Wire report

‘I was mesmerised by how the fog turned the tower into a monolith’: Derek Zhao’s best phone picture

Zhao was out jogging around Treasure Island, near San Francisco, when he spotted a lonely tower stabbing through the clouds Every morning, Derek Zhao jogs the perimeter of Treasure Island, his home, situated an eight-minute ferry ride from San Francisco. “It’s an endless source of frustration for me that I can’t bring my cameras with me,” he says. “When the island gifts me its beautiful scenes, I should be grateful that phones have pretty decent cameras, too.” Zhao works as a machine-learning engineer at Disney California. He relocated from Texas last year to take up the role, finding the 400-acre human-made island to be the perfect location, “close enough to the office and all the culture the city has to offer, but far enough that I’m waking up to the sound of seagulls instead of car horns”. Continue reading...

Image from linked report: ‘I was mesmerised by how the fog turned the tower into a monolith’: Derek Zhao’s best phone picture
Image from the linked report: ‘I was mesmerised by how the fog turned the tower into a monolith’: Derek Zhao’s best phone picture.Credit: The Guardian Thumbnail shown with attribution and outbound source link; VINI does not claim ownership or republish the original article body. Image source Image shown with attribution and an outbound source link; VINI does not claim ownership or republish the original article body.
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Why it mattersCulture

Zhao was out jogging around Treasure Island, near San Francisco, when he spotted a lonely tower stabbing through the clouds Every morning, Derek Zhao jogs the perimeter of Treasure Island, his home, situated an eight-minute ferry ride from San Francisco. “It’s an endless source of frustration for me that I can’t bring my cameras with me,” he says. “When the island gifts me its beautiful scenes, I should be grateful that phones have pretty decent cameras, too.” Zhao works as a machine-learning engineer at Disney California. He relocated from Texas last year to take up the role, finding the 400-acre human-made island to be the perfect location, “close enough to the office and all the culture the city has to offer, but far enough that I’m waking up to the sound of seagulls instead of car horns”. Continue reading...

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What happened

According to The Guardian’s source item, ‘I was mesmerised by how the fog turned the tower into a monolith’: Derek Zhao’s best phone picture, Zhao was out jogging around Treasure Island, near San Francisco, when he spotted a lonely tower stabbing through the clouds Every morning, Derek Zhao jogs the perimeter of Treasure Island, his home, situated an eight-minute ferry ride from San Francisco. “It’s an endless source of frustration for me that I can’t bring my cameras with me,” he says. “When the island gifts me its beautiful scenes, I should be grateful that phones have pretty decent cameras, too.” Zhao works as a machine-learning engineer at Disney California. He relocated from Texas last year to take up the role, finding the 400-acre human-made island to be the perfect location, “close enough to the office and all the culture the city has to offer, but far enough that I’m waking up to the sound of seagulls instead of car horns”. Continue reading…

Context

The development sits in VINI’s Culture file for readers following arts, entertainment, fashion, film, music, celebrity, and the business of culture. The original report is linked so readers can check the source account, follow later updates, and compare new coverage against the first published record. The source item is dated 2026-09-26T10:00:32+00:00.

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Primary source: ‘I was mesmerised by how the fog turned the tower into a monolith’: Derek Zhao’s best phone picture via The Guardian. VINI cites and links the source; it does not reproduce the publisher’s full article text without rights clearance.

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