There’s just something about Hawaii.  I never really think that I want to move there, but boy do I ever enjoy visiting that place!  It’s just so relaxing.  I guess part of it is the island lifestyle, but I’m guessing another part of it is that since you are 5 hours or more behind the mainland, you just can’t stay up to speed on what’s happening back there...so you don’t try.  Instead, you have a drink with a little umbrella in it, and work on your sunburn.

When we were there in April, my wife and I took a car out for a day to drive around Maui, and headed part of the way out the road to Hana.  It’s a famous drive, but it’s really a winding road and honestly, it gets old after a while.  So we stopped before we made it, turned around, and found this black sand beach to enjoy for a while.  That’s better than driving.  :-)

Mar Hall is a luxury resort situated outside of Glasgow, Scotland - and it’s pretty awesome.  I was there for a customer event - which involved wearing a kilt, ha - and really enjoyed my stay there.  I got up early the next morning to get out and shoot a little.  Like all places, if you get up for sunrise and shoot you normally get it all to yourself.  That’s always my goal, so whenever possible that’s what I do - and it always pays off.

On this morning, I was treated to an incredible sunrise over the golf course, which you can see here.  After that, I wandered around the resort itself, taking pictures of the structure which I found very interesting.  Being a fan of architecture and history, I was lucky to get both here!

Every time I visit London, I make sure and stop by this spot looking at Big Ben across the River Thames.  It’s the classic London shot, and I take a lot of them.  I know every one else does too, so it’s not special, but it’s a great spot and why not take a boat load of shots from here?  It’s a great view.

There’s a reason this is one of the “famous” spots to shoot in London - it kicks ass.  Wouldn’t you take a million shots of it too?  It’s lovely!

If you have ever been to Brussels, Belgium you have probably walked by this spot - or planned to.  It’s one of the most visited street corners in that most lovely of cities.  It’s where the Manneken Pis statue resides.

Have you heard of Manneken Pis?  It’s the statue of a little boy who is urinating into a fountain.  It’s incredibly famous - almost inexplicably so.  It’s really not a big deal, but everyone goes to see it and you can buy all sorts of souvenirs of Brussels which commemorate this little guy.

So where is it in this picture? It’s on the far right side about midway up, tucked up against that wall.  You can see all sorts of tourists milling about, and some posing for their picture in front of this famous little chap.  He’s only about 18 inches tall, so be sure and look closely and you will spot him.

That’s it.  That’s all there is to it.  Thankfully it’s close to Grand Place, which is their famous town square, and in my opinion more deserving of its fame.  That way you don’t spend too much time wandering away from stuff that is more beautiful.

But at least the locals dress him up from time to time, so when you arrive you may find him in some fancy outfit!

When I went to Oregon last year with a bunch of AWESOME photo dudes, one thing we planned on was shooting along the Oregon coast, specifically around Cannon Beach.   If you have never been, I highly recommend a visit.  That place is just awesome all the way around.

But one thing I did NOT plan on was doing some long exposures of the stars and the Milky Way, such as this one.  I had never done this before - and haven’t done it since - and didn’t know anything about it.  It’s just not something I normally do.  But it’s great to try new things, and I enjoyed the hell out of it!

So we stood on Cannon Beach by ourselves, beneath a million dead stars, and gunned long exposures into the depth of the night.  Awesomeness!

With all these photos I have taken, sometimes I get really behind in processing and sharing them.  It’s hard to keep up, actually.  That might sound goofy, but I just mean that my library has grown so much over the last couple of years that I may never catch up.  Then again, that might be a good thing.  It gives me something to work on when I am not traveling.

If you follow my page on FB, you may recall that I posted some iPhone shots from a trip in April out to Maui, HI.  It’s an incredible place and I have also shared a few of my photos from the trip here on the blog.  Well, here’s another one!

We stayed at the Grand Wailea, which is a great property.  I was very happy to find this beautiful waterfall out front.  I stood there and shot it for a while.  It required some lens cleaning (and photo retouching) to get all the water drops off, but it was worth it!

Christ Church Cathedral is one of my favorite spots to visit when I am in Dublin. It’s a beautiful church with incredible architecture.  The interior is amazing, but I arrived after closing time on my recent visit to Dublin.  That’s ok though, as I have shot the inside before...and I will probably shoot it again someday.

This time, I tried to get some different shots of the exterior.  In this case, I had shot all around the front and had crossed the street when I noticed this angle.  I like the view from here with that bridge spanning the road, and of course I loved that the clouds in the background were awesome!

I generally shoot 7 frames for my HDR’s, and depending on the outcome generally use all of them.  However, I find that sometimes I get all I need out of a single exposure.  This was just what happened with this shot.

It was blue hour early one morning in San Francisco, and I had my Nikon pointed at the Bay Bridge, which is pretty common for me when I visit that town.  I fired all 7 like normal, but when it came time to process, I really just liked this single exposure all by itself.  In this case, HDR didn’t really help me any.

That doesn’t happen a lot, and it depends on what look you are trying to achieve with the shot, but when it does happen it sure makes the processing a little quicker!

One more shot from my recent trip to Dublin, Ireland...(with many more to come).

I grabbed this one while wandering late one afternoon in downtown Dublin, next to the River Liffey.  My hotel was facing the river, so that gave me easy access to walk out and shoot anytime (which is nice - but I assume that’s an obvious statement!).

Some folks don’t like to shoot HDR in broad daylight, and I can understand why.  A lot of times you just don’t need it.  But other times it really pays to do so, and in this case I felt like it was worth it.  The cloud cover overhead kept the day sort of dull, and HDR allowed me to get enough light all the way through the scene (and I processed it in such a way as to accentuate that).

Another thing I like to do is vary my processing a little, depending on the time of day that  the shot was taken.  I keep it brighter all the way through a shot like this, which was taken during the daylight hours - because your eyes expect to see a brighter scene and less shadows.  But when I shoot at the edges of the day and you expect more shadows, I tend to process that way as well. 

What do you do in situations like that?

I spent a full day shooting in London last year, out with my friend Mike Murphy.  At some point we ended up over in Greenwich, which is famous for Greenwich Mean Time, among other things.  Well there is a University there too, and it's incredible.  I love shooting architecture, and though this campus isn't large, it packs in a lot of awesomeness for its size.

This hallway was just interesting to me, and I of course just had to frame that blue dome in the distance!