Nikon D800

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Photo Adventure: Taking Photos in New Zealand

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I'm offline, off the grid, and deep in the mountains of New Zealand. The good news is that I'm busy taking hundreds and thousands of photos as part of Trey Ratcliff's NZ photo adventure. 

I'm a few days in and we're having a blast. We've been super busy waking up at 5:30AM and shooting until breakfast. Then a few hours doing some valuable post processing time, lunch, and then off into the sunset for more shooting. Rinse and repeat.  

I'm learning a boat load and can't wait to start sharing more tips and tricks I've learned along the 'unexpected journey'. Meanwhile, here's a sunrise shot I took this morning at a super secret location called The Hills. This is an HDR using seven exposures with my Nikon D800.

The Hills in New Zealand at sunrise. 

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Photo of the Day: Disney's Aulani Resort in Hawaii

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When we arrived at the Aulani resort in Hawaii I was struck by how beautiful the lobby was. Due to a combination of both jet lag and children I woke up before sunrise and ran down to the lobby. I set up my Nikon D800 and grabbed a series of exposures.

I have been using a light weight tripod that's really not meant for the hefty Nikon D800. It's the Slik tripod that I'd been using with the much smaller Sony NEX-7. I had quite of bit of shaking to deal with even with using the timer mode.

I wanted to get these shots when no one was around. One worker was cleaning the windows and remarked that he'd never really paid much attention to how beautiful this lobby was. He said he hadn't thought about it until he noticed me taking photos. Amazing what a little perspective will do. Maybe he'll have greater appreciation for the windows he's cleaning.

Aulani: A Disney Resort in Hawaii

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Photo of the Day: Concannon Winery

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After escaping the hurricane damage in New Jersey my wife and I retreated to our in-laws' house in California. I woke up early because of jet lag to shoot some photos at sunrise at a local winery. I didn't get many great shots but I was happy with this one.

The problem I had was with the landscape. Sure the sunrise was great but the landscape was flat and boring. There were trucks, houses, and power lines in the way. So I decided the best option was to get really low to the ground and shoot directly into the sunlight.

Here I shot seven exposures about 6 inches off the ground. The house in the background is used for theater but not much else. It sits on the winery grounds and is owned, I later learned, by John Madden. You can see the front steps in the shot.

Concannon Winery, Livermore CA

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Photo of the Day: Halloween

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My wife used the sewing machine for the first time and sewed a Catwoman tail on our baby girl's black unitard. We had to flee from our house to my folks' house because of Hurricane Sandy so she forgot the cat ears.

I took this using a Nikon D800 as the sun was setting. The ISO was a bit high because of the lower light but I'm happy with it.

My two favorite ladies.

My two ladies.

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Photo of the Day

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In my quest to capture some Fall colors I wandered up to a local resort called Woodloch. I don't think anyone saw me trespassing on their grounds. It just started to rain so I set up quickly on a tripod and fired off three exposures of the most interesting angle of the lake.

oodloch Resort

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Photo of the Day

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t's my favorite time of the year, Fall! We always venture up to the Poconos Mountains to catch some of the leaves changing. This season is no exception.

As I am just beginning to learn a Nikon D800 I thought it would be a good learning experience to head out and shoot some local rivers and streams as the sun was setting. I have a lot to learn. One of my big mistakes was using the flimsy tripod I bought for a lighter camera. The problem was that even when taking bracketed photos with a 2 second timer it still managed to shake the tripod. The result was some ghosting between my five images. The Nikon D800 is a beast! 

Anyway I climbed down to this rocky outcropping to grab this shot. I spent sometime in Photosho trying to fix some ghosting using layers. This is the first photo I've ever exported from Photoshop and I'm proud that I got over my intellectual fear of using it.

imble River, PA