A New Home!!

I pulled the trigger on a domain and a new name for this project!

Follow me here:  http://www.thelifeexposure.com/

More Water & Wide Angles

I'm frustrated that I'm encumbered by my back/shoulder/neck pain - I really want to go on another hike in search of altitude to experiment with my new wide angle lens, but I get too sore after just a few hours of plain vanilla walking.  Fortunately, I have a physical therapy appointment scheduled and I don't even care what kind of sadistic stretches or exercise they may impose, I just want to go back to normal.

In any case, we went to breakfast on the beach and then walked along the tide pools before it got too hot - basically the same easy excursion as this one a couple of weeks ago.  Unfortunately, our efforts at timing to arrive with low tide were foiled by some kind of storm surge that sent waves crashing up to what is normally the high tide line.  My boyfriend had a waterproof point & shoot on hand, but I wasn't willing to risk my DSLR to get much closer to the water than I did.  I am excited that he's totally gotten sucked into my photography hobby and basically going to take my D3100 body off my hands so I can upgrade to a D3300 without feeling too guilty over a purchase I don't need, but would love, given the 5 FPS (frames per second) multi-shot capability (vs. 3 FPS on the D3100) and the panorama mode.

In any case, the shots I took didn't really made me feel like I used the wide angle well - part of that is due to the fact that I shot in kind of bright mid-morning light and corrected in post by tweaking the lighting & saturation, but more experimentation and practice is clearly needed.

The waves from the surge were huge & the low tide only intensified the effect

Crash

Crash II

More Waves

Active Shooting Hours: 1.5 hours

Review Hours: 2 hours

Hours to Date: 165 hours

Compare & Contrast

With more than a year in the books for this project, it's interesting and exciting to do year over year (hilariously abbreviated to "YOY" in the business world) comparisons on big holidays like Independence Day.

Last year, I spent the 4th in Huntington Beach, capturing some of the hilarious antics of celebrants. Even though this year, I was largely less adventurous because of dealing with back/shoulder/neck pain from getting rear-ended, I still managed to get shots of some big booms for comparison and I can tell that both my technical skill and artistic eye have improved with some 140 hours under my belt more than I had this time last year.  I was especially happy to see how sharp the pictures came out this year - I didn't own a tripod this time last year and managed to forget my tripod this year,

Last year:

Overexposed, shaky camera, and pretty terrible composition

This year:

One of the images from this year - reminiscent of a dandelion seed head, but pink!

I didn't get as many shots in and didn't get to take advantage of some of the patriotic subjects out there because of the pain, but I made the best of a bad situation (also not fun: abstaining from yummy drinks on a celebratory holiday since muscle relaxers means no alcohol) and think that as far as the images go, it was still a pretty successful day.  It was especially fun experimenting with long exposures, people, and sparklers to get shapes from light.  Definitely will replicate that experience with glow sticks the next chance I get.

Firework fountain on the street

Long exposure with a sparkler.  Will try glow sticks next to remove the weird hairy effect.

Tail-end of some fireworks or distant galaxies?

This and above tie for my favorite shots of the night.
I love how the fireworks light up behind the trees to form a silhouette.

More Booms

Active Shooting Hours: 1.5

Review Hours: 1

Hours to Date: 161.5

Crossing More Adventures Off the Bucket List

Everyone should have a bucket list and actively plan to experience things on that list.  If you're me, you have multiple bucket lists covering a variety of activities.  This year, I managed to cross off 2 items on the "Interact with Cool Animals" list within the course of 2 months:

• Pet a Penguin: done!!
• Feed some Ungulates

Yes, I used the word "ungulates" - partly because it's a funny sounding word and partly because it sounds way more intelligent and downright cool compared with "rhinos & giraffes."

Originally, my birthday was supposed to entail trekking through Santa Barbara wine country with a new wide angle lens birthday present in tow.  That plan was pretty much obliterated once I was rear-ended the week before my birthday and prescribed muscle relaxants for the ensuing back pain... aka drinking centric activities were going to be a no go.

No matter, I decided I wasn't going to let that ruin my day and decided I wanted to do something so memorable, I would look back years from now and remember the fantastic birthday I had and not have a rear-end collision define this 2014's marking of another revolution around the sun.

That something memorable turned out to be feeding giraffes and rhinoceroses at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park as part of their caravan safari, which basically was a 2 hour drive through the exhibit!!  The guide provided all kinds of facts and explained animal behaviors as they were happening right before our eyes.  I think it could have been better only if Sir David Attenborough himself had been there narrating in his dignified British accent.  Something I took away from the experience is that rhinos are actually rather docile and love apples!!

Not the best time of day for photography and most of these pictures ended up being more snapshot-y than artistic image, but it was still an amazing experience.  And I'm proud of the fact that I have seemingly fixed my under-exposure problem by checking the histogram outputs and not just relying on the internal light meter.

All in all, I can't wait to head back during more favorable lighting to photograph more interesting animals, having a membership is the best!

Rhino smelling & listening to our caravan... apparently, their eyesight isn't great.

Fun fact - rhinos actually wear down & shape their horns to their liking and said horns are made of keratin

Fed a rhino!! Contrary to popular belief, they're actually so docile and sweet... the cows of the savannah!!

Giraffe interested in the acacia leaves we've got

Making the giraffe reach for it!  I love her expression and that purple tongue in this!!

Crossing another one off the "Interact with Cool Animals" bucket list!

Alright, didn't get to play with the tigers, but the new Tiger Trail exhibit was really cool!!  Actually took this photo through glass & managed to minimize the reflection & glare.

More Safari to See!

Active Shooting Hours: 3
Review Hours: 1
Hours to Date: 159