ANGELA B. PAN

Before leaving for this trip, I had made a mental note of the new moon. I was so happy that we would be along the Oregon coast for it. I don’t make enough effort to photograph it in the DC area because we would have to drive at least an hour away to get to a decent place to photograph it. But in Oregon, it was so much easier to photograph the stars and milky way.

This image was taken at the Samuel H Boardman State Scenic Corridor in southern Oregon. We had clear skies all day so I knew this night would be perfect. Right before sunset, Andrew and I scouted different places I could go to photograph the milky way and decided on Meyers Creek Beach. One, because it’s so beautiful with the rock formations in the water. Two, because we would be able to park along the edge of the beach and not go very far to capture images. It was a win-win for everyone.

I had so much fun photographing these star images. I’m going to try to make more of an effort in the future to photograph the milky way.

My camera settings for this image is F2.8 at 10 seconds and ISO 3200 with my Sony A7II and borrowed a 24-70mm lens just for this trip. I wanted to test it out as an everyday lens but came in handy for these night shots because of how fast it is.

So on this girls’ trip, we had 6 girls. With so many of us, we are obviously going to have different sleeping schedules. There were about half of us who were earlier risers and the other half who likes to sleep in. I was in the early riser category so the first morning I woke up my fellow earlier risers and asked if they wanted to go on a walk.

It was perfect that we were staying in the downtown area so there were a lot of interesting things to see. We ended up walking to the Texas State Capitol and then made our way to brunch. On the way to brunch, we ran into this colorful wall with a few cute sayings on it, like “I <3 Austin” and this one, “The only magic I still believe in is love”.

I took a few pictures of the different parts of the wall and as I looked up, I noticed this man who was about to walk by. I took a few steps back and held my camera low so he wouldn’t notice I was taking a picture. For some reason, it immediately reminded me of this image I took in Aruba. Andrew had always liked that picture so when I got back from our trip and showed him this picture he said that it was cool. Without even mentioning anything, he referenced the Aruban image as well. LOL.

My camera settings for this image are F4 at 1/125 sec and ISO 250 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide-angle lens.

A quick break from travel images for this one of the Washington Monument. Although it’s not the main subject of this image, I love the different perspective.

About a week before I left for Oregon, Washington was having some amazing sunsets. This was one of those evenings. I met up with my friend, Zack and we were running around the mall trying to find different perspectives to photograph the Monument and the sunset. We were about to cross the street when I noticed this ice cream truck parked alongside of the road. I thought I could find something where I could use the windows of the truck as a way to frame the Washington Monument or maybe even the front window as a reflection. So I yelled out to Zack, pointed to the ice cream truck and started shooting. He knew exactly what I was thinking. So we each grabbed our shots and was about to cross the street again when I noticed the screen on his camera. I asked him to hold it up one more time and captured this.

So we all that said, I thought this was an appropriate image to say Happy Grand ReOpening to the Washington Monument. Today is the day we’ve been waiting for so long in the DC area. I can’t wait to go back up to the Monument and capture it from the tallest structure in the city. To be honest, I may wait a little bit for the crowds to die down a bit but it’s on my to-do list for sure.

My camera settings for this image is F6.3 at 1/50th sec and ISO 500 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide-angle lens.

I forgot to mention on the blog that my girlfriends and I were going to go to Austin, Texas. As you may know, I went for the first time earlier this year to help my friend, Sue move. She’s all moved in and invited my friends and me to come visit her for a fun girls’ weekend in the south. I had a blast!

But since it was a girls’ weekend, I decided to just keep it simple and only bring my camera. That’s it. Meaning, I didn’t bring my drone, tripod, GoPro or anything like that. I just had my camera and two lenses and to be honest, walking through the airport with such little equipment/baggage felt so nice. I don’t think I’ve ever traveled so light.

The first two nights we spent at the Wyndham in downtown Austin and one of the best parts of the room was the outdoor patio. This image was from our first sunset. We were hanging out by the pool when I saw the clouds and color start to come in. So I quickly ran to the elevator to go back to our room and tried to capture it all from an above level perspective. I love this view and thought the buildings were all so different and interesting.

I had a blast in Austin and looking forward to sharing more images from our trip.

My camera settings for this image are F22 at 0.6 sec and ISO 125 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide-angle lens.

I was TIRED! I don’t know why but driving down to the Samuel H Boardman State Scenic Corridor was a trek! It took way longer than I thought it would have and by the time we were in the vicinity, I was just ready to go straight our Airbnb and lay in bed.

But then we drove past Meyers Creek Beach. Holy cow. This place looked beautiful. It woke me right back up. Since I was the one driving, I made a mental note to remember the name. As soon as we parked, I went into my phone and wrote it down so I knew where I wanted to go for the next day. Luckily, it was already in my notes as one of the first places I wanted to visit in the corridor. LOL, it was honestly no surprise.

So this image was taken the very next day. We didn’t make it for sunrise but this was still taken in the early morning. Unfortunately, the whole time we were in South Oregon there were barely any clouds. So I tried my best to fill the frame with the lines in the sand. But I think one of my favorite parts about this image is that even though there weren’t many clouds, you can still see a few clouds above the mountains but then you can also see it in the reflection in the sand. OMG.

My camera settings for this image are F6.3 at 1/2000th sec and ISO 320 with my Sony A7II and 24-70mm.

We spent 2 nights in Portland at the end of our trip. It was definitely necessary because no matter how much Andrew loves me, he’s way more of a city boy than someone who would want to spend the entire trip in nature. Which is completely fine with me. I enjoy both.

This was taken on our last full day of the trip. We decided to head to Pittock Mansion to watch the sunrise but it was so foggy that you could barely see anything. So I quickly shifted the idea from taking landscape images to more people images. For a Monday morning, I was surprised to see at least 10 other people at this location. But I’m glad they were there because it gave me plenty of opportunities to create different kinds of images. I believe these two were checking out the images they had just captured on their camera but they were so close to each other that it looked like it could have been a loving embrace. I love how they are silhouetted and the only color you see is from the city.

Next time I visit Portland, I’m going to have to come here during the day. Not only was the view amazing but Pittock Mansion itself looks like it would have been really cool on the inside. And there will be a next time. I think Andrew and I both agreed that we didn’t have enough time in Portland or Oregon in general. There’s still so much more to explore!

My camera settings for this image are F4.5 at 1/10th sec and ISO 800 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens.