Whew! I made a big dumb mistake yesterday when trying to do some advanced coding on the back end of the site. I apparently cut off access to the database where all of my posts, comments, and meta are stored, therefore there was no access to any of that. In a feverish, cold sweated rush I eventually got the database linked back up, but then I ran into another problem. I only had access to the root blog page, but not any of my posts themselves, i.e. if you clicked a link there was an error page. Well, thanks to my degree in making mistakes, I have quite a few resources to dig through online to figure out fixes for this kind of thing. I got the site back up and running this morning and I will do my best to make sure that doesn’t happen again!

A Whole New Site Coming?

Yes! That was part of the cause for the site going down yesterday, I was trying to transfer some information to the new one. I’m really excited about this new site, and hope you are too. It’s basically going to be a more focused site for photographers and for showing my travel and HDR work, but there will be so much more than that! I’ll go into more details as I get closer and closer to the launch date, so keep your eye on the blog for more. Tell your friends, tell you mom, tell your co workers, tell your dog, it’s going to be great!

To Hell via Deep Ellum

Last weekend, I went on a photo walk through Deep Ellum in Dallas. It was kind of the wrong time of day to go, I feel like Deep Ellum is a place that was meant to be photographed at night, and it was about 10am by the time I got around to this location. I may go back later at night to see what I can get at that time. Deep Ellum if you don’t know is an area in Dallas that is infamous for night clubs, tatoo parlors, culture, music, graffiti, and a few shady people here and there. It’s also the home of the original Twisted Root Burger, my absolute favorite burger in the entire world. Seriously. I took a friend to the one in Roanoke and he was all mad at me because it was going to cost him like $15 for a burger and drink and fries. He kept saying, “A burger is a burger, and no burger is worth $15.” Then he took his first bite. All he could say at that point: “What just happened to my life?” True story. I know this has nothing to do with the image, but oh well, I love that place!

I have no idea what this place is. There were no clear or apparent signs to let us know. So I figured it’s one of the many ways to get to hell via Deep Ellum! Can’t you just see it? Opening the door and seeing a staircase that goes down, but you can’t see the bottom, just a faint red glow somewhere in the distance. I’m sure that is what’s behind this door. No doubt in my mind.

Laziness: It’s become an epidemic in our society and culture. I despise it, mainly because I’ve struggled with it my entire life. It’s something I have to fight on a daily basis. One of the ways I combat laziness and complacency is by getting up as early as I can. I’ve developed a bad attitude towards sleeping in. In fact, if I sleep in past 8am, I feel like the world has started without me. I then spend the rest of my day trying to catch up and get back on schedule. Why am I rambling about getting up early? Well, for photographers, the light that comes with the sunrise is some of the most beautiful light of any time of the day. But it requires dedication and a love for what we do. It’s not easy to wake up before the majority of the world, pack up our gear, grab a cup of coffee, all in an effort to beat the sun to a spot we want to photograph. I can tell you this though; every time I have gotten up to photograph the sunrise, the rest of my day has been great. My drive home is always great, I have a smile on my face, I’m energized and ready for the rest of the day, and there is no crash in the afternoon. Besides great light for photography, getting up early has it’s other benefits too. I’ve found that most successful people share this trait, and I certainly want in on that.

A Rather Large Drifter

I found this rather large piece of drift wood in Miami one bright and early morning. You may have noticed the backdrop of this photo as I have posted several images from this location. Miami is one the most beautiful cities I have ever been to. I always imagined it as this dangerous, run down, dirty city. I don’t know why, maybe because of the way Hollywood portrays the city. I’m sure there is some truth to this in the night life, but I’m not one to spend my nights hopping around bars and clubs. I was constantly amazed at how beautiful and clean and vibrant the city was. There was no smog, no trash, no grime, no run down industrial areas (at least that I could find). I could easily live in Miami, if not for the unreasonably high humidity levels during the day. I shot this tree from several angles, but this one was the clear keeper of the bunch. Because I was shooting straight into the sun, I took 7 exposures to ensure I had enough light to work with in post. The key there was “enough light to work with.” Just because you have the light in your multiple exposures, doesn’t mean you have to use it. I could have processed a “perfectly exposed” image where the histogram showed no clipping on the highlights, but that’s not what I wanted here. I wanted a sun drenched image, because that’s the way I remember it. Hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed shooting and processing it!

I finally got around to setting up a newsletter just for fans of the blog. If you’ll take a look at the sidebar on the right, you will see a new box there where you can sign up for it. The newsletter is and always will be free, and I will send it out as time permits, or when anything big is happening. If I release a product or contest, newsletter subscribers will find out first. I will also include interesting things I find here and there that I don’t always get a chance to post to the blog. Sign up now! And don’t worry, we will never sell your information or use it in any way besides the newsletter mailings.

Magical Psychedelic Shrooms

Can you imagine seeing mushrooms like this in the wild!? I’m not sure what I would do, but I can tell you I’d be a little concerned with their…well…effects. I found these little gems at the Gaylor Texan Hotel and Resort in Grapevine, Texas. The hotel basically wraps around a giant, indoor theme park with restaurants and bars and games. The whole place seems to be modeled after Alice in Wonderland, and there are little magical things like this at every turn.

I added a new feature to the blog posts here. Before, whenever a comment was posted (which I always love and always read!), the person would have to visit back later to see if anyone responded. Now, there is a box underneath the submit button where you can subscribe to the comments for that post. As long as you enter your email address in the comment form, we will shoot you an email any time someone else leaves a comment for the same post. And don’t worry, we never do anything with your email address or information.

The Entrance to the Maya

As you may already know, I visited the Kimbell Art Museum a couple week back. At the time, they were putting the finishing touches on their new exhibit called: The Fiery Pool: The Maya and the Mythic Sea. The Maya have held my interest for some time, mainly ever since visited the ruins in the Yucatan Peninsula. Everything about them is so enchanting and mind blowing. From their deep and profound knowledge of astrology, architecture and mathematics, to their seemingly sudden and tragic disappearance. The exhibit official opened its doors yesterday, but I’m not too keen of the Sunday crowds. I plan on visiting tomorrow when it’s half price ($6) and the crowds will be subsided quite a bit. I’ll be sure to put up a mini review of the exhibit if you’re on the fence about visiting. I know some of these exhibits can be hit or miss.

I originally composed this image in portrait, in an effort to capture the ceiling lines leading to the door, and just as much of the floor leading the way as well. The more I looked at the image in photoshop, however, the more I saw the image as a landscape framed image. One of the many advantages of today’s cameras is how large the files are that they produce. Because of that, you need not be afraid to make aggressive crops like this. There is so much detail that you won’t even notice. I also took note to position several parts of the frame in the sweet spots of the “golden ratio,” which I talk briefly on in my “12 Ways to Improve Your Photography Today” article. At that page, you can even follow a link to watch a YouTube video to find out more about it. Once you learn and understand this magical little ratio, the rule of thirds begins to seem petty and lazy.

I found this little gem outside the Kimbell Art Museum. Who knows what it is, who cares. It’s interesting, it caught my eye, it made me stop and think about it and try to figure it out. As far as I’m concerned, it did its job! So the question is: What is it? Do you know? What do you think it is? Can’t wait to hear your thoughts!

Canon EOS 1ds Mark III, Canon 24-70mm, ISO 100, f/13, 1/200th, 5 exposures

I get quite a few questions here and there about what gear I use. I have gone on a few tangents about gear and whether or not it really matters. In a few words, I think gear is extremely important. And most of the people in the industry who say it isn’t, are the same guys who own a fleet of six thousand dollar camera bodies and forty thousand dollar collections of lenses. Having good gear doesn’t mean you are going to get good images, but it certainly removes any roadblocks there may be to having a shot at them. I will admit it openly, there are shots that I have gotten with my 1Ds Mark III (see my review here) that I wouldn’t have been able to get with cheaper camera bodies. If you’re interested in what kind of gear I use to get the shots you see here on the site, check out my Tools of the Trade page for a list of everything. But don’t go out and by some piece of gear just because another photographer uses it. Try it out first through your local camera store, or through companies like Borrow Lenses.

The Path to the Unknown

The title of today’s image is actually quite literal. I had no idea where this path led. While in Hawaii, I was able to visit quite a few rain forests, and this one was exceptionally beautiful. It was located in Volcano’s National Park on the Big Island of Hawaii, and I sort of just stumbled onto the path after coming out of a ginormous lava tube that stretched for what seemed a mile. I wish I could take you all to this place. Even an image like this can’t do justice to what it was like walking through this rain forest. Everything there is so alive, so vibrant and refreshing, so secluded and untamed. There really is no way to describe it. Fortunately, the path eventually led back to my wife and her family who I’d been separated from for a bit, and all was well in Hawaii .

That’s right. I spent pretty much all day yesterday working through a new page to help photographers. I know most of us (no matter what our profession or hobby) can hit walls or plateaus in our creativity and skill. I wrote an article titled “12 Ways To Improve Your Photography Today” in an effort to help push through these blockades quickly, and to have fun while doing it. Why 12 ways? Well, it started as 10, then I thought I’d do 20, then maybe 22 because everyone does these even numbers when writing list posts, then night time came and I was at 12, so 12 it is!

Atop the Renaissance at Sunset

The other night, my wife and I went to the roof of the Renaissance Hotel to shoot the skyline of Dallas. The Renaissance is a 32 (I believe?) story hotel leading into Dallas, and it kind of looks like a huge deodorant stick. It’s beautiful though, and the lines of the rooftop really stand out. Whenever I’m shooting a subject, I always make sure to take a step back and look at my surroundings. Sometimes, the best images aren’t what you planned on shooting at all. I had this image in my head as the sun was going down, but I had to wait a bit until the light conditions matches what I saw in my minds eye.

Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III, Canon 24-70mm, ISO 50, 34mm, f/16, 8 seconds, 5 exposures

The Highland Village Balloon Festival is an annual event, and I heard about it through a local photography meet up group. While I only went the last day, the event is all weekend long, starting Friday evening. They have balloon glows every night, events all day long, a carnival, vendors, and balloon races in the mornings.

Getting a shot like this can be tough, especially when shooting for HDR. Here are a few steps to keep in mind when shooting action (moving) shots.

• Pay attention to shutter speed. You want a fast shutter speed to freeze the balloons in the air, as well as the movement on the ground.
• Forget about brackets (multiple exposures). With action shots, there is simply too much movement going on, and you won’t be able to combine multiple exposures in post.
• Forget about your tripod. Go hand held, or use a monopod. There is simply too much going on in a situation like this to use a tripod. Balloons were taking off left and right, people were walking in front of me, cars were driving by, it was just too hectic to spend time framing and balancing the horizon.
• If you can’t capture the full range of light in the scene, don’t worry, you can still process your shot to get all the light in most cases. There are two main ways of doing this
  • In Lightroom, make two virtual copies of the image you want to process. Take one down in exposure until the sky looks right, the take one up in exposure to get detail in dark areas. Then send all three to Photomatix as usual.
  • If you want bypass Photomatix, just take the exposures into Photoshop and process them manually using masks. This will certainly depend on the image and how complicated it is.

Canon EOS 1Ds Mark III, Canon 24-70mm, ISO 100, 24mm, f/3.2, 1/200th, 1 exposure