Lake Tahoe/Reno 2012 (Part 7)

If you live in the SF Bay Area, you probably know it never snows here. Many people like me who live in the SF Bay Area love snow. The nearest place that does get snow is in Lake Tahoe and Reno. Many of us go there in the winter to go ski and snowboard, but for me, I don't like any of that. I enjoy taking photos of snow and playing in it. :) Here are photos of Lake Tahoe and Reno I took during my trip in Christmas of 2012. I will be splitting them into several parts as I took a lot of photos there. Hope you enjoy.

Full Resolution Photos and Prints: If you want to see full resolution photos or buy prints of any of the photos you see, they are up on my portfolio for viewing. To see my best Lake Tahoe/Reno/Donner Lake photos from 2012, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 

Before I get started today, I would like to tell you about a great product to add to your camera bag. First question I for you is, do you do panoramas? If you do, have your panoramas ever turn out tilted? I have an easy solution for you. In order to have a straight panorama, not only do you have to get your camera leveled out, you also have to get your tripod leveled (usually the root cause of tilted panoramas)! Most tripods only have levels for your camera but not for the legs itself, but that is easily fixed. The product I want to tell you about today is the Manfrotto 032SPL Autopole Spirit Level. This tiny level is adjustable, and fits on most tripod's center columns so you can easily level your tripod legs so you can fix the root problem with panoramas. There isn't much else to say about this, and using it is pretty self-explanatory, so if you are interested in getting your panoramas leveled and straight the time that you take it, please check out the Manfrotto 032SPL Autopole Spirit Level.

Okay, now let's get started with today's photos. :) The photos for today are from my 3rd day. These photos are from my trip down to Donner Lake and also some photos from the residential area (on Point Drive for a few) near Donner Lake.

Continuing my trip down to Truckee, CA to go see Donner Lake. These first few photos are from the Hirschdale Road Exit (bridge) on I-80 near Truckee, CA.

Beautiful tall tree covered in snow at the Hirschdale Road Exit.

Then I proceeded to take a photo of the Truckee River on the bridge at the Hirschdale Road Exit. So much snow right?

Here is a photo of the bridge and a bridge for walking (not too sure what the right bridge is for) at the Hirschdale Road Exit. 

Tree covered in snow.

Then I proceeded to Truckee, CA and circled Donner Lake. This is not Point Drive yet, just some other residential area near the lake. 

More houses covered in snow! 

I think this might be Donner Creek? Not too sure though. Photo taken on the bridge on the east side of Donner Lake facing east. At approximately +39° 19' 25.31", -120° 14' 13.41" (Thanks Google Maps!). On the mountain in the distance is the Abandoned Central Pacific Railroad (CPRR) Tunnels.

Photography Tip: Try to use lead in lines in your photos to guide the viewer's eyes to your subject. In the photo above, the creek acts as a lead in line. 

Same location above, just facing west this time. Donner Creek (again not too sure) flowing into Donner Lake. Donner Lake off in the distance. 

Now here are the photos I took on Point Drive (a small residential road near Donner Lake). The whole road was covered in snow! In fact, the hill was so slippery, I asked my parents to park the car on the side of the main road and I just walked down there. The hill is too hard to drive down on, might get stuck, in fact as I was going up hill, I saw a guy's car just slide half way downhill! Lucky he didn't hit anyone. 

Another shot of the snow covered roads. The area sure got a lot of snow fall this year. 

The reason I circled Donner Lake was to find a wide open area where I can get some landscape shots. Didn't really find one. Most of the parks and decks had too much snow piled up to access. Here is another shot in that residential area with a small view of Donner Lake. The snowy landscapes was beautiful too, but I wanted the lake. 

These are all the photos for today. I hope you have enjoyed them! Next time I got more snowy landscapes from residential areas and also some photos from Donner Memorial State Park. Please don't forget to share the blog post with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

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Lake Tahoe/Reno 2012 (Part 6)

If you live in the SF Bay Area, you probably know it never snows here. Many people like me who live in the SF Bay Area love snow. The nearest place that does get snow is in Lake Tahoe and Reno. Many of us go there in the winter to go ski and snowboard, but for me, I don't like any of that. I enjoy taking photos of snow and playing in it. :) Here are photos of Lake Tahoe and Reno I took during my trip in Christmas of 2012. I will be splitting them into several parts as I took a lot of photos there. Hope you enjoy.

Full Resolution Photos and Prints: If you want to see full resolution photos or buy prints of any of the photos you see, they are up on my portfolio for viewing. To see my best Lake Tahoe/Reno/Donner Lake photos from 2012, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 

Before I get started on today's blog post, I would like to tell you about a great product that I own. Let me ask you first: Do you have a device like the Canon EOS 7D that only takes Compact Flash cards? Hate the big prices on the Compact Flash Cards? What if I tell you that you can use your current SD cards lying around your house in these devices? Well you can with the SD-CF II: SD to CF Type II Adapter. This little adapter will adapt all your SD cards (SDHC and SDXC) into a CF card! Unlike other brands of adapters, I can shoot 1080p video on my camera with no breaks! Other cheaper adapters sometimes don't have the speed to support 1080p video, this adapter is not one of them. If you are tight on your photography budget and have a bunch of SD cards lying around, this adapter is definitely a must have for you!

Okay, now let's get started with today's photos. :) The photos for today are from my 3rd day. In the morning, I did time lapse from my hotel room of Downtown Reno. I also have a few shots of my trip down to Truckee, CA to go see Donner Lake. For the time lapse, you can click on the first photo and navigate the time lapse with your arrow keys. Hope you enjoy the photos for today.

The view of Downtown Reno from my hotel room.  

I begin my trip to Truckee, CA. Took a photo of the highway of people installing chains.  

 Truckee River. Photo taken at approximately +39° 23' 40.64", -120° 1' 31.91" at Exit 199 (Floriston) on I-80. Thank you Google Maps and Google Street View!

Another shot at around the same area as the above photo. 

Now heading back to I-80, I thought the snow covered trees looked nice so I took a few shots. 

Here is another photo of snow covered trees. 

This is all the photos I have for today. I hope you have enjoyed them and the time lapse. Next time I will have photos from Truckee, CA with photos from Donner Lake and more photos from my trip to Truckee, CA. Please don't forget to share the blog post with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

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Donner Lake/Reno At Night - Lake Tahoe/Reno 2012 (Part 1)

If you live in the SF Bay Area, you probably know it never snows here. Many people like me who live in the SF Bay Area love snow. The nearest place that does get snow is in Lake Tahoe and Reno. Many of us go there in the winter to go ski and snowboard, but for me, I don't like any of that. I enjoy taking photos of snow and playing in it. :) Here are photos of Lake Tahoe and Reno I took during my trip in Christmas of 2012. I will be splitting them into several parts as I took a lot of photos there. Hope you enjoy.

Full Resolution Photos and Prints: If you want to see full resolution photos or buy prints of any of the photos you see, they are up on my portfolio for viewing. To see my best Lake Tahoe/Reno/Donner Lake photos from 2012, use this link. To see my best sunset and night photos of 2012, use this link. To see all of my photos from this trip, use this link.

Parts: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 

Okay, now let's get started with today's photos. :) These photos are from my first day of the trip, on my way to Reno, NV. My first photos are just before sunset, and after I arrived in Reno, NV, I took some night street photography in downtown.

This was on the road right before sunset. First snow I saw and I turned out first chance I got. :) Story doesn't just stop here, see the rest under the next photo. :P 

 So I turned out and parked on the side of the road doing some long exposures because it was right before sunset, dark out... The next thing I know, this cop car drove by and screamed at me and this other car parked there, this is private property, you can't park here. LOL So I continued my trip after this shot. A lot of snow though. :P Loved it!

Obviously this photo was taken after sunset. I stopped at the Vista Point on I-80 to see Donner Lake. This first one was a 30 second exposure. 

I noticed the 30 second exposure seemed a bit dark so I pulled out my remote shutter release and did a 1 minute exposure instead.  

 The hotel I stayed at was Harrah's in Downtown Reno. Before I headed to the hotel lobby, I took a night long exposure from the parking lot. Sure was cold, but it was worth it. The day I arrived, the weather was pretty good, no snow. I picked the good days to go and leave Reno so driving wouldn't be hazardous.

As my parents went to go check-in to our hotel room, I decided to get a long exposure inside the lobby. The blur is all the people walking around.  

 Here is another long exposure in the lobby. Can't believe the people on the left barely moved! XD

After I dropped off some stuff in the hotel room, I decided to go downtown and do some night exposures of the lights. 

Here is another shot of Cal-Nevada with a car driving by.  

 Here is a shot of the road between Cal-Nevada and Harrah's.

I thought all the lights would make great bokeh! I was right. :) Looks cool doesn't it? 

Here is an in focus shot of the photo above. Love night time long exposures, they are fun, except I was freezing to death in the cold. LOL 

 Here is another bokeh shot with my lens on the 35mm (farthest zoom). Looks cool doesn't it?

Here is the Reno sign. I tried to to a bokeh on this too, but it didn't turn out cool. The lights were too close together.  

Long exposure of Eldorado. 

I hope you have enjoyed these snow photos and long exposure night photos! These are all the photos I have for today, next time I will start on photos from the next day. Please don't forget to share the blog post with your friends and family members! Also, if you want to get notifications when I post up more photos, "Like" us on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Instagram. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

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