Light The Sky

Light The Sky :: Maine

“Even
After
All this time
The Sun never says to the Earth,

“You owe me.”

Look
What happens
With a love like that,
It lights the whole sky.”

Hāfez

(Working title: “JJ Acadia”, for those JJ Abrams fans out there! Or Acadia fans, as the case may be.  Both = a double win! lol)

It’s been a busy few weeks…as I mentioned last week, we are working on a book (which will be awesome.  Sign up for the newsletter for updates, discounts, etc when the time comes!), I’ve got a few personal projects going on and I’ve spent the last few weeks working with Edith Levy on an mutual interview project (because her travel images rock and I think you’ll love them.  Her interview will be released next week…stay tuned for that!).

As of yesterday, she was kind enough to put together a little behind the scenes interview about my photography work.  Please, go check it out and show her page some love. 🙂

This image will be part of the upcoming ebook that David and I are working on…it is a shot I took in Acadia last fall as an example of sun flare.  The final is actually a blend of three exposures, using luminosity masks and manual tweaking.  When we got to the beach a little before sunrise, I wasn’t sure if we were going to get much color.  It’s always a fine line between heavy clouds adding texture to a sky, and heavy clouds blotting out the sun.  Thankfully we got just enough breaks for the light to pour through and give us a show.

That trip was still one of my top photo trips.  I was there with such good company and the weather was just perfect for dramatic shots…what more can a landscaper ask for? ❤

Follow my work on any (all?) of my various social medias…I use each for something a little different. 500px, twitter, FB, G+, IG

Friend, like, circle me (in a non-creepy way), 1+….get to it!

Eternity of the Tides

Eternity of the Tides

And so castles made of sand, fall in the sea, eventually. -Hendrix

I’ve noticed, lately, that I spend a lot of time photographing water. It’s powerful, eternal, enchanting and dangerous. How can any reasonable girl resist those charms?

This Beautiful Life

Mirror, Mirror

Promise to stay wild with me.  We’ll seek and return and stay and find beauty and the extraordinary in all the spaces we can claim.  We’ll know how to live.  How to breathe magic into the mundane. -Victoria Erickson

Spiritual Symphony

Prelude

The land of Song within thee lies, Watered by living springs…

The ducks and geese chattering to themselves as they settle in the water, the soft wind blowing through reeds along the shore and an ever changing masterpiece in the sky above me.  These are the summer nights I live for. 🙂

For those of you haven’t done so yet, I’m looking for your quote contribution in exchange for a free gift!  TOMORROW IS THE LAST DAY! Go here, check it out, leave your quote, win stuff.  Boom.

 

Grow Old With You

Grow Old With You

I want to make you smile, whenever you’re sad. Carry you around when your arthritis is bad. All I wanna do, is grow old with you…

Yesterday I spent a little time cleaning up the to-do list.  I worked on some edits, set up some meetings, tended my social media gardens and FINALLY finished a new logo watermark.
Now I know, people tend to be pretty split on the watermark issue.  For a long time I never marked the images, mostly because I never got around to putting together a logo I liked.  Then I came up with this idea…probably about 2 or 3 months ago, thought it was super genius…and didn’t have time to follow up.  haha

New Logo!

So…what made me decide to finally mark the shots?  Well, two things.  First, I want there to be some way for people who are interested to be able to find me, as images often get separated from their captions…. And second, I wanted to make an attempt to at least show that this is a product of my heart and soul, in case push ever came to shove.  It’s easy to remove for someone determined to do so, but at least I can tell people I tried. 😉

Now, what I didn’t want to do was make an obnoxious, obtrusive, glaringly obvious watermark that detracted from the images.  I wanted something that had a way to find me (website), a personal touch (that is, in fact, my handwriting at the top) and still looked polished.

Not too bad for someone who is awful at graphic design, eh?

Now, as for the shot itself…  3 exposure manual blend, luminosity masks mostly. The image was taken in Bolton, CT at one of my favorite parks for engagement shoots. These trees reminded me of a photo of my grandparents, grandma folded into grandpa’s arms, looking off into the distance together.  Sunsets like that just sing romance. ❤

La Jolla Essentials

La Jolla Sunset

In my opinion, one of the elements that tends to enhance a seacape is a great rocky shore.  Not to say that sand and a nice sunset aren’t spectacular on their own…but add a nice interesting rocky foreground and I’m hooked.  (Let’s blame my Connecticut upbringing here…our beaches just don’t do “drama”.)

 

Things to keep in mind while shooting on or near awesome rocks in the middle of a deep ocean though.

1) Rocks + waves = ocean spray (and not the delicious cranberry juice kind).  Make sure you have a cleaning kit handy, and be prepared to cover your lens between shots or you’ll find they turn out a bit…um…misty.  Unless you really like practicing your clone stamping skills in photoshop. haha

 

2) Rocks + water = slippery. One big wave can spell disaster.  (Funny story about that…remind me to tell you later! haha)

 

3) Rocks + a vast, flat ocean = no wind breaks. Dress accordingly! If the weather is at all, possibly, maybe going to be uncomfortable, bring gloves and a weather/water resistant coat. If it’s going to be windy, also be prepared to secure your tripod. Last thing you want to do is fish your expensive camera out of the ocean.  Second to last thing you want to do is suffer through a tropical storm just to find out that every shot over 1/60 is blurry courtesy of the hurricane strength winds you endured to snag that beautiful sunset.

 

In this particular instance, we were perfectly safe (but very wet and chilly) – however, we all know as photogs we take risks.  I really did almost get swept into the ocean at one point, mostly due to my own stupidity, and I don’t advocate that.  Keep your common sense close and do your best to prepare for most scenarios you’re likely to encounter.  Safety first…no photo is worth your life.

I’m a Photographer (And So Can You!)

Well, I did it.  I survived a quick (wonderfully awesome sleep deprived) trip to Cali…and boy are my arms tired!  It’s going to take a while to download and edit all of the photos from the long weekend, but if you follow my instagram, you’ve gotten the sneak preview.

For those of you who are late to the IG party, here is a post to catch you up.  Of course…you coooouuulllddd just hit the follow button on my IG profile (seeingspotsphoto).  That would pretty much put you in the know, real-time.  Who wouldn’t want that??

For those of you like David Pasillas who think, “This Instagram thing will never catch on”…………………… Pffft.

Enjoy!!!

Travelgram – Airport People Mover

 

Travelgram – Sea Lion Beach Bums

 

Travelgram – Joshua Tree National Park

 

Travelgram – Pacific Sunset

Sunset and a Smile

Sky on Fire

I came from a B&W film background, where the color of the sky doesn’t matter.  To have success as a B&W photog, you need to train your eyes to see things like texture, lines and composition.

Whenever I’m teaching a new student, I remind them that there has to be more to a photo than just a pretty sunset.  Light is so very important, but it is not the only thing that goes into making a great photograph.

That being said, some sunsets are just too spectacular not to preserve!  This was taken a while ago, but it makes me smiile every time I see it.  I hope you enjoy it as well! 🙂

Product of the day: http://www.zazzle.com/sunset_mug-168051273144038380