dawn

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A little break from Norway images for this one beautiful morning in Washington DC. Even while we were in Norway, I heard it was raining in Washington at the same time. It rained when we got back and even a week after we landed. But at that point I had so many Norway images to keep me busy that I didn’t even care.

After a week or so, I started to get that itch again. I needed to just go out with my camera and get creative. Luckily I saw that there was going to be fog one morning instead of rain. So I woke up extra early and headed to the National Mall. I didn’t see any fog, but I did see some beautiful color in the sky. I walked around the Lincoln Memorial and captured a few images but then decided to head down to the Reflecting Pool to see if I could get any cool shots there. Walking down the steps, there was this huge puddle. To be honest, the puddle is always there, but this time it was especially big. Probably from all the rain we had been getting. It was great. I kneeled down to get some shots when I noticed a duck enjoying the puddle as well. I moved over to try to line the duck up with the monument while at the same time not trying to scare him away. I love the perspective and how the duck in the foreground looks just as big as the Washington Monument in the background. Luckily the sky stayed beautiful while I was lining everything up because it didn’t last much longer after that. It went pretty grey but I still went home happy just being able to get out there and shoot.

My camera settings for this image is F8 at 0.6sec ISO 2000 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide angle lens.

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The cherry blossoms haven’t bloomed this year. I’m hoping they’ll be out at this time next week.

So this is an image I took last year around this same time. I have tried working on this image several times in the past year but I could never get it right. It’s really different from other images I create because of the lighting. I don’t have much practice with artificial lighting, especially outdoors like that. So whenever I edited it, the colors would look funny and didn’t like it. I’m so happy with the way this one turned out. It’s exactly what I had envisioned from the very beginning. Finally.

It was that same super foggy day that I took this image and this one. This just happens to be the very first image I took that whole morning. The fog had not fully settle in yet so you can see how it’s covering half of the Washington Monument. Little did I know that later on in the morning the entire monument would be covered. So cool!

And little did I know, I would drop my tripod in the Tidal Basin that day too. *face palm* #neverforget.

Anyways, hope you all have a great weekend. I am about to send out my monthly newsletter on Sunday the 1st so if you aren’t subscribed, please do so here. You won’t want to miss out on free calendar downloads, an updated cherry blossom guide and so much more! And if you do use the free wallpapers, screen shot them and send them to me! I would love to see it!

The settings for this image is F8 at 2.5 seconds and ISO 160 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide angle lens on a tripod.

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Monday mornings. Usually people dread it. Me, I love them. I love what I do and when weekend plans don’t get in the way of doing what I love, I can’t help but welcome the day with open arms.

Although this past Monday started superrr early. I’m talking 3a wake up call. Y’all know me and how I’m a morning person, but I’m also a person who likes to sleep through the whole night. LOL. My friend, Larry, told me he was going to go to the National Mall to try to capture the super moon setting, so I had to get up and join him. The moon was alright, but the sunrise was amazing!

So we met up by the WWII memorial and had plans of capturing the super moon over the Lincoln Memorial and use the Reflecting Pool for the reflection of it all. What’s better than a super moon image? 2 super moons in one shot! I still think the images turned out pretty good, but while we were waiting for the moon to set, we started to play around with different images and angles.

So for this image, I set up the shot, Larry helped me by hitting the trigger and our friend, Dave helped out by lighting me up. It was totally a group effort and am so happy with the way it turned out. Thanks guys for all your help!

Super moon shoot was fun, but I think I’ll just stick to sunrise next time 🙂 Or just capture the moon it as it rises. I was definietly feeling the effects of an early wake up by 9am. At that time, I had already been up for 6 hours! Craziness!

The settings for this image is F5.6 at 4 seconds and ISO 500 with my Sony A7II and 16-35mm wide angle lens.

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You know, sometimes waking up for sunrise can be really tiring. Am I right?

Somehow I forgot about how little sleep I get, especially after the spring equinox, and I just keep going and going. It’s hard for me to remember to slow down sometimes. Well, I definietly felt the effects of that last week. I had woken up for sunrise 3 days in a row. I think out of all the days, 1 of them was really worth it. The day that I took this image at the Reflecting Pool right in front of the Lincoln Memorial. I was super excited to see that little bit of purple pop out of the deep blue sky. But by the end of the third day, I was EXHAUSTED. So, I’m really proud to say that on Saturday, April 22nd I slept in until 10a!!! That’s crazy! I don’t think I’ve slept that much in 10 years. I don’t know what got into me but it felt soooo good.

Ever since I got real serious about photography and ever since I’ve been waking up for sunrise, my natural body clock will wake me up about an hour after sunrise. That’s usually about 7 or 8a depending on what season we’re talking about. The most annoying part is that once I am up, I can’t fall back to sleep. If you had known me when I was in college, I would of thought that was the craziest, most ridiculous thing ever and it would never happen to me.  I purposely made it so I had all afternoon/night classes and I’d sleep in for as long as I’d want. Usually that mean waking up at 11a or 12p. To think about how much I used to sleep in really makes me jealous, but its all good. It’s all a part of growing up right? Becoming a real adult? or something like that.

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I’m not sure how it happened but I spent a lot of time off from taking pictures in December. I think I was using cold, windy weather as an excuse. So it felt awesome when I got back out and shot my first sunrise of 2017. It was still cold and windy but I missed wondering around with my camera. I don’t want another long break like that to happen for a long time.

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I feel like I’ve been to these monuments a million and one times but it never gets old. I feel like I see something new every time I go. I can’t even imagine what it’s like for a first time visiter to see the Washington DC. It must be mind blowing. I’m so lucky to call this place home.