Juy 31 - Milford Sound Sunset

Woohoo.. Made it through the first month of Pic of the day! This photo comes to you from New Zealand in 2004. The sun was setting on a beautiful day in the Milford Sound. This is a lake completely surrounded by sheer rock faces that rise 4000 ft. Needless to say the water is VERY cold, but very clear and the Sound is so quiet and peaceful. We spent the night on a little cruise boat that had heaters and electric blankets.

This is the opening of Milford Sound into the Tasman Sea. I love how the sun was setting behind the mountain opening and colors wash across the sky. The other fun part of it is the moon can be seen in the upper part of the photo.

Enjoy your weekend!

July 30 - Vienna City Gardens

While in Europe, we landed in Vienna, Austria for my birthday. After having one of my favorite pork knuckles, enjoying good company at an Irish Pub and crashing in our amazing suite at the Le Meridien, we wandered around the city of Vienna. This is the city gardens and overlooks many of the government buildings of this beautiful capital.

PS, This is one of the many crazy locations I've had the pleasure of spending my birthday. This year, I'm spending it in my beautiful home with my beautiful wife. I couldn't be happier.

July 29 - Spirit of the Pacific

This beautiful boat was my home for 3 days while in Fiji. It's name is the Spirit of the Pacific. There wasn't much wind while I was there, so we actually moved via motor most of the trip, but one morning they hoisted up all the sails for us and took us out on a little boat so we could get photos. It is definitely a beautiful boat and makes taking a picture of it so easy. We didn't actually sleep on the boat, we were able to enjoy huts on an island with no electricity or hot water.

I don't have much more to say today, so enjoy.

July 28 - Kindergarden, Africa Style

While travelling in Africa, I got to see different tribes. Some tribes you felt like they didn't really live there, they just showed up to "work" every day dressed in their "native" attire and then when the tourists left, they went back home to more "normal" lives. Other tribes you really felt like that's how they lived.

Unfortunately, this was one of the former tribes. It was very touristy, a lot of the people knew english and they sold "crafts" that were probably made in China. They took us to their Kindergarden, which was a caged in looking room just outside the main circle. They all lined up for us and then they sang their abc's. All of them very cute and all looked well nourished. Jon and Kate got nothing on these guys when it comes to exploiting kids.. I'm just sayin..

July 27 - Ica Sand Dunes

The dunes in Ica were absolutely amazing. They were huge and went on forever. We spent two hours out on a dune buggy going up, down and around. We stopped to take on sandboarding as well.

This photo is looking East, towards the end of the dunes, into the city of Ica and then beyond to the highlands of the Andes. I love the detail of the dunes close in, then seeing that lone huge dune right in the middle of the photo. Although it's pretty hazy in the background, the haze actually brings out the detail of the ruggedness of the Andes. The contrast between the smoothness of the dunes and the jagged edges of the mountains play here as well. The only greenery is from the valley in the middle where the city of Ica resides.

July 24 - Town Hall Meeting at the Watering Hole

This is back in Etoshia. A couple of the watering holes are lit up at night so that we can sit and watch the animals that like to come by at night. We are "protected" by about a 6 ft wall, but sometimes it doesn't feel so protecting. I was sitting here and there was absolutely no activity going on. I was about ready to pack it in for the night. Then off in the distance I could see an elephant coming towards the watering hole. I decided to stay, along with a couple of others in our group.

When the elephant got closer, you could see there was more with them. About 10 in all. Cool, we'll sit and watch. But then, from the other direction, another line of elephants started to emerge. Soon, 20 elephants were hanging out at the watering hole, only 20 ft from us. It didn't stop there, another 10 soon came forward. It was a little party now. The little ones are playing in the water and the big ones are moving around to greet one another. Again, I was about to pack it in, and ANOTHER 10 elephants showed up. Now it was a rave. You can see in the photo dust being kicked up with all the animals shuffling around. We waited to see if more would show up, but only a few minutes later, some began to leave. I decided it was time to call it a night as well.

Have a great weekend all. I'll be back on Monday!

July 23 - Waynu Picchu

Eventually I'll post a Machu Picchu picture on here, but I want to build up to it. This photo was taken on our hike up Waynu Picchu, a mountain next to Machu Picchu that means "Young Mountain". We got up early (5am) to be able to get onto the trail at 7am. The fog still covered most of the area.

While taking a break from climbing 1100 ft worth of rock-carved stairs, I saw the dew dripping from this branch and I wanted to focus on it. When I saw the minimum depth of field created from my close up focusing, I fell in love with this photo. You can still make out the fog, blue sky and mountains in the background, while still focusing on the water dripping from the branch.

July 22 - Hookah Pipe

I feel like being a little artsy today. If you don't know, this is a hookah or shisha pipe. It has tobacco in it and tobacco ONLY. Just in case you thought it was something else. We found this little cafe in Turkey and decided to stop in for some local flavor. It also got us relaxed before we got beat up by large harry Turkish men.. I mean, before we went for our Turkish massage.

I decided on B&W for this image mainly because I thought it looked neat and put more focus on the pipe and not the background. Sometimes getting up close to something gives it a little more life.

July 21 - Death Valley

In 2005, the 100-year bloom hit at Death Valley and I convinced my friends Allie and Ryan to tag along. The trip itself was a disaster and the 100-year bloom wasn't as amazing as everyone said it was going to be, but I'm still glad I've been to Death Valley, I have little need to go back and I was still able to get a few good photos out of it.

This picture is of Badwater, the lowest point in North America, 282 ft below sea level (thanks Wikipedia!). Thousands of years ago there were salt water lakes here. Eventually the lakes dried up and left a bunch of salt. There was actually some water puddles in the "lake" due to the above average rainfalls in February that contributed to the 100-year bloom. The mountain ranges in the background are of the Sierra Nevadas. Later on, I'll show a picture of the flowers that brought all of Southern California and Nevada to this place on the same weekend, but I actually thought this was a more interesting picture.

July 20 - Italian Pride

I'm not the biggest fan of soccer and I could care less in a match between France and Italy, but I love the atmosphere of a big game. I was traveling through Europe during the World Cup that was taking place in Germany. I landed in Rome on the day before the World Cup Final between France and Italy. How could you miss a party like that? So we headed down to Circus Maximus, a big field where they had big screen TVs and joined the party.

I love this shot because it not only shows the enthusiasm of the crowd without really showing the crowd, it has color and history all in one. How could you not be excited imagining yourself in the middle of this crowd, loving their team and country.

July 19 - Kid Fun

Not too much to say about this photo. I think it speaks for itself. My nephew Jake was enjoying the water fountain as Disneyland today. Could not get enough of it. I love the minimum depth of field that just makes Jake "pop".

Enjoy!

July 18 - Arenal Volcano

Arenal Volcano is located in the jungles of Costa Rica. It is still an active volcano and you aren't allowed to climb it or get within 3 miles of it. The lava doesn't flow, it just spits out rocks. It's pretty cool to see at night, like a little fireworks show. Anyway, back to the photo at hand.

This was taken after a small rainfall. Of course, in the rainforest, there's always a small rainfall. We took a hike to get to this point and came around the corner and there it was, not only the volcano, but the rainbow as well. Our guide says he NEVER sees a rainbow here (I don't know if he says that to make it special or if he was telling the truth). I took quite a few different shots from different angles, but this one was the best. The rainbow cuts across the volcano and looks like it ends just over the ridge.

July 17 - Giraffe Happy Hour

When you live in the desert, you gotta get to a watering hole sooner or later. The downside is you might get eatten on the way. So what do you do? You invite your buddies along for a happy hour.

This photo was taken at Etosha National Park in Namibia. Etosha is a lot like the Mohave desert, but with interesting animals in it. It's a dry flat plain that rains most of the winter but is completely dry in the summer. If you visit Etosha in their winter, you probably won't see many animals because they can get water from anywhere at any time. In the summer, they have to come to the watering holes. During our safari we saw this herd of giraffes heading towards the water so we decided to stay put. They all walked up and then one by one they spread their front legs so that they can lean down and drink.

There is always one that will not drink with the rest so that he can be on the look out for those pesky meat-eating animals.

July 16 - Waterfall at Night

Nights shots can be a pain in the butt or they can be a lot of fun. This is the shot of a waterfall outside of Lauderbrennen in Switzerland. They spotlight the waterfall at night (our tour guide tried to tell everyone they turn off the waterfall at night and then waited to see how many people watched for it to be turned off).

I had the camera on the tripod. I actually had the aperture at 7.1, basically right in the middle. I didn't want too much light to come in or the waterwall would have been washed out, but I didn't want the aperture to be small and have to leave the shutter open for a longer time. I figured this out mostly with trial and error, and ended up exposing the shot for 30 seconds. Enough to make the water look like it's flowing and you get a lot of detail in the rocks and the sky has just a little bit of color which helps define the mountain top.

July 15 - Chichen Itza

The hardest part about taking photos in a touristy area, is the tourists. They are always getting in the way, always trying to get the "best shot" (which usually happens to be right in front of you trying to get the "best shot"). I admit, I too can be a tourist, but I think because of my travels and because of my enjoyment of photography, I tend to be more aware of where I am with the camera and where others are with the camera. I take my shot and get out of the way, I don't stay and admire the location if I know it's a good one for photo taking.

Here is Chichen Itza, one of the newly nominated 7 manmade wonders of the world. AND, without people in it. Luckily, they no longer allow people to climb up it as it was not only dangerous due to the steepness, it also was damaging to the structure. Plus, it keeps people out of the photos! Although the pyramid is centered in the photo, I like the lines that the staircases produce as they run off the page. I think the blue sky peeking out of the clouds made it a great day for picture taking because it meant it wasn't too bright in the middle of the day and created some nice contrast in the rocks of the pyramid.

July 14 - Devil's Throat

The Devil's Throat is the highlight of Iguazu Falls, which is on theAregentina/Brazil border. There are over a dozen waterfalls, but Devil's Throat is the biggest. There's actually a pathway that takes you to the top and you can look right over the falls.

This photo was actually taken from the balcony of our hotel. It captures the entire scope of the Fall and you can see why it is called the "throat". This shows the benefits of having a telephoto lens as well, I had bought the Nikon 18-200mm VR lens just for this trip. Nowhere else on the grounds could you get this shot but in the hotel because it is kind of up on a hill looking down towards Iguazu.

This is the first of many Honeymoon photos you will see.

July 13 - The Kill

This is why I went to Africa. To see a kill. Okay, so we missed the actual killing, but they sure were enjoying it. I took this in the Serengeti from the roof of a Land Rover. We were actually out looking for a leopard that we were told was in the area, but then came upon this. We were only the third vehicle there and then we got trapped in and had to wait until they were done because all the other vehicles boxed us in.

It's rare that you see two male lions interacting with each other. Especially at the dinner table. It also doesn't look like they were leaving much for the lionesses that probably actually participated in the said killing. There were plenty of hyena and voltures circling around the area waiting for them to finish up. I love that I also got the lion with his tongue out, probably finishing licking his lips.

July 12 - Red Bull Air Race

Last year Apryl humored me and let me drag her to the Red Bull Air Races in San Diego. They fly at 200 mph just 30ft above the water through air filled pylons that determine the course. We had a lot of fun and luckily it was overcast so that it wasn't too hot. It makes my the pictures somewhat dull, but I'm working on that. Enjoy the action shot and hopefully your week is a good one.

July 10 - Wine Grapes

Ahhh.... Wine.. Gotta love wine.. It starts out so innocently doesn't it? Just a bunch of grapes hanging out in the sun. Did you know that the wine makers actually pick off over half of the grapes so that the other half become better? Talk about survival of the fittest. Some grapes just don't have a chance, the could grow up on the wrong part of the vine, or just be hanging out with the wrong bunch of grapes.

I love this photo because of the minimum depth of field that just make the grapes pop. On our honeymoon I brought my new 50mm 1.8D lens and got to play with hit from time to time. I think this was the best of that effort.

Enjoy!

July 9 - Felucca at Dawn

During my trip to Egypt, we spent two nights on this felucca. Basically a boat that was designed to travel up and down the Nile. You sleep out on the top, under the stars. I woke up to the sunrise, quietly scrambled off the boat with my camera and tripod and took this photo. Sure, it was like 4am in the morning, sure I could have woken the entire boat up and sure, I couldn't see anything on the marshy coast, but a photographer does whatever he needs to get his shot right?

This is one of my favorite photos from Egypt. Everyone has the Pyramid photos and the Sphynx. I have tons of photos of all the temples. This photo, I WORKED to get and when it comes out like you want, it feels good. It's one of the photos that I entered into the OC Fair, but didn't get nothin.. Oh well.. I still like it and I hope you do too.

July 8 - Star Flower

I don't know much about flowers and I don't tend to take photos of them, but I'm not sure why. Maybe it's because everyone else seems to. Anyway, this flower used to grow near my house in Huntington Beach and when I'd walk the dogs, I'd always pass by them. One day I decided to take a camera with me as I thought they looked really cool and I had never seen one before.

This was taken about 4 years ago, I think with an Olympus P&S. Enjoy this, as you won't see too many flower photos in my portfolio. I think I need to take more.

July 7 - The Giant Clam

Underwater photography is a completely different monster. First of all, you are doing quite a bit of "keeping yourself alive" when you are underwater before you can even focus on taking pictures. On top of that, you are carrying around a big bulky FILM camera (digital is more common today, but not so much 5 years ago) and you don't really know what you are taking a picture of because the viewfinder is pretty much useless with goggles on.

While in the Great Barrier Reef, I took a course to get my Advanced Open Water diving certificate. This allows me to dive deeper and lets other dive shops around the world know they can trust you do be a decent diver. OF course, I also love photography, so the opportunity to rent a camera for the day was definitely exciting. They say if you get one good photo out of a roll, you should be happy. It's darker underwater, the flash doesn't travel very far and keeping still (or getting the fish to stay still) isn't easy. If you can get under the object, so that you can take advantage of the sun, that's best.

Here I have a picture of a giant clam. It doesn't move and it doesn't live very deep in the water, so that made the picture taking easier. Although the "rule of thirds" says that the clam shouldn't be centered, when you aren't sure of what exactly you are taking, it is best to put the object you want in the center so that you know you got it all. I love that I still got a pretty fish in the corner of the photo and some coral in the foreground that framses the shot.

July 6 - Hurricane Wilma

I don't know if anyone knows this, but I've only been in one hurricane. It just happened to be the largest hurricane the Caribbean had ever seen. Hurricane Wilma is the same hurricane that pretty much destroyed Cancun. They are still rebuilding from this hurricane.

In 2005, I dreamed of doing some more scuba diving after falling in love with it in the Great Barrier Reef. I did a bunch of research on the Caribbean and where I should go. Most places point to Belize as some of the most spectacular Scuba Diving in the area. Digging a little deeper, I found out that an island called Roatan off the coast of Honduras had just as good Scuba Diving, but was cheaper and less crowded than popular Belize. Since I had also wanted to see Costa Rica, this was a perfect option and off I went. I picked the end of October because it was still off season and was supposed to be the end of hurricane season (notice Wilma is near the end of the alphabet).

When I arrived, the island was more beautiful and more laid back than I could imagine. I was able to get in 3 days of amazing diving in before they told us that a tropical storm was coming in and we probably wouldn't be able to dive the next day, but don't worry, we'd be back in the water the day after. We woke up the next morning and found out that the tropical storm went straight to Category 5. The largest hurricane possible. We were supposed to get ready to evacuate the island. We only got hit by the outskirts and never evacuated, but were in 80 mph winds for 2 days and were regularly left without electricity (and were certainly cut off from the outside world). By the time it passed, I made friends with locals and tourists alike and still found it to be an amazing adventure. I was due off the island the next day, so I didn't get any more diving in, but it was still a great story.

The picture above is after the hurricane, it destroyed most of the docks on our side of the island and flooded some of the hotels (I was on the second floor). This was a popular bar and I had planned to visit one night while I was there, but as you can see, I never got a chance.

I love how the sign still says "OPEN".

July 5 - Church of the Good Shepherd

Although I didn't know it at the time, 5 years ago today was the beginning of my world travels. I saved up my max vacation time of 5 weeks (meaning I didn't take a vacation day for almost 2 years) and booked a solo trip to New Zealand, Australia and Fiji. Except for a cruise to the Bahamas when I was a kid, 2 trips to Germany with my friend Markus and a trip to Cozumel for Spring Break, I had never left the country, let alone go on a trip alone.

The day after July 4th, I flew to New Zealand and met up with a bunch of Ozzies for a 9 day tour around the South Island. It was winter time there as you can see from the Southern Alps in the background. This photo is from the inside of the Church of the Good Shepherd, which is a small church located on Lake Tekapo. The chuch was built in the 1930s and is still used for service (or at least it was 5 years ago). This is the view from the altar framing the lake and mountains in the background.

July 4 - Lincoln Monument at Night

I don't have any fireworks photos on this computer, so I thought I'd pick the next best thing in honor of July 4th. I picked the Lincoln Memorial at night. I took this image for a full second and I think I had it sitting on one of the ledges heading up to the monument.

This picture was taken in early March of last year, the same trip to DC as my Cherry Blossom photos. It was fairly warm that night and it looks like many others decided to check it out on the same night I did. Either way, it is still a beautiful way to see the monuments in DC and I definitely recommend it to anyone that visits our nations Capital.

Happy 4th!

July 3 - Declaration of Independence

We the People.. That's what started it all.. This document is why we celebrate Independence Day. It's pretty amazing how these things get preserved and kept for so long. It's a 200+ year old piece of paper.

This image was taken without a flash, for two reasons, a) they don't allow it and b) there's glass in the way that would have given a reflection anyway. The first reason didn't stop a lot of people from using a flash anyway. I wish I would have had my 50mm lens at the time as the image would have been a lot clearer. I think the document and the image speak for themselves. Have a happy 4th of July.

July 2 - Washington Monument

(click for full size image)

In honor of Independence Day, this weekend I will focus on our Nation's Capital, Washington, DC. At my previous job, I was required to go to DC on and off over the course of three years. Luckily I was able to have some time off each time. The last time I went for a significant amount of time was March of 2008.

Luckily it was during the peak of the Cherry Blossom Festival and I got to experience the city all over again. This shot is of the Washington Monument with the Cherry trees framing it. Most of the cherry trees are in the Tidal Basin surrounding the Jefferson Monument, but if you look through the trees you can see back to the Washington Monument.

I took in the Tidal Basin 3 times during this trip. The first time I was alone and they were just starting to bloom. The next weekend Apryl came out and they were right at their peak, this is when this shot was taken. The last weekend was with my friend Markus and although just after the peak, it was still beautiful.

Dave's Pic of the Day Blog

Hey all.. I'm going to start posting a pic of the day (or almost every day) and give a little description of where it was taken and when, and anything unusual about it. Most of the pictures are of my travels in the US and abroad.

I appreciate any feedback.

Enjoy!
~Dave