Saturday, October 24, 2009
Our Lady of Mount Carmel Courtyard

This is a beautiful little church out in Montecito. It's one of my favorite places to wander in the evenings with my camera. The architecture is really something special and the people are really nice too! This was actually taken the same night as a previous photo of the day which is now part of my Santa Barbara Calendar.

Saturday, September 26, 2009
Anna's Hummingbird

The hummingbirds are quite active around here these days. They seem to like to taunt me any time I'm outside without my camera. I have not had time to chase them down, this guy was from a walk at Seaside Gardens. Hopefully I'll get out with my camera to chase the hummers tomorrow.

Sunday, August 2, 2009
Goleta Koi Pond

From the street you would never know this peaceful little spot is here. It's in the middle of an office park. Not sure how the offices are on the inside, but at least it must make for nice breaks.

Saturday, July 4, 2009
Fourth of July Over Santa Barbara

We usually try to avoid the crowds when there is some sort of celebration in town. (The exception being the Solstice Parade.) This year however, I was looking for a nice Independence Day Photograph for a project I'm working on. The thing is I would not really have been interested in the normal looking-up-from-the-crowd shot anyway. So earlier in the day we spent some time scoping out a nice angle that would include the Wharf and a more interesting Santa Barbara view and this is the result. It always helps to scout your locations ahead of time.

You can click on the main image for a larger view.

Happy Independence Day!! And thank you to all the brave people in uniform who make this day possible.

Sunday, June 21, 2009
Sunset Over the Rose Garden Bench

Usually when I'm in the Mission rose garden I'm focusing on the Mission, or even the roses. But this time was something special. I was there to get an image for an anniversary gift. You see, one of the rose garden benches is where he chose to propose to her. He came to me looking for just the right image and had just about selected one of my older panoramic Mission Photographs. But listening to his story, I thought I could create something a little more fitting. Of course, it's not all up to me. I had to hope for just the right backdrop. Wednesday evening I saw my chance!

Wednesday, April 29, 2009
Queen of the Missions Fountain Test VR

This is the rest of the image from my lens test at the Mission Santa Barbara the other day. Actually, most of the recent photos of the day have full 360° panorams to go with them that I will get online soon. Usually the panoramas start out based around one nice shot. Of course the challenge is to find a point of view on that nice shot that also looks good in all directions.

Monday, April 27, 2009
Sunset over Knapp's Castle

This was one of the last shots as we were starting our walk back to the car from Knapp's Castle. I had put most of my camera gear away at this point and just looked back as I was walking away.

For a test shoot I ended up with quite a few images that I'm really happy with.

Thursday, April 23, 2009
El Paseo Courtyard

So after the Mission the other day I was pretty happy with the new lens I was considering. But I like to get my money's worth out of a rental. I had it for two evenings, and when I went out last night I was a little disappointed by the overcast sky. It looked like it was going to be a very grey evening with low fog. But I figured it was worth a try. Fortunatly, my art director (my wonderful wife) suggested going to the El Paseo restaurant. As the sky got a darker blue there were a few minutes where the sunset colors mixed with the blue sky and the reflected city lights on the low fog to creat a wonderful purple color.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Queen of the Missions Fountain Test Shot

Last evening I rented a lens to try out for some upcoming panorama work. I was pretty sure I knew what I wanted, but it was worth taking it for a spin first. When I'm trying out new equipment I like to go somewhere familiar. I couldn't think of anywhere better to start than the Santa Barbara Mission. This is only one part of the image. The final image is a full 360° panorama. But my computer is a little overworked at the moment, so I thought I would get this much online.

As for the lens, I was so happy with the results that I was ready to buy it before the rental was up but it turns out I'm not the only one who likes it, it's on backorder everywhere I called. Oh well, there is always the rental! And whenever I have rental equipment it motivates me to go out and get my money's worth.

Monday, April 20, 2009
Our Lady of Mount Carmel

After an unseasonably hot day my intention was to go down to Stearns Wharf to both take some evening pictures and enjoy the cool sea breeze. Unfortunately, the day had been too much for the power grid and there was a strange intermittent power outage down by the beach including the wharf.

After cruising around for a while and enjoying the cool evening we ended up at Our Lady of Mount Carmel in Montecito. There was just enough blue left in the sky to get a few nice shots. And, in the end, it was an even nicer place to spend the evening.

Sunday, March 15, 2009
Misty Morning Courthouse

This is another image from my recent Courthouse shoot. When I posted my previous courthouse shot I thought that was the one the client chose. But they are leaning toward this one now. A massive panorama taken in the first glow of the morning. The fog was so thick when I was driving there I thought I would not be able to get the shot. But it actually made for some interesting lighting. The light on the left cast shadows up from the building through the fog.

A few projects have been taking a lot of my time lately. To top it off, my main backup drive crashed. With just under a Terabyte of images on there I'm feeling pretty lucky at this point to have everything safe with the exception of one large image that I was working on at the time of the crash.

I did find an interesting thing though. When your backup drive crashes it is very nerve racking until you find a way to get everything backed up again. Of course, the only way to backup a terabyte of data fast is to put it anywhere and everywhere there is space.

I started posting this image on the fifteenth, but it's taken me a week since the full size image is 2.6 gigabytes. But I finally got things moved off onto new hard drives so I actually have some scratch disk space. TWO terabyte backup drives so everything is double backed up. With every drive crash I get more paranoid. But it's a healthy paranoia that keeps my favorite images safe.

Sunday, February 22, 2009
Courthouse Evening

This is another image from my recent Courthouse shoot. In fact, it's looking like this will be THE shot that the client likes. They were only looking for one cover shot, but since I was going through all the paperwork to get the permit I made it a day long event. Good thing too, this is not really what the client was asking for in the beginning, but they decided they liked this one even better than the requested image.

These were some of the first shots with my new camera, and so far I am very happy with the results. It's not like me to buy camera equipment anywhere but eBay, but once in a while it's nice to have a shiny new toy... oh I mean shiny new piece of business equipment. Besides, my 20D took it's 40,000th shot just before this project. So it's time it had some reinforcements just in case that shutter decides to give out in the middle of an important shoot.

Tuesday, February 3, 2009
Mission Carmel Bell Tower

This is from the inner courtyard at the Carmel Mission. I believe the tree with the white blossoms is a Flowering Pear Tree. This is thier time of year. There are some around here that are pure white with so many blossoms you can't see their leaves.

Sunday, February 1, 2009
Secluded Cove

Today we took a drive down Highway 1 to look for a place called Jade cove. It is always a beautiful drive and we usually stop at various parks in Big Sur but this time we found everything on the east side of Highway 1 closed. They had some massive fires last year and they still have not reopened the parks.

Luckily all the vista points on the beach side were still open. This is just south of Big Sur at a vista point looking south along the coast.

Probably good we did not stop that often anyway, Jade cove was a lot further than we expected, almost twenty miles further. And if you have ever been on Highway 1, twenty miles can be a long way especially this time of year when they are just barely keeping parts of it passable.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Stearns Wharf in the Distance

This is the shot I was looking for when I got yesterday's photo of the day. Well sort of anyway. I was thinking this might be a nice angle a little later in the evening once the lights are on in the buildings on Stearns Wharf. Maybe next time I'll get out there a little later. And as I type this the evening news is calling for more clouds next week. I better start making some space on my hard drive for more photos!

Monday, January 26, 2009
SBCC Stearns Wharf View

Saturday was a beautiful day. We had the opportunity to wander around and enjoy the sunset. Which is one of the things I like to do as much as possible this time of year. This was the view from Santa Barbara City College just a bit before sunset. Sometimes my images are totally controlled and I have a plan for exactly what I'm looking for. In this case I stared with a shot from the pathway that you see. The streetlights were not very interesting looking. But after I got what I was looking for I took a walk around to see what I might be missing. I thought the path looked nice so I got a few shots, but even then I did not notice that the lights were already on. It was only after I got home and looked through the pictures that I saw the glow in the lights and decided this was one of my favorite images.

Thursday, December 25, 2008
Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!!

This is a beautiful little shopping center in Carmel, called The Barnyard. After dinner at our favorite restaurant in Carmel we spent the evening wandering around and checking out Christmas lights. On the right is a great place called Succulent Gardens. If you can't tell from the Epi photos on the site, a place like that is a real magnet for me. In fact a few of our Epis even came from there. On the left is a great little candy shop. (Try the grasshopper bark and the caramel cashew turtles if you stop there!)

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas!

Thursday, November 6, 2008
Joe's Cafe

This is from Tuesday night. Tuesdays are farmers' market nights on lower State Street. You can see the booths at the left. The street is closed so it makes it safer, and more interesting, to be down there with my camera. This is about my fourth attempt to get the image I was looking for. There is a large tree (at the left) in front of Joe's. The tree makes for nice pictures, but it makes it a little hard to get a full shot of the front of the building where you can see the whole logo. But, I love a challenge. And this Tuesday my art director (my wife) went with me so that always helps!

Sunday, October 5, 2008
Hotel Santa Barbara VR

This is another shot (or series of them really) from last night. It was a really great evening to take pictures. Maybe I'll Spend some more time on state street with my camera in the near future.

Saturday, October 4, 2008
Eat at Joes! VR

I've been working more on restaurant photography lately. And, recently I got a request for a print of Joe's Cafe, a local landmark. At some point early in my search through old slides I realized it would be much MUCH more fun to just go take some new shots! Any excuse to get out with my camera makes me happy. This is one of the first shots. I have a few other angles I'm working with but it is going to take a couple of trips down there when the lighting is just right.

If you have any favorite Santa Barbara spots (or anywhere up to Monterey for that matter) you'd like to see, feel free to drop me a note with the form at the bottom of the page.

Thursday, March 6, 2008
Queen of the missions in HDR VR

Ok, still taking a while to get these images together this way. But after taking all the time to build the VR interface I could hardly wait to use it again.

I got the opportunity today when the clouds started to get interesting. We dropped everything to try to get some nice images. Turned out to be a busy afternoon and an amazing sunset. This is the first of several nice images that will come out of the adventure around town today.

The clouds look a little ominous, but they were fast moving and quite beautiful.

Monday, January 21, 2008
Moonlit Tree

This evening I went out to take some test shots for my current project. The moon was doing some beautiful things with the clouds so it got me a little sidetracked. But that is always lots of fun too.

Thursday, January 10, 2008
Our Lady of Mount Carmel

My intent was to get some nice sunset shots of this beautiful church in Montecito. I was a little late, but it was still a nice night.

If you tilt your head to the left and use your imagination a little you can make out half of the constellation Orion rising from behind the church.

Friday, January 4, 2008
Mission Storm

Click on the main image for a bigger version

Another attempt to get to the Nativity Scene at the mission a couple of weeks ago, and still no animals. Probably a good thing for them, it was raining like crazy. But I do so hate to come home empty handed! And, I still have not had a chance to develop the film from this evening. This was from my digital camera, but four feet wide just might not be big enough. :-D