The last couple of weeks are exactly why I now find myself living in the Pacific Northwest.
Sort of.
So it's no secret that this region of the country has some of the most incredibly beautiful and inspiring fodder for landscape and nature lovers and overall wanderlusters.
If anything, the region is known for its copious amounts of water and incredibly liberal natural display of every shade of green known to man.
It's what I moved up here to explore and embed with.
Between the forests, the waterfalls, the rivers, the coastlines, the almost-religious focus on sustainability and conservation and nature-worship, and perhaps the world's most concentrated populations of tree-huggers on the planet (myself proudly and unapologetically included), it's enough to occupy infinite lifetimes of discovery.
What we didn't see coming (well actually we did) was…
This one is very very dear to my heart. When I made the choice to move up to the Pacific Northwest a few months ago, I knew that I had to pay homage to the Santa Monica Mountains - the mountains that made me ‘me.’
So I figured during my final weeks living in the Santa Monica Mountains, I’d take along a 360˚ VR video camera on the remainder of my hikes and excursions and cut together my gift back to the mountains…
Our National Parks and outdoors spaces have done more for me than I can ever possibly express. I have learned more about myself, more about all of us, and more about what and why matters and drives me and all of humanity in those parks than anywhere and anytime else in my adult life. I cannot think of anything that has helped to heal my psyche over the past decade more than our natural world and outdoors spaces, and while it's absolutely impossible to express all of those sentiments in a blog post, the most appropriate attempt would be to simply rehash some of my favorite scenes and stories that I have been blessed to see with my own eyes and experience with my own being over the years. So below is a gallery of 100 images from within some of our national parks and some links to some of the stories behind those images. Hope You Enjoy.
As I mentioned in the previous post, I just got back from a few weeks in Maine. The main purpose of the trip was to work on a video for Camp Skylemar, one of the most beautiful, efficiently run sleep away summer camps in the country. I’ll post much more about this insanely incredible experience once we’re done with the video in a few weeks, but this post is a quick focus on the 5 days after we were done. Since I had never been to Maine before, I tacked on some extra time at the end of the job to explore the State for a few days.
So this is a little uncharacteristic of me, but this time, I’m going to try to go easy on the words and let the images tell the story. Yosemite is just one of those places…the type that no matter who or what you are, will be affected by it. It’s simply impossible to turn that final curve on Highway 41 and exit that 1/4 mile tunnel 30 miles past Yosemite National Park’s South Entrance, without feeling like time slows down, at least for a split-second, to work out whether or not your eyes and senses have failed you as you try to come to grips with the sheer scale and beauty of the surreal valley that lies before you.
I know I'm still not completely caught up on the Sri Lanka adventure posts, but I've spent the past week in Yosemite National Park and wanted to throw a lil' bit of that paradise your way. Here's an image from Wednesday afternoon in Yosemite Valley, just as the sun began it's descent.
I woke up this morning a bit ragged. Today it was much harder to open the eyes, due in no small part to the fact that I was planning on making the drive back from Big Sur to Los Angeles. As I was unzipping my tent and cursing under my breath that I couldn't at least indulge in a cup of coffee on my final morning here due to the fire ban, there comes my aunt, as if on cue, straight out of the bushes at the other end of the campground, holding bright sunny fresh to-go cups of coffee! Boom!
She had made her way into town to come back and make our day! I took it as a sign.
he next few days in Big Sur were nothing short of magical. We woke up the following morning, our first in Big Sur, and figured the most logical thing to do would be to hit the beach. And, well, who are we to argue logic? The universe led us down the 3/4 or so mile hiking path from the campsite, through a covered canopy of trees that straddles the Big Sur River, all the way down to the quaint cove that makes up Andrew Molera State Beach. We spent several hours here sunning, swimming, playing, fighting off the seagulls that boldly flew off with half our food, and watching the surfers slowly but surely converge at Molera Point as they anticipated the swells from Hurricane Marie, the category 4 that had hit Baja California earlier that day, to come ashore any moment. And boy did they!
So after the kayak melee in Morro Bay, it was time for Stephen Chiang, the photographer I was assisting, and I to drive up north to San Francisco for the job the next morning. Put two photographers in a car, give them the choice between A. a straight and direct, but boring route, and B. a windy, curvy, 2-hours-longer scenic route through Big Sur, and, well, you can guess which one they’re going to choose 11 times out of 10. So up the curvy Pacific Coast Highway we went, absolutely one of the most beautiful and scenic drives in the country.
It began as a work trip. Well, sort of. I’m finding more and more and more these days I’ll fish for any excuse to leave Los Angeles...just the thought alone gets me excited. So when Stephen Chiang, a photographer friend that I occasionally assist mentioned he needed an assistant for a gig in San Francisco, I jumped at it. When he mentioned it would begin with a night of camping in Morro Bay State Park, and end with 4 nights of camping in Big Sur, that wasn’t just the icing on the cake, that WAS the cake.
Day 3 of this unplanned impromptu journey into the Eastern Sierras thing was a tough choice. While I was happy with what I got in Yosemite’s Tuolumne Meadows yesterday, now that I knew the lay of the land a bit better, it couldn’t hurt to head back again, which I would have been absolutely HAPPY to do. However, I was also dangerously close to Mono Lake, California, another one on the bucket list, so I had to decide whether to turn this into 2 days of Tuolumne or 1 day of each, Tuolumne and Mono Lake, both of which, in my opinion, would have been WIN! I know, I know, tough decisions…
So all that hype about the ‘super moon’ that we’ve heard not only this month but last month and sometime back earlier this year as well? Well, this is more of it! Apparently this weekend, on Sunday, August 10, is the superest of all super moons (at least in 2014). Scientists like to get all loose and crazy and call it a ‘perigee full moon,’ basically meaning it’s the closest the moon will be to earth this year. Anyhow, along with all the hype about the super moon itself, for us photographers, comes all the hype about how to photograph the super moon, so here are my obligatory tips on how to photograph the super super moon.
This is just one of those places. You hear about it, you see pictures of it, you read about it, and if you’re a nature-lover or photographer, or better yet, both, you’d be hot damned if you that’s the one you didn’t get to cross off your bucket-list.
The mystique around this place runs high. It’s been called a ‘photographers paradise,’ as well as one of ‘the most difficult places to photograph.’ The thing about it is, it’s closed off most of the year.
It eventually happens to every new photographer. You’re out in the field. You’re setting up to make a shot, and you see others around you setting up for a shot, only, some of these people have these strange contraptions attached to the front of their lens. It looks like a huge piece of square glass. You sit there. You stare. You wonder. And when you get back home, you Google ‘square things on lens.’ The first time this happened to me, I was set up to shoot some images of Bonsai Rock in Lake Tahoe, California several years back.
I recently found myself standing in front of a stunning vista in the Santa Monica Mountains. It was June 21, 2014. The Summer Solstice. And the sun was just about to set behind the mountains, leaving a beautiful show of colors and clouds and reflections and highlights and vivid shadows in it’s wake. There was another group of photographers at the other end of the overlook and they were doing what most photographers first instinct is to do…pay full attention to the focal point of their image, the subject they wish to draw attention to, and everything else came secondary.
Here are a couple more images from the Summer Solstice sunset in the Santa Monica Mountains last weekend. Perfect for your mobile phone, tablets, and desktop computer wallpaper. Figured I'd throw 'em your way! Just right-click on the image, and choose 'Save Link As' for the 2400px version.
Just wanted to share a couple of images of this year's Summer Solstice sunset from the Santa Monica Mountains and wish everyone (in the Northern Hemisphere...) a happy wonderful Summer 2014. Thank you all so much for joining me on this online photographic journey over the past 18 months. I am forever grateful. To learn how to get shots like these, check out my post How To Photograph Sunsets, Silhouettes And Starbursts For Your Summer Snaps!
In honor of Apple’s latest operating system announcement, OS X Yosemite (which, if you know me, that word alone gets me excited) I figured I’d rehash some of my images from my Yosemite adventures last year. In case you don’t want to (or can’t) wait until the fall for the official release, after the 'read more' break below, you'll find a few of my favorites optimized for your desktop backgrounds, and below those are the iPhone-optimized versions. To save them, just right click and choose ‘Save Link As...’
