DIY Diffuser for Nitecore TM06 & Other 50mm Flashlights (Video)

I show you how to make a DIY flashlight diffuser for your Nitecore TM06 flashlight. I also perform a before and after demo with my Nitecore TM06S flashlight and DIY diffuser.

Other flashlights compatible:

• Nitecore TM06S
• Nitecore MT40/MT40GT
• Nitecore P30/P36
• And most other 50mm flashlights.

For complete product list, see video description on YouTube.

Warning: Hateful, rude, anti-LGBT comments will be deleted, and you may be banned from my channel.

Subscribe to my Youtube Channel here.

Flappy Droid - Getting to Lollipop Easter Egg (Video)

This tutorial will show you how to get to the Android Lollipop Easter Egg. Google decided to incorporate a modified version of Flappy Bird (which we will call Flappy Droid) into the Android Lollipop's Easter Egg. You will also get to see me fail miserably at the game.

Bypass Nexus 6 Data Tether Subscription Check (Video)

Warning: Hateful, rude, anti-LGBT comments will be deleted, and you may be banned from my channel.

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Bypass Nexus 6 Data Tether Subscription Check (Video)

Have you tried to turn on your Nexus 6's portable hotspot feature, USB tether, or Bluetooth tether, but it won't turn on because you either don't have a tethering plan, your carrier wants you to purchase a new plan, or your carrier mis-programmed your SIM card? If you have this issue, when you try to turn on data tethering, it will show a notification saying connecting to your carrier, and then after a while it will either tell you your carrier has blocked tethering, it failed to connect to the carrier to check, or a window will pop up asking you to buy a new plan. This video will show you how to bypass the data tethering check on your Nexus 6.

Required:

• Nexus 6 must be rooted.
• Have File Manager (LINK) installed.

Tips:

• It is recommended you make a backup copy of your original "build.prop" file before proceeding in case you mess something up.
• It is recommended you deselect the option that marks the system partition writable after you finish the modifications. 

Warning: Hateful, rude, anti-LGBT comments will be deleted, and you may be banned from my channel.

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Light My Fire 2.0 Army Swedish FireSteel Review (Video)

Are you as nature photographer? Do you head into the woods and wilderness a lot? Ever thought about what you will do if you ever get lost and can't find your way back? Hopefully such an event will never happen to you, but you should always be prepared in case something like this ever happens on your photo shoots. Not to mention, having one of these in hand during an emergency or natural disaster will allow you to start a fire relatively easily.

In this video, I show you, review, and demonstrate the Light My Fire 2.0 Army Swedish FireSteel, a compact fire starter. This is an okay fire starter for emergencies, but I would not go to this fire starter as my first choice of tools for fire starting. As mentioned in the video, I had much better luck with a Fresnel lens on a sunny day than with this.

As mentioned, the fire starting demonstration in this video was done in less than ideal conditions. The test was shot a day after a huge rain storm hit California. The air and ground was still pretty humid and wet, and so was the pine needles I used as a fuel source. I did some testing with it off camera several days back when it was dry outside, and the fire steel ignited shredded printer paper and shredded newspaper by themselves in under a minute.

Overall I would recommend you carry this inside your camera bag or bug out bag as a backup fire starter in case your main methods of fire starting (like a lighter) fails to work.

Related Video: Big Fresnel Lens Fire Starter Video

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Disclaimer: You try this at your own risk. The photographer can not be held accountable for any damages, injuries, or loss of life for trying the things you learn in the video. You are starting a fire. Please use your common sense. Unless you are in a survival situation, please have a bucket of water or fire extinguisher handy to put out the fire in case it gets out of hand.

Large Fresnel Lens Fire Starter (Survival Preparedness) (Video)

Are you as nature photographer? Do you head into the woods and wilderness a lot? Ever thought about what you will do if you ever get lost and can't find your way back? Hopefully such an event will never happen to you, but you should always be prepared in case something like this ever happens on your photo shoots. Not to mention, having one of these in hand during an emergency or natural disaster will allow you to start a fire relatively easily.

I recently have to thinking about this as I am a nature and wildlife photographer and head into the wilderness pretty often. I got this A4 paper sized Fresnel lens to put in my camera bag so I can be prepared for the unexpected. The large size helps it trap more sunlight and help concentrate more energy into a small area making lighting fires easy, yet the A4 size makes it easy to store it in most laptop compartments on a camera bag. I hope you find this video helpful.

Warning: Hateful, rude, anti-LGBT comments will be deleted, and you may be banned from my channel.

Subscribe to my Youtube Channel here.

Disclaimer: You try this at your own risk. The photographer can not be held accountable for any damages, injuries, or loss of life for trying the things you learn in the video. You are starting a fire. Please use your common sense. Unless you are in a survival situation, please have a bucket of water or fire extinguisher handy to put out the fire in case it gets out of hand.

Connecting Blue Yeti Microphone to DSLR (Video)

This video will show you how to connect your Blue Yeti microphone to your DSLR for recording audio during a video (as long as your DSLR support audio in). This is especially handy if you are shooting a vlog, a talk show, or any video that requires video. Also included is a quick tutorial on how to set up the microphone on your Canon EOS 5D Mark III.

Subscribe to my Youtube Channel here.

Depth-Of-Field (DOF) in Photography

Hi guys, today I am writing up a general tutorial on how Depth-Of-Field (DOF for short) works in photography. It is actually pretty easy to learn. DOF is pretty much how much of an image that can be in focus at certain settings. There is actually quite a lot of physics and how light travels, but I will just be giving a pretty general overview in this tutorial to help you take better photos.

For depth of field, here are the 2 rules you need to remember:

• The closer you are to an object, the less you can get in focus. The farther away, the more you can get in focus. That is why you see people using telephoto lenses to do portraits. Zoom in and back up if you want more in focus. 
• The wider your aperture, the less you can get in focus, however you get more light and faster shutter. The narrower your aperture, the more you can get in focus, however less light means slower shutter speed. Don't go too narrow, or you will experience blurriness. 

The distance is quite self explanatory, but aperture might be a bit confusing for beginners, so I will go into more detail here. The scale for aperture might be a bit confusing for beginners as the scale is kind of "opposite". The aperture is measured in f-stops (generally denoted as "f/XX" where "XX" is the aperture). The SMALLER the number, the BIGGER the aperture opening (example: f/2.8), more light and faster shutter speed. The BIGGER the number, the SMALLER the aperture opening (example: f/22), less light and slower shutter speed. If you are on a tripod and want everything in focus, you can use a smaller aperture, however when handheld, you want to balance these to not get motion blur, but still get a usable image. The widest aperture for the lens is generally denoted in the name of the lens (you can't go wider than that). Some zoom lenses have a variable aperture where the widest aperture will change as you zoom in and out. You usually find two aperture numbers in the names of those lenses. 

For landscape shots, you don't want to go all out f/22. When the aperture opening gets that small, a different type of distortion occurs and you will get a blurry image that looks out of focus. I generally use an f/14 and f/16 for my landscape shots, but the "good aperture" varies lens to lens and is something you want to experiment with and balance out with DOF. When handheld, I use a middle of the road aperture for landscape shots somewhere from f/8 to f/11.

If you want to experiment with the aperture controls to further control DOF, you can do so in the following modes of your camera: A or Av (Aperture Priority), M (Manual), or B (Bulb) modes.

Below are some sample photos to show you the DOF from controlling the aperture. These photos are shot at Sundial Bridge in Redding, CA on my road trip from the SF Bay Area to Vancouver, BC, Canada. You can view the photos from my trip here. The photos are of the giant steel cables keeping the bridge up. I thought they would make a great DOF subject to do a tutorial on.

This first photo is shot at f/2.8, a very wide aperture with less of the cable in focus. 

Here is a photo at f/5. As you can see more of the cable is in focus now. 

Here is a photo at f/2.8. See how very little of the cable is in focus. 

Here is another photo at f/5. As you can see more of the cable is in focus. 

This is it for the tutorial! I hope it has helped you out a bit with your photography. :) 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.

Circular Polarizer Demo

If you remember at two years ago, I posted up a circular polarizer demo article. Today I will show you some more examples of why you should use a circular polarizer, but I most likely will be copying some text I wrote in the last article as there is no point typing the same content up twice. HAHA If you want to see the last post, you can do so here.

The sample photos with the polarizer shown today was taken using the B+W 82mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. First off, let me tell you why a circular polarizer is good. First of all, if you love landscape photos, you have to get one, a circular polarizer helps contrast the colors and deepen the blue sky. Using a circular polarizer can also help get rid of glare from water, glass, leaves (what I'm showing you today), etc... A polarizer will also protect your lens from the elements like fingerprints, scratches, and water. It is a good idea to use a filter. I have also read online that a filter saved his L model lens from a fall! Definitely worth the investment because $100 < $5,000. LOL

If you are serious about photography like me, I recommend you not get the cheap ones because they cause unwanted glares in your photos and the polarizing effect isn't good. The ones I have are a B+W 58mm Kaesemann Circular Polarizer and a B+W 82mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. They are German made filters, and includes special nano-technology coating that causes water that collect on there to drip right off. There is also little vignetting at wider angles. However, this filter is pretty expensive, but most good ones are. The 58mm one cost me around $100 and the 82mm one cost me around $250 (still worth it for the great German optics).

If you don't know much about polarizers, you will find two types of polarizers. One type is the linear polarizer and one type is the circular polarizer. The linear polarizers will have a slightly better polarizing effect than circular polarizers, but will render your auto focus function useless as the polarizer will prevent the auto focus sensor from seeing light. Linear polarizers are usually cheaper than circular polarizers. Circular polarizers won't effect the auto focus sensor and is what most people use. Circular polarizers are more expensive.

The only down sides to using a circular polarizer (like with all filters) is that since filters is suppose to filter out the light, it will also slow down your shutter speed and the time of day it will work the test (due to the sun) is slightly limiting. If the shutter speed gets too slow, make sure you have your camera on a tripod.

Alright, let's move onto the sample photos I took. All these photos were taken on my road trip traveling from the SF Bay Area to Vancouver, BC, Canada. If you want to see my trip photos, you can do so here. Please note some of the "non-polarized" shots still had the polarizer on, but it was rotated to not have a polarizing effect on the image as taking off the filter is a bit of a hassle.

A non-polarized shot at Eureka, CA. 

Here is a polarized shot. As you can see some of the glare from the water has been removed. 

Here is a non-polarized shot from Wheeler, Oregon from the deck of the Wheeler On The Bay Lodge. 

Here is a polarized shot. As you can see the glare from the window is minimized. 

Here is a non-polarized shot from Government House in Victoria, BC, Canada. 

Here is a polarized shot. As you can see the reflection from the glass is minimized.

Also, the circular polarizer can help make your photos more saturated. This photo is shot at Reflection Lake inside Mount Rainier National Park in Washington. Without a polarizer, this photo would not be as colorful. 

This is all the sample photos I got. Remember the filters I have is a  B+W 58mm Kaesemann Circular Polarizer  and a B+W 82mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. If you are going to buy it, please buy it through my link. :) I get referral money that way and you'll be supporting the costs of running this blog. Even if you don't, please click in to check it out. I understand this filter might be a bit expensive for a lot of people, there are cheaper filters out there, but I don't recommend those. Also, when purchasing, don't forget to check if you got the right size filter!

Thanks for looking at this demo. I hope you have enjoyed it. If you haven't seen my past sample photos taken with circular polarizers, you can do so here. 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.

Circular Polarizer Demo

If you remember at the beginning of the year, I posted up a circular polarizer demo article. Today I will show you some more examples of why you should use a circular polarizer, but I most likely will be copying some text I wrote in the last article as there is no point typing the same content up twice. HAHA If you want to see the last post, you can do so here.

The sample photos with the polarizer shown today was taken using the B+W 82mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. First off, let me tell you why a circular polarizer is good. First of all, if you love landscape photos, you have to get one, a circular polarizer helps contrast the colors and deepen the blue sky. Using a circular polarizer can also help get rid of glare from water, glass, leaves (what I'm showing you today), etc... A polarizer will also protect your lens from the elements like fingerprints, scratches, and water. It is a good idea to use a filter. I have also read online that a filter saved his L model lens from a fall! Definitely worth the investment because $100 < $5,000. LOL

If you are serious about photography like me, I recommend you not get the cheap ones because they cause unwanted glares in your photos and the polarizing effect isn't good. The ones I have are a B+W 58mm Kaesemann Circular Polarizer and a B+W 82mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. They are German made filters, and includes special nano-technology coating that causes water that collect on there to drip right off. There is also little vignetting at wider angles. However, this filter is pretty expensive, but most good ones are. The 58mm one cost me around $100 and the 82mm one cost me around $250 (still worth it for the great German optics).

If you don't know much about polarizers, you will find two types of polarizers. One type is the linear polarizer and one type is the circular polarizer. The linear polarizers will have a slightly better polarizing effect than circular polarizers, but will render your auto focus function useless as the polarizer will prevent the auto focus sensor from seeing light. Linear polarizers are usually cheaper than circular polarizers. Circular polarizers won't effect the auto focus sensor and is what most people use. Circular polarizers are more expensive.

The only down sides to using a circular polarizer (like with all filters) is that since filters is suppose to filter out the light, it will also slow down your shutter speed and the time of day it will work the test (due to the sun) is slightly limiting. If the shutter speed gets too slow, make sure you have your camera on a tripod.

Alright, let's move onto the sample photos I took. All these photos were taken in the town of Pleasanton, CA and are of autumn foliage.

This photo was taken without any filter. 

 This photo was taken with my circular polarizer. See how the glare from the leaves almost disappeared and the colors are more saturated? :)

Here is another shot with the circular polarizer.  

Here is a landscape shot taken with a circular polarizer in a park in Pleasanton, CA with the fall foliage on the trees. See how the sky is a deep blue color and all the colorful leaves are more saturated?

This is all the sample photos I got. Remember the filters I have is a  B+W 58mm Kaesemann Circular Polarizer  and a B+W 82mm XS-Pro Kaesemann Circular Polarizer with Multi-Resistant Nano Coating. If you are going to buy it, please buy it through my link. :) I get referral money that way and you'll be supporting the costs of running this blog. Even if you don't, please click in to check it out. I understand this filter might be a bit expensive for a lot of people, there are cheaper filters out there, but I don't recommend those. Also, when purchasing, don't forget to check if you got the right size filter!

Thanks for looking at this demo. I hope you have enjoyed it. If you haven't seen my past sample photos taken with circular polarizers, you can do so here. 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.

High Speed Photography Tutorial (Including a Video Version)

Space Shuttle Endeavour Flyover at NASA Moffett Field near Mountain View, CA.
See more photos of the event here.

How would you guys like to learn high speed photography and be able to take a photo like the one I did above? Pretty sure all of you do. I am here to offer some tips and tricks on the method I use for high speed photography. Let's get started!

In order to take the photo, you need to have the correct settings on your camera. Here are some of the settings I use on my camera. I'll explain them in more detail under the image. These were just screenshots pulled out of my video. If this text version tutorial don't make that much sense to you, I recommend you want the video at the end of this blog post.

1. In a high speed shot, you always want to control the speed of the shot. Always use Shutter Priority Mode (Tv or S) on your camera. In this mode, you can set the camera's shutter speed, and have your camera decide the rest of the values (ISO, Aperture) automatically to reach the correct exposure. You do this by using the mode dial on the top of your camera. 
2. Secondly, make sure you have a shutter speed fast enough for your moving object. However, you should not drive this speed up too much as your camera may not be able to get the right exposure! Generally if the camera can not reach the correct exposure, the values in the camera will flash. Generally when this happens, it means your photo will turn out too dark, however under some circumstances, it may mean your photo will turn out too bright. This is generally a trial and error process. The tip here is to get it at the "right" exposure, one that is neither too short or too long. I can not give you a specific shutter speed as it will depend on how fast your subject is moving. 
3. Set your camera in AI SERVO mode (Canon) or in the special focus tracking mode in your camera. This mode is generally under different names in other brands of cameras. I only know the name for Canon cameras as I have never used other brands before. AI SERVO will insure that your subject will be continuously focused on as long as you are pressing down the shutter button half way or in between shots when it is fully pressed down. 
4. Set your camera on High-Speed Continuous Burst so it will take as many shots as fast as it can when the shutter button is pressed down. This will make it more likely you will get the shot you are looking for. 
5. Zone-AF is what I use for these kinds of photos. The center focus points of ANY camera is the fastest and is great for focusing on fast moving objects. Most likely, your subject will be in the center anyways, so why not just limit the focusing to those points! 
6. Setting the metering mode to center weighted average will help you get the correct exposure. Sometimes when you try to take a photo of a bird in flight, the sky behind will be extremely bright compared to the under side of the bird. If you left it on evaluative metering, your camera will most likely expose for the sky instead of your subject. Again, your subject will be in the center most likely, so this will even out the exposure a bit and help you get the right image. 

Some people may disagree with the tips I provide below. Again, this is just my way of doing things. Whether or not you want to follow these is completely up to you. 

Another thing I like to do is setting my camera on RAW + Small JPEG. I love shooting RAW as I have more work room in post processing, and I also shoot a small JPEG because RAW photos can not be previewed with out special softwares like Photoshop. Generally people look down at this for high speed photography as it will fill the buffer (temporary storage) of your camera as it writes the data to memory card. When this limit is reached, your speed will slow down significantly and your camera will refuse to take any more photos. How fast you hit this limit depends completely on the camera you have and the write speed of your memory card. If you want to see how fast before the Canon EOS 7D hits its buffer, check out my video below. The Canon EOS 7D has a pretty fast processor and a fairly large buffer inside so I shoot in RAW as the buffer limit don't bother me as much. 

If your camera hits the buffer too soon and it starts bothering you, you can try these few things:

• Turn off the JPEG "preview".
• Choose a lower resolution RAW format.
• Switch to JPEG format (you usually can't fill your buffer in JPEG mode).
• Buy a faster memory card or camera. 

The other thing you see in my above image is that I have my camera set on ISO Auto. If you are a bit more experienced with photography, you might be thinking, "That is not very professional!". Usually I'd agree with you, but however, the recently Canon EOS 7D firmware upgrade added the option for me to set a max in ISO Auto. If you want to read more about the firmware update, you can read about it here. You want to use as low of an ISO as you want, but with fast moving objects, there is no telling what you need to use. It is best to let your camera automatically pick between a limited range. I usually don't like to go over ISO 800, but in the Space Shuttle Endeavour Flyover case, I know ISO 400 should be enough to properly expose the shots. In photography, everything is about experience. You should be able to get a rough estimate of the settings you need for a particular image with out even seeing it first. Only tip I can offer you on that is keep taking photos and soon you will get the hang of it. To configure the maximum ISO on a Canon EOS 7D, press (Menu), and scroll to the 3rd menu. You should see this option. If you don't, you probably didn't update your camera yet, and again, you get get more details on that here.

I love these settings, and I wish to use them more often! What should I do? You can easily set it to one of your custom function modes on your camera (may not be present on some cameras and the number of modes you have vary between different bodies too). The method I show you here is for the Canon EOS 7D as this is the only camera I have and know how to use. Different cameras may have different methods of setting this up, or you may not have custom functions entirely. I recommend you consult your camera's instruction manual for more details on this subject.

If you have a Canon EOS 7D like me, you are in luck! Ever wondered what the C1, C2, or C3 on your mode dial is for? It stands for Custom Function 1, Custom Function 2, and Custom Function 3. On your Canon EOS 7D, you can set up a total of 3 custom functions. For me, I my C1 set on the settings for HDR photography. For my C2, I have it set up on landscape shot without a remote shutter release (in other words 2 second delay). For my C3, you have been looking at it all this time and it is my high speed photography settings.

The settings can be any mode you want (expect Auto and Creative Auto). The button can be P, Tv, Av, M, or B and any custom settings you dial in will be saved. Custom settings includes your menu options, your metering modes, your shutter speed (in Tv or M mode), and all the other things displayed on your LCD. Every time you turn to the Custom Function, all those options will be there set up for you the same way you did the first time. To do this, turn your mode dial to the mode you want (P, Tv, Av, M, or B) and dial in the settings. Then just press (Menu), scroll to the 9th menu, and go down to Camera user setting (as demonstrated in the photo above). Then it will ask you to either Register, or Clear Settings. You will want Register (obviously). Then you just pick which mode dial you want to set it on. Doing so will reset what ever you have set on that mode previously, so make sure you don't pick the wrong one!

Now that we are done with camera settings, let's move on to some methods I use in the field when I'm actually taking photos.

The first tip I offer you may not be practical in all situations. Sometimes you maybe wondering if the shutter speed you set is fast enough, or if the tracking modes is correct. In planned events, like the Space Shuttle Endeavour Flyover, I know the subject will be a Boeing 747 (airplane). Before the main target flew over, I saw some other airplanes flying over the area and I took some test shots with those planes. You can see the test shots I took below.

Generally this is not practical with wildlife photography because those things are not planned and the speed they move at varies too greatly. However, in these planned events, I know those airplanes flying overhead is traveling at about the same speed as the Boeing 747 later, so I was able to use them as test targets. If you expecting the subject to fly over sometime, and it is totally planned, I recommend you find some test objects traveling at about the same speed before the real deal comes.

If you are in the field getting wildlife photos, it is a process of trial and error. Again, like I said above, The more photos you take, the easier it is for you to judge the correct shutter speed.

Remember how I said above with your buffer filling up? One way I try to avoid that is by shooting 2-3 shots, and then taking a break. I still keep the shutter button half way pressed, and I still track the subject, but I take a break from taking any shots. If you think about it, later on your computer, you only need 1 or 2 good shots. You don't need several hundred trashy shots (even if they are all in focus). So when I take a break between the shots, it gives the camera more time to write the data to the memory card, it gives me time to reframe the shot (You can't see anything when the mirror is up!), and it also gives AI SERVO some time to refocus accurately. Technically AI SERVO is still focusing between the shots, however it will be much more accurate when it doesn't have the mirror flipping up and down.

If you looked at my Endeavour photos, you will know I left some margins in every photo. I recommend you do the same just incase you have to crop and reframe a photo. This will also give you some error space as well. As I mentioned above, you can't see through your view finder when the mirror is up! Sometimes I will find myself not panning my camera when the mirror is up! I am not the only one who make this mistake, so make sure you leave some margins when you frame up the shot. Also remember to continue panning even when the viewfinder goes dark.

Alright, I hope you have enjoyed this tutorial! I hope this tutorial can help you out with your future photos. Please don't forget to share my blog posts with your friends! If you would like to get notifications next time I post, you can "Like" me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Instagram. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar. Alright, and below is a video version of this tutorial which may further clarify somethings if you didn't get it in writing.

If you enjoy the video and would like more, you can subscribe me on Youtube here. 

Copyright Warning: The first photo in this blog post is one of my best and most popular works of art. Unauthorized usage and reproductions are strictly prohibited. Please contact me here to purchase prints and negotiate photo licenses.

American Whitewater Expeditions

Remember the star trails I did last time? If you missed it, you can see it here. Here are the other photos from my camping trip. Obviously, I did not bring my camera along on the rafting trip, so there will be no photos from that. These photos was from around the campsite. I took both regular and HDR photos there. I hope you enjoy viewing these!

If you want to see my star trails, you can see it here. There is also a tutorial on how you can do star trails on there too.

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. See my best photos from that trip here. See all of my photos from that trip here.

There were some baby ducklings in the pond near the campsite.
边上一个池塘里的小鸭子。

The duckling in the back was slightly blurred.  

Can't tell if this was due to bad focusing or high ISO, but I thought the slight blur made a great effect for the photo. I suspect the blurring was bad focusing. Should have used AI SERVO on my camera instead of ONE SHOT.

Another shot of the ducklings.

 American river, and a house in the background. I thought the golden color of the sun as it was setting for the day looked great on the house. 

A photo of the sunset in Placerville. This was taken after the rafting trip on the way home.
在回家路上拍的日落。

The rest are the HDR compositions I made. In my option, they weren't very good subjects for HDR. LOL Please enjoy.

This is the pond the ducklings was swimming in. I don't think they are in this shot.

A shot of the American River. A 5-stop neutral density filter was used for the shot. 

HDR composition of the house and the river. This time zoomed out a bit. 

This is all the photos for this trip. I hope you have enjoyed viewing those! Again, if you haven't checked out my star trails photo and instructions on how to do one yourself, you can see my post here. Please don't forget to share my blog posts with your friends! If you would like to get notifications next time I post, you can "Like" me on Facebook or follow me on Twitter and Google+. These links can also be found on the top of the right sidebar.

Depth of Field in Photography (Video)

This video explains what depth of field in photography is and how you can adjust it in your camera.

Key Points:

• Depth of Field = DOF
• Wide DOF is narrow aperture, high F-stop number, and will have most/all of your photo in focus. This is generally used for landscape shots.
• Narrow DOF is wide aperture, low F-stop number, and will blur out most of the foreground/background. This is generally used for portraits, animal, macro, etc photos.

If you enjoyed this video, please subscribe me here.

Message from author: Looks like I broke my promise again! This isn't Monterey photos right? XD Well first of all, sorry! Second of all, I want to tell you all something. This is the first photography tip/tutorial video I made and I plan on doing more of these "lectures" in the future. If you haven't done so, the link to my Youtube channel is above, so please subscribe if you love photography! Have a nice day. I will begin the Monterey photos tomorrow. No more excuses!