ANGELA B. PAN

I know I’m skipping around a lot. I just took so many pictures on our trip that it’s difficult to decide where to start. I’m all over the place when it comes to editing, but this one is another one from Rocky Mountain National Park. Can you tell it was my favorite national park that we visited? I really enjoyed the fresh air and the snow-capped mountains. Although you can’t even tell there was snow in this image. It looks like a beautiful spring day, which it was. And you know me, when I see a puddle, I have to check out what reflections I can see out of it. This one was a particularly awesome puddle. It was huge and so reflective. I got a few shots and decided it needed something else. So I asked Andrew to stand there and model for me. This is obviously his best model pose. LOL.

In case you were interested, this was on along the trail walking to Alberta Falls. It was one of the only trails we could confidently walk on. So many of them still had snow on them. And forget about making it to Emerald Lake. It was the ultimate goal but the elevation was so high and there was so much snow still on the ground that it was impossible. We only had sneakers on so we were slipping and sliding all over the place. Note to future self: Always pack hiking boots. Even when you don’t think you’ll need them, it will just make life so much easier.

The settings for this image are F/14 at 1/80th of a second at ISO 400 handheld. If any of you know of a tripod where you can shoot really low to the ground, I mean flush to the ground, please let me know! I’m always finding myself wanting something that can get that low but just haven’t found one yet.

So funny story. Remember how yesterday I said that the cherry blossom won’t be peaking this year? I was wrong. I wrote that post way to soon because guess what?! Only half the cherry blossoms were really effected by the snow last week. It’s like a huge sigh of relief. I really look forward to this time of year every year and I really didn’t want to miss out on it this time. So for the last 50% of the cherry blossoms remaining, they’re expected peak date is now March 22-25th which is only a few days from now!!!

I went out Sunday morning to meet up with a local instagram group called, Walk with Locals. I had been to some of their events before but this was their one year birthday so I had to go. I hate missin’ out on a good time. Even though it was wet, rainy, and snowing, there was an impressive amount of people who showed up at sunrise. We walked around the tidal basin but I kind of stayed in the back of the crowd. Eventually I was the only one walking by myself when I saw this duck.

Its not uncommon to see ducks in DC, especially around the water. But this one was actually on the sidewalk. So I approached him slowly and calmly and he didn’t seem to mind me at all. We then started having our own little photoshoot. I intentionally got low so I could try to get the “cherry blossoms”, Washington Monument, and duck all in one frame. My settings were  F6.3 1/100th of a second ISO 400 with my 16-35mm wide angle lens. I had to bump up my ISO high even though we were outdoors because I didn’t want any motion from the duck. It was so very grey and dark, it was difficult to get a fast enough shutter speed to make sure everything was sharp.

Anyways, Happy Birthday Walk with Locals! You guys are awesome.

And you know what else is awesome? Cherry Blossoms! I’ll be out there shooting. And if you are too, come say hi!

Now that the snow has fallen, it’s crazy cold outside and it’s official that the cherry blossoms will not peak this year, it made me think about our trip to Japan around this time last year. Unfortunately while we were on our trip, I missed the peak bloom of blossoms in DC. Double unfortunate that we also missed the peak in Tokyo. We did see some cherry blossoms, but if we really wanted to see it, we should of stayed for a week longer. Oh well. I still loved our visit and was still able to see some beautiful flowers including this one. Do any of you guys know what this one is called? I have no clue and would not even know where to beginning to find out.

I took it in Shinjuku Gyoen National Garden. The perfect place to go if you want to catch any kind of blooms. When you walk through the park, you almost forget you are in a major city. You don’t hear any honking horns or busy streets. You’re in your own little world, walking down paths of diverse garden areas and scenic views. If I had the opportunity, I would of loved to spend sunrise walking around by myself like I do in DC. The best part is that people come here not just to walk around and enjoy the flowers, but they will bring a blanket with a picnic baskets and hangout for a couple of hours. Kinda like what they do at the tidal basin for the cherry blossoms but it’s definietly not as crowded. I feel like when you can sit down and relax like that, you’ll get the full experience of the beautiful sakuras and these unnamed flower I photographed 🙂

By the way, if you missed it, I made a Tokyo guide. Click here if you’d like to see it.

Shot on the same puddle as this image. Even on a super cold, windy day there will always be people running around the tidal basin. I don’t know how they do it, especially in shorts. Anyways, I saw him running from 100 ft away. I immediately got into position where I thought I could get him and the Washington Monument in the same shot, squatted down low and hoped that it would work out. Luckily it did. This was probably about 20 minutes after the first image was shot though. Thats why this one is way more moodier and darker than the other one. I really like how the guy is almost silhouetted.

In other news, Andrew and I have booked our next trip! We’re going to be flying into Denver and road tripping it to Moab, UT and Rocky Mountain National Park. If you’ve been there, please let me know if you have any recommendations. Hotel, food, photography, whatever. Neither of us have ever been and I’m super excited to explore the mile high city and for our road trip. I know its going to be amazingly beautiful. One of my friends just came back from there and he was telling me that the altitude sickness is real while in Denver. After a quick amazon search, I’m not sure which medicine would be the best for us. So if you have any experience with that, please let me know as well. I never thought I’d get motion sickness but recently there have been times when I’m on a boat and will get pretty ill. I’d like to prevent anything like that from happening on our trip so I can maximize my photography time. Oh YEA!

This is going to be an awesome experience. I’ve always felt like I’ve only been to the coasts and edges of the United States but never anywhere in the middle. Really looking forward to the adventure 🙂

Finally we got snow! After a super mild winter, I thought we weren’t going to get snow at all this year. The other day I said we were expecting at least 5″ but I think it only came out to be 2″. Then it turned into sleet. Man was it sleeting! That was definietly the worst part. It felt like mini ice cubes were attacking your face. At some points during the morning walk, I had to turn around and walk backwards. It was too much to handle. Then it made everything turn in to slush. Oh well. It was good while it lasted.

I shot this with my friend, Navin. Turns out the metro didn’t close down but they were just on a delayed schedule. Even still, I’m so happy I was able to get out there and shoot. I would of been so sad to have missed the opportunity. This time I took the Federal Triangle stop which is something I’ve never done before. Usually I’ll take Smithsonian or Foggy Bottom but I was feeling kinda adventurous 🙂 I’m glad I did because it forced me to walk a different way than I usually would have to the Washington Monument which then made me see it in a totally different way. If you’re interested, I was standing sort of close the National Museum of African American History and Culture but on the bottom of the hill. I love how the snow simplifies everything and it really just reduces the image down to the trees and the monument. The smaller trees in the background, close to the monument are cherry blossom trees. I also thought it was kind of cool how the flags perfectly align inside the two tree trunks.

I’m glad it snowed but I’d like to get on with spring now, please?

Last Friday was a crazy weather day. It’s been a long time since I’d seen anything like it. All through out the day mother nature switched from cloudy to sunny, rain to snow and even sunny with snow! It was bananas just sitting in front of the window and watching it all happen. Especially since the changes would happen every 10 minutes. So around 4pm I looked out again and saw some amazing clouds. I was really hoping for a great sunset. Usually when we have crazy weather days like this, the skies really light up.

I met up with my friend, Zack, to shoot the sunset from the Tidal Basin. Half sunset shooting, half scouting the cherry blossoms. Unfortunately the skies didn’t light up like I was expecting but I had a great time shooting from a low point of view. When I say low, I mean so low that I wasn’t even able to see what I was shooting. It was really a guessing game but one that worked in my favor. The water in the tidal basin was so choppy, there was no way that I would of been able get a reflection from it. Then we found this amazing puddle. It made me see the skies and the clouds in a totally different way.

Most of the time I’m out shooting by myself. So it’s great to meet up with people who have some of the same interest as I do. I had complimented Zack on a similar picture he took of a puddle and he was kind enough to show me how he did it. It made me think about all the other amazing puddles that I could of gotten a great shot out of but just walked away because I didn’t try it. Oh well. At least now I know.