Rainstorm Abstracts (Part 2) - Pleasanton, CA (12-11-2014)

On 12/11/2014, the San Francisco Bay Area experienced a huge rainstorm. While great for the severe drought conditions occurring in California, the storm took many by surprise, and flooded many areas. Where I live (Pleasanton, CA) wasn't so much affected by the flooding, however many other areas in the San Francisco Bay Areas got flooded like crazy! If you want to see the aftermaths this storm had on the Arroyo Del Valle (creek in Pleasanton), you can see the post here.

The photos I'm showing today are some abstract photos I shot of the rainstorm from my house. Most of them will be selective focus bokeh photos (you'll get what I mean). Also, most of the photos shot were shot using the help of a flash to help freeze the rain droplets as they were dropping. The photos are split into 2 parts. This is part 2.

Full Resolution Photos: If you want to see full resolution photos of any of the photos you see here, use the following links. If you wish to purchase prints of any of the photos, please contact me here. To view my best at home photos for 2013 and 2014, use this link. To view my best monochrome/abstract photos for 2014, use this link. To see all of my 2014 at home photos, use this link.

Part: 1 | 2 |

This blog post is just filled with out-of-focus abstract photos I took. Pretty much what I did was focused to achieve bokeh and background blur while capturing the rain droplets that happened to have fallen down on the plane of focus. Rain drops were frozen using my Canon Speedlike 600EX-RT.

You are probably wonder what this brown stuff is. It is the fence of my yard.

 Black and white process of the photo above.

I decided to compose with a bit more color in the shot. Those are tiny bushes in my yard (kinda obvious). 

Black and white process of the photo above.  

Now you are probably wondering how I knew there was going to rain drops that fall down in the plane of focus... Answer to that is... I don't! It was heavy rain (so it was easier to catch them in midair), however I sometimes have to shoot several times on each composition to get an adequate amount of rain drops in the shot. These photos are all trial and error and no 2 photos will ever look the same!  

 Black and white process of the photo above.

Also needed for these photos are a bit of luck. Most of these photos you see here, I've only had to do 2-3 photos before I got one I was satisfied with. On one of my compositions, however, I tried 9-10 times trying to get adequate amounts of rain to show up on the photo, but it just didn't happen. I ended up giving up on that particular composition. I suspect it was due to the tree in my backyard obstructing a lot of the rain in that direction. 

Black and white process of the photo above.   

Last one of these abstract photos.  

Black and white process of the photo above.  

These are all the photos for today. 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.

Part: 1 | 2 |

Rainstorm Abstracts (Part 1) - Pleasanton, CA (12-11-2014)

On 12/11/2014, the San Francisco Bay Area experienced a huge rainstorm. While great for the severe drought conditions occurring in California, the storm took many by surprise, and flooded many areas. Where I live (Pleasanton, CA) wasn't so much affected by the flooding, however many other areas in the San Francisco Bay Areas got flooded like crazy! If you want to see the aftermaths this storm had on the Arroyo Del Valle (creek in Pleasanton), you can see the post here.

The photos I'm showing today are some abstract photos I shot of the rainstorm from my house. Most of them will be selective focus bokeh photos (you'll get what I mean). Also, most of the photos shot were shot using the help of a flash to help freeze the rain droplets as they were dropping. The photos are split into 2 parts. This is part 1.

Full Resolution Photos: If you want to see full resolution photos of any of the photos you see here, use the following links. If you wish to purchase prints of any of the photos, please contact me here. To view my best at home photos for 2013 and 2014, use this link. To view my best monochrome/abstract photos for 2014, use this link. To see all of my 2014 at home photos, use this link.

Part: 1 | 2 |

Rain drops falling frozen using flash effects. 

Here is another exposure. You might be wondering why each water droplet shows up a few times. The Canon Speedlike 600EX-RT can strobe. My flash went off several times during the exposures. 

 One last exposure of the rain shot like this.

 Black and white processes of the 3 photos above. I displayed the black and whites separately because I know a few of you will click on the photo (which opens up a slideshow) and play it like a stop motion animation.

A tried to do the same thing with my telephoto lens to get more background separation, but because I am more zoomed in, the rain droplets are dropping "too fast" for my flash to freeze at the power I selected. I think I had my flash at full power when I did this which extends the "flash duration". If I had turned down the power, it would have probably froze the motion better. Nonetheless, I feel that the photo still make a cool abstract. 

Here is another photo shot with the same method above. One of the best things about these photos? No two photos will ever be alike! 

 Black and white processes of the 2 photos above.

Notice that swimming pool in my backyard in the photo at the beginning? It made quite a great subject too with the splashes and bubbles the rain droplets made. There are also a few autumn leaves floating in my pool. I wanted to frame them out, but there was too much floating around to completely get rid of. You'll see what I mean in the next photo. 

Black and white process of the photo above.  

 A photo shot of the autumn foliage floating around my pool. I think it made a nice contrast against the blue water. 

A photo of parts of fallen pine cones contrasted against the wet ground. 

These are all the photos for today. I will continue with the rest of the abstract photos next time. 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.

Part: 1 | 2 |

Bored at Home Macro

Maybe it is raining outside and you don't have anything to do. Maybe it isn't raining, but you go no where else to go. What do you do? Feel like taking photos? If you do macro photography, there are a lot of things you can take photos of! Just look around your house, I assure you will find something. :) Today, I want to show you some macro photos I took of objects around the house. All of these photos were taken with the help of my Kenko Extension Tubes and a few shots were lit using my Canon Speedlite 600EX-RT. Most of the photos here were taken with my new Canon EOS 5D Mark III except for one photo which I shot with my Canon EOS 7D. 

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 2012 macro shots, use this link. To see all of my 2012 at home and backyard photography photos, use this link.

Photo of an orange's skin. This was the only shot taken using my Canon EOS 7D. I shot this photo using one of the fruits on my orange tree in my front yard. 

I sometimes solder up electronic circuits so I have quite some electronic components laying around. Here is a photo of a resistor I had lying around my parts bin. 

A photo of a spring I had lying in my parts bin. 

For this photo, I laid a US Dime (10¢) on a DVD that failed the burning process. The DVD creates the colorful background. If you want to see more of coin shots like this, I have some photos from a previous blog post on a US Quarter (25¢). 

Drops of water can always help spice up an image. I covered the back of the US Dime (10¢) with water and quickly gave the rest of the DVD a spray using my spray bottle. A spray bottle is always handy for macro photography, especially on flowers and leaves! 

Yum. Jelly Belly. That is right, I took a jelly bean out of my Jelly Belly jar to get a photo of it. Good thing I got through the shot with out eating it first. LOL

Here is another photo of the jelly bean. Just looking at this makes me want some now, which is exactly what I will be doing after I finish typing this sentence. 

I also found some LEDs in my parts bin. Here are a few photos. The above is of my green LED. 

Another photo of my green LED. 

After trial and error placing these 3 LEDs under my camera set up, I finally got it. Here is a photo of my red, green, and yellow LEDs. It takes a lot of time to set it up. Remember, the camera's angle of view is only around 3.5 cm across. You need patience and steady hands to set it up. 

These are all the photos for today. I hope you have enjoyed viewing them. 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.

Lake Tahoe/Reno 2012 (Part 10)

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 rechargeable battery I own. The battery is called the Sanyo Eneloop XX 2500 mAh AA Ni-MH Rechargeable Batteries. These are Sanyo's new line of batteries which holds up to 2500 mAh compared to the original ones which only hold 2000 mAh so it will last you longer per charge. The company claims the batteries do have a slow self-discharge rate with it still holding 75% of its charge even after 1 year in storage. The only downside to the new XX series is that the batteries can only be recharged 500 times compared to 1500 charges on the original Eneloops, but at its low price, easily replaceable. These batteries are the only batteries I use in my Canon Speedlite 600EX-RT. I have noticed they do great and I can get more flashes out of each recharge compared to my original Eneloops. I also found that these batteries do give out a bit more kick so my recycle times are a bit faster than with the originals. If you are a serious  photographer that use your flashes a lot, I would recommend you to get several pairs of the Sanyo Eneloop XX 2500 mAh AA Ni-MH Rechargeable Batteries.

Okay, now let's get started with today's photos. :) The photos for today are from the 4th and last day of my trip. These photos will be divided into 2 blog posts. I don't have the exact location of my images, but I can tell you the route I took. So I started off in Reno, NV driving over to Truckee. Then I took SR-89 to Lake Tahoe. Then I went east toward Incline Village traveling around the bigger half of Lake Tahoe. Afterwards I headed back home toward SF Bay Area via US Route 50.

View of Donner Lake from the Vista Point on I-80. 

I think this was on my trip from Truckee, CA to Lake Tahoe. Where exactly I don't know. I found a place on the road and turned out because it looked beautiful covered in snow. It seems to be some kind of hiking trail head. Not too sure because everything was drowned in snow. This is an HDR composition.

I shot a portrait panorama of the snow covered trees there. My fans really liked it on G+.

Then I went to the trail head and did an HDR composition there. Nice trail head. The only issue was after I took the shot and I tried to walk out of there, the snow was so high and loosely packed, I fell waist deep in it and had some trouble getting out! HAHA It was so cold and I got half of my camera wet. Gotta love Canon's weatherproofing, nothing broke, but I was like completely wet and cold. Managed to get out at the end after like a minute. 

So I arrived at Lake Tahoe. 

Another shot of Lake Tahoe.

Icicles! 

I forgot what city this was, but sure loved the look of the buildings.

Snow covered benches in a park. 

Snow covered beach at Lake Tahoe.

Snow covered beach at Lake Tahoe. 

Lake Tahoe's clean and clear water. 

Another shot of the snow covered beach. 

These are all the photos for today. Next time, I will post the rest of my photos from Lake Tahoe and on my way home. Next blog post will be the last one for this chain. After the next post, I will start on my Death Valley National Park photos. I hope you have enjoyed these shots! 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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Wingfield Park - Lake Tahoe/Reno 2012 (Part 9)

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 | 

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 the night of my 3rd day. That night I decided to do some night long exposures, mainly in Wingfield Park in Downtown Reno of the Truckee River. After thinking about it, I have decided to leave the photos from the 4th day of my trip for next time.

Truckee River facing east. The mountains off in the distance was not visible to the naked eye that night but the camera picked it up in the long exposure. Sure surprised me! 

Now facing towards Harrah's hotel. The direction should be southwest.  

 Another shot facing southwest from a different angle towards Harrah's hotel. 

Now just facing west. The city's lights really cast a great color on the clouds!

Another shot facing east. Again the mountains were only visible to the camera when I exposed for the shot. 

Facing south. 

Facing west. 

Then I did a shot from my hotel room of Downtown Reno. The reflection you see is my camera lens. I turned off all the lights but some reflections still showed up. 

These are all the photos for today and I am done with photos from my 3rd day. Next time I will begin the photos from my 4th and last day of my trip. I hope you have enjoyed these! 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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