trappers in the fur trade. It carries no mainland Nation's name. ### `steppe.jpg` (1400x828, 274 KB) Juniper and snow on the high desert. - **Source:** Oregon Badlands Wilderness, Bureau of Land Management (BLM Oregon and Washington). - **Original:** [Commons, File:Oregon Badlands Wilderness (31831976804).jpg](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Oregon_Badlands_Wilderness_(31831976804).jpg) via [BLM on Flickr](https://www.flickr.com/photos/blmoregon/31831976804) - **Licence:** Public domain, a work of the U.S. federal government. - **Treatment:** scaled to 1400px, contrast raised, duotoned. - **Content check:** no people, no structures, no signage. --- ## Supporting imagery **Regraded to violet on 2026-08-17.** These two were originally graphite, on the reasoning below, and Feather chose one image language across the whole site instead. Both now run the same violet curve as the hero, the rimrock and the steppe. The original reasoning is kept because it was sound on its own terms and would apply again if a second image class is ever wanted: > *Graded on the ink-to-grey axis rather than the violet one, because the palette holds a single hue > and "a different colour from the purple" resolves to the neutral axis. The violet duotone belongs > to the hero and the land, and these read as a separate, quieter class of picture instead of > competing with it.* ### Superseded note (graphite, not violet) Two small topical photographs sit in the negative space beside a section head and a quote on the home page. They are graded on the **ink-to-grey axis rather than the violet one**, because the palette holds a single hue and "a different colour from the purple" resolves to the neutral axis. That turned out to be the better answer anyway: the violet duotone belongs to the hero and the land, and these read as a separate, quieter class of picture instead of competing with it. Both carry a small drop shadow with a real offset and a soft blur, tinted to the ink rather than pure black. ### `work.jpg` (760x506, 80 KB) A road grader and towed roller on a graded dirt road. Sits beside **Open positions**. - **Source:** Road Equipment along the South Fork John Day Wild and Scenic River, Bureau of Land Management (BLM Oregon and Washington). - **Original:** [Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Road_Equipment_along_the_South_Fork_John_Day_Wild_and_Scenic_River_(36265613852).jpg) - **Licence:** Public domain, a work of the U.S. federal government. - **Treatment:** cropped to 3:2, scaled to 760px, contrast raised, graphite duotone. - **Content check:** no people. The cab is empty. A manufacturer's name is legible on the machine at full size and illegible at the size used; it is a documentary photograph of real equipment on public land, not a placement. - **Name note:** the John Day is named for a member of the Astor expedition. The unit name carries no Nation's name. ### `economy.jpg` (760x506, 64 KB) Rows of solar panels on open ground. Sits beside the Chairwoman's quote, which is about where the Nation's money comes from. Ties to the fictional High Desert Solar. - **Source:** "A photovoltaic power station in the United States", U.S. Department of Energy. - **Original:** [Commons](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:A_photovoltaic_power_station_in_the_United_States_(36130544274).jpg) - **Licence:** Public domain, a work of the U.S. federal government. - **Treatment:** cropped to 3:2, scaled to 760px, contrast raised, graphite duotone. - **Content check:** no people, no signage, no identifiable business. The title is as generic as a title gets, which is exactly why it was chosen. ### Rejected for this slot - **"Rusty Tractor Vineyards Eclipses Success with Solar Power"** (USDA, public domain). Good solar subject. **Rejected twice over:** there are people visible inside the lit building, and it is a named private business, so the credit line would advertise someone's vineyard on a Tribal Nation's website. --- ## People **There are no photographs of people anywhere on this site, and no generated faces.** Council members and staff carry designed initial marks instead. A fictional Nation is never represented by a real person's face, and we do not generate faces to fill the gap. Every person named on this site is invented. ## The duotone Greyscale, then a five-point gradient map from `#1b1620` in the shadows through `#6b6494` in the mid tones to `#f4eff7` in the highlights, with contrast raised slightly first. Applied with `ffmpeg`. It is what makes three photographs from two different wilderness areas read as one place, and it is why the palette holds on every page. When a real Nation supplies their own photographs, they drop into the same slots. The grade is a single command and is entirely optional.