Seattle is the virtual home of the TV show Grey's Anatomy. Some of the scenes you see in the show were shot on location in Seattle, though obviously the show is actually shot mostly in a set in Los Angeles. I admit to a fondness for the show, though more in the line of watching a slow motion car wreck, than a great deal of sympathy for their political or social point of view.
The first two shots are of the KOMO Channel 4 building, said building being the "location" of the Seattle Grace helicopter pad. While I couldn't get on to the roof to get the shot I wanted, I could shoot the building from the parking lot of the Needle, which as watchers will remember is shown in some of the aerial shots of helicopters coming in to land at "Seattle Grace/Mercy West".
And here is my personal reproduction of a photo that is shown in the background of many scenes, with the photo apparently being in an elevator..
Finally, two shots of the observation deck of pier 66, the cruise ship pier. This is the location where Addison and Derek Shepherd have a picnic, and in both the TV show, and in my shot, you can see the "stack" at the end of the small boat marina that sits right next to the big cruise ship dock. Yes, there are those mounted binoculars, and there, and there only are they free!
The first shot attempts to replicate the background of one of the scenes, the other shows the view from the end of the observation deck, and shows five of Seattle's landmarks in one shot: Both stadiums, the new Big Wheel (just barely visible in part on the left side of the shot), the port, and of course, Mount Ranier. The first time I saw Ranier on a clear day, I said out loud: "Fist of God!" Two points to anybody who can identify the source of that! But seriously, it really does look like Fist of God, doesn't it!?
Two similiar shots, showing more of the wheel.
I've visited as many of the location shots from the first episode, of the first season as I could. In re-watching the first episode, I looked in surprise, then jumped to my feet and shouted: "Wrong time of day! And the wrong direction too!". That was in reference to a scene showing Meredith supposedly coming to work at dawn, on an elevated road. That road is actually the Alaskan Way Viaduct, and she is driving in on the upper tier, which means she is driving North towards City Center (her mother's house is somewhere in North Queen Anne, which is North of City Center, so in that shot she is coming from the South, not the North) and the sun is "rising" on her left. Which is the West, thus in reality it was just before sunset, not sunrise.
I've been working on triangulating, from the outdoor scenery shots, the supposed location of Meredith's Mother's house. It is a little trickier than at first I supposed it would be, but I've narrowed it down to a six block square area. One of these days, now that the Solar release is out the door, I'll walk the area and look for a distinctively shaped house.
. . . and here it is. This house is just up the street from one of the most famous parks in the city (Kerry), and I confirmed this in four different ways.
In season nine, there is another location shot that was supposedly shot at a corner (George nearly gets hit by a falling window washer). It doesn't look right, but I'm still casting around. Most likely, looking at the buses in the background, that location shot wasn't actually in Seattle, but I'm keeping an eye open.
There are other outdoor locations that I simply lack the necessary information to find, such as where Owen and Cristina are sitting on the step outside her apartment building, in the rain. That shot is so close, and shows so little of the background and scenery as to be nearly anonymous, but the somewhat distinctive stonework around the door of Cristina's apartment is unique enough that if I ever pass it, I'm sure I will recognize it.
The others, I'm less sanguine about. But I've walked nearly 500 miles in and around Seattle since I got here, so I've only got to keep doing it for the next 67 and a half years, and eventually I'll walk past it!
John Stevens
john at betelgeuse dot us