water

All photos available for print and licensing >

This is a good story. Or at least I think it is.

So at any given moment you can catch one of these brown pelicans hanging out on a rock in the ocean. They’re pretty cool to look at since we have nothing like them in the DC metro area. So my friend Sue and I decided to just sit down, watch the pelican and relax for a little bit. We actually copied this idea from another couple who were sitting fairly close to the pelican. But once they got up to leave, the pelican started acting funny.

At first Sue and I did not know what was going on, but then saw that he was actually spitting up something on to the rock. He had stored a whole bunch of little fish in his lower bill. So I guess when he thought the coast was clear he felt freedom to start eating them.

That’s when the seagull came.

And it was literally a fight for the fish. It was hilarious. Especially with Sue’s commentary in the background while I was taking the pics. She would be like “uh oh, get your own fish” “oh no, it’s a battle!” “*gasp* he fell into the water”. HAHAHA I actually got some of it on video because I was recording parts of it for my youtube video (coming soon) and that’s the only reason why I remember what she said. But I could not stop laughing in the moment and watching it back on video. It was literally like watching the nature channel in real life.

I don’t remember exactly what happened afterwards, but I do know the seagull ended up flying away after a while.

End story. HAHAHA

My camera settings for this image is F4 at 1/1600the of a second at ISO 160 with my Sony a7II and 70-200mm lens.

 

All photos available for print and licensing >

While in Aruba, we stayed at the Renaissance Resort and Casino. I’d recommend it if you really want to go to Flamingo Beach and stay in Oranjestad. I liked it because the location was really convient to a lot of shopping, restaurants and bars. It made life so much easier when you could just walk across the street and get the best dutch pancakes on the island.

This image was taken on our first morning in Oranjestad, just like this one. Apparently Sue and I had a great photowalk because I got so many images that I am happy with including this one. This building is right by our hotel. We could actually see it from our balcony everyday. If I remember correctly, it was a church. But I just loved the vibrant yellow color with the black trimming on the windows. It made it a very unique looking building. The red sign was just the focal pointed need to make this even more interesting. It took a couple of frames for me to get it just right but I love the way it turned out.

I hope you’re liking these Aruba images because I still have a ton more to go through. I’ve literally just scratched the surface. I’ve been pretty busy lately working on a couple of projects here and there but hopefully I’ll have some time to work on those images soon as well as an Aruba vlog! I can’t wait to check out the gopro footage of when we went snorkeling in the ocean 🙂

One last reminder, if you’re not busy tonight, come join me, my friends Geoff and Focus on the Story International Photo Festival for an Evening with the Monuments. Click here for the details.

My camera settings for this image is F8 at 1/1000th of a second at ISO 320 with my 70-200mm lens.

All photos available for print and licensing >

This image is nuts. I can’t even believe I captured it because it’s really not supposed to look like this at all. This has got to be the worst flooding that I have EVER seen at the Tidal Basin and I’ve seen it flooded a number of times before. For example, here and here and even here.

The sidewalks were totally not walkable at all. I didn’t have my rain boots on this day but that would not have mattered. At some points I think the water came up to my knees. At that point I would have needed waders. Which is a funny story because I actually have a pair. Don’t ask me how I was given a pair… just trust me in knowing that I look super cool in them.

In order to captured this, I walked along the grass the entire time. It was pretty sad to see so many cherry blossom trees just wading in the water. At some points I would even see ducks swim by in places that was supposed to be a sidewalk. It was almost like I was walking through a really weird dream.

The only good side to this is that the reflections were unbelievable. The water was only moving when ducks would swim by but otherwise it was like glass. The sunrise was way better than expected so I was super happy to be able to capture it all in the water and make it look even more dramatic with the reflections.

My camera settings for this image is F4 at 1/500th of a second at ISO 1000 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide angle lens. I noticed that a lot of the images I captured this day were in the shadows because I was walking around in the trees so much (with no tripod) so I had to bump up my ISO to compensate.

All photos available for print and licensing >

There’s always room for firsts and I had my first podcast experience a few weeks ago. Thanks so much to Jason Flakes and Mary Bailey for having me on PhotoStank. I had so much talking about photography, Snap DC and so much more. To be honest, I didn’t want the conversation to end. I was having so much fun. If you’re interested, click here to listen to the episode.

And if you have time, check out the episode’s challenge. I think it’s an interesting one. Use the hashtag #photostankchallenge so I can be sure to see what you have come up with.

Today’s image was taken a couple of weekends ago in Lake Anna, Virginia. It had just stopped raining and was still a bit too cold to go out on the boat for some water fun so I thought it was the perfect opportunity to fly the drone! I love practicing flying as much as I can. I’m still a bit nervous at it but I know the more flying time I get, the better it will be.This birds eye view of the world is such an interesting perspective. And my favorite part of this image is the way that you can see the reflections of the clouds in the water. The trees weren’t looking too bad after the rain either 🙂 I think I’ll be flying my drone a lot more often in the summer. Sunflower fields here I come!

Speaking of flying, my friend Andy just came out with a video about flying drones. If you have one, you should definietly check out this video. I learned so much! Just wish it came out before the trip to Lake Anna so I could have applied some new knowledge I learned.

My camera settings for this image is F2.2 at 1/220th of a second and ISO 100 on my DJI Mavic Pro.

 

All photos available for print and licensing >

Special Announcement! I’m hosting my very first photowalk and I’m so excited!!!

It’s happening on Saturday June 9th at 5:20a meeting at the Lincoln Memorial. Mark yo calendars. Super early, I know, but it will be so fun. I’m teaming up with the Focus on the Story International Photo Festival for a super cool Saturday morning. Don’t quote me on this but I heard they’re bringing Krispe Kremes too. So what could be better than the National Mall, sunrise, donuts and ME?! LOL.

Click here to sign up for the free event. And while you’re at it, check out some of the other events that will be going on that weekend. I’ve signed up for a couple myself and really looking forward to learning from other photographers.

This image was taken in August 2016 but I still remember the details of taking it. It was a super humid summer evening and we were expecting thunderstorms that night. So with weather conditions like that, I thought the sunset would be super colorful. It was, but only along the bottom of the sky, right above the horizon. So I decided to crop the top part and focus more on the water ripples. I don’t know if this image would have been as successful as it is without the water because I think the best part of it was catching the color reflection. It makes it seem a lot more colorful and dramatic than it really was. The most interesting part to me is that little line that flows down the center left hand side of the reflecting pool. I love the way that it bounces from one side to another so subtly.

So that’s our meeting spot! The Lincoln Memorial! Don’t forget to register for the sunrise photowalk and see ya there!

My camera settings for this image is F6.3 at 1/10th of a second at ISO 250 with my Sony A7II and 28-70mm lens.

All photos available for print and licensing >

I took this image almost a year ago during Cherry Blossom season on that one crazy foggy morning we had. If you look closely enough, you can make out the cherry blossom trees in the background. But my focus for this image were on the birds that were flying in the foreground.

I know there has to be quite a few fish swimming around in the Tidal Basin. It’s not uncommon to see a couple of people out there fishing in the mornings, once in a while you’ll hear a random splash in the water and there’s always birds circling. 3 indications that in fact, there are fish in the tidal basin. So there are usually always a fair amount of birds that are on the water fishing. (What’s even cooler is when you can capture them all flying away together.) I thought it would be interesting to see if I could get a cool image of the birds and the fog, so for a good 10 minutes my focus went from photographing the flowers to the birds.

Then this one guy started flapping his wings like he was about to take off. Bird photography isn’t always my thing so I just took a few snap shots and kept it moving. It wasn’t until I got home and could view this image large on the computer screen that I noticed all the cool ripples it was creating. I also really like the reflection within those ripples. Overall I am just really happy with the way this turned out. I think it’s a pretty cool portrait of the scary flying creature about to take off.

And if you don’t know, I’m not a huge fan of birds. 

My settings for this image is F6.3 at 1/125the of a second at ISO 200 with my Sony A7II and 28-70mm lens.