Day One Hawaii

I have been so busy catching up with home life and drama at work that I am now just getting around to my Hawaii images. These are from the first day we were in Kauai and just a fraction of the many images we took in Hawaii. Cassi was given one of my point and shoot cameras and I will post some of hers in a later post...She has an amazing eye for composition and it's fun to see her interpretation of the same pictures I am taking. Some of these are from my point and shoot camera and some from my Canon 20D. The picture above is somewhere over the pacific ocean before we landed in Honolulu.

This group of arrows was in front of an arts and craft fair in Kapa'a that had many vendors from Kauai who were selling their handmade goods. I love supporting local artists instead of the mainstream stores and so we spent some time and money here!!!

The three pictures above are some of the art pieces sold at the fair. The picture of all of the homemade postcards caught my eye because there was such harmony from the display and the walls. I wanted to purchase some and then decided that my own personal photos would be more meaningful to me. The next two images are actually pieces of silk material one of the locals was selling and they were all hanging throughout the fair and really gave us an amazing feel for all of the local color you find in Hawaii.
Many of the walls throughout Hawaii are painted bright, fun, happy pictures and I love that!

This picture is taken in Northern Kauai at the Kilauea Lighthouse. It had been raining most of the day and at this lookout it was cloudy and rainy to our left and sunny, bright and blue to the left.
This is a small island at Kilauea Pointe.
The lighthouse at Kilauea Pointe.
This is a viewpoint right outside of Princeville. The lines and patterns of this area were beautiful and because of the rain...there were rainbows here too!
Cassi being my second shooter!

At Kee beach (which is the northernmost point you can drive to before the NaPali coast starts) the waves were incredible. I don't think you can truly capture how powerfully beautiful these waves were crashing on the beach. Cassi and MacKenzie tried to with their cameras though!

MacKenzie is totally cracking up because a huge wave crashed near the shore and Diane (her Mom) was videotaping when the wave scared her and as she rushed up the shore away form the wave she fell. It was hysterical and Diane actually caught the whole thing on videotape and I think I would have pee'd my pants laughing if I would have replayed the video. I don't think I have experienced such a gut-wrenching funny moment in a long time.
At Kaepa Beach there is a cave you can walk into and this was what it looked like when you exited.

These two pictures were also taken at Kaepa Beach. If you look towards the top of the stream you will see that the stream goes over the road you need to drive over to go into this beach area.
Back in Kapa'a, this wall was painted by the famous wildlife/sealife artist Wyland. He painted this one in particular in 1991 and there are 34 others all over the world that draw attention to the plight of animals in the sea. There is one other painted by him in Kauai and when we found it, the only camera I had on me was my camera phone and I have not downloaded it yet.

This is taken from the lookout point towards Opeakaa Falls.

The three sunsets above are taken right outside the complex we stayed at. It was so cool to see this area every day because it changed each day. The color of the water, the clouds and everything about it. We had a great first day and I will post more in the coming days.

Enjoy!

Hawaii

Aloha!

Cassi and I have been in Hawaii for the last week or so and I have so many images I want to share but I need to get them all organized first- We were able to do so many things on Kauai and Oahu that I never thought possible. Hawaii is a beautiful place with such a rich history and so many traditions. Everyone made us feel welcome and I feel blessed to have met so many people and seen some of the most beautiful places in the world. I plan to share them with you in the future and let you experience some of the beauty we found there!

Enjoy!

Happy Halloween mateys!!

I love this time of year! Last year...Cassi's Dad was in a motorcycle accident on the 28th of October and we were still in a daze on Halloween night so I don't have any pics of Cassi being a belly dancer. Every other year I have these amazing Halloween pictures of her in costume.

This year, our studio had a pirate themed homecoming and we had this killer backdrop that I planned on using. And then the fires came...and I never got a round to taking the pictures so we decided on the next best thing...

A real pirate ship. This pirate ship is docked down at the Embarcadero here in San Diego. It is the ship that was used in the movie Master and Commander that Russell Crowe starred in. We also spent some time touring some of the other ships in the bay...The Berkeley, the Star of India and a Russian submarine that was used by the Russians in the Cold War.

Cassi had toured these recently with her father so she played tour guide for me...all the while looking like a genuine wench...errr....pirate!!!

I was playing around with actions in photoshop so you can see there are many different effects on the images.

I love getting feedback so tell me your favorite!!!

Cassi and I are headed to Hawaii for a much needed vacation on Saturday and I haven't decided if I am bringing the laptop along but I am sure I will have a lot to share at some point!

Enjoy!

San Diego Fires

This is the sunset tonight from Del Cerro. If you look close, directly under the sun...Qualcomm stadium is there. If I lightened this image you would see it...the sight of the evacuation center for over 10,ooo evacuees. I didn't enhance this image at all because I wanted to show how true red the sunset was tonight.

When we were at Qualcomm on Monday night, this was one of the people evacuated. I don't know how he got the bed down there but he sure looks comfortable. I believe his wife is asleep in the front seat of the car.
I shot this picture out of the window on the way out of the parking lot. Behind the fence is set up for a radio station's event for this Sunday's Charger game. As of right now...it isn't known where the Charger's will play this Sunday.

The view from my house on Monday morning. This faces North. The fires were to the North and South of us.
The stadium where the evacuation center is.
The Charger's evacuation field being used for all animals. I have heard it referred to as Noah's Ark.
They brought in the National Guard to protect everything all throughout the city at the evacuation centers and where the fires are. I love that this particular National Guard is protecting a huge stack of Huggie diapers...go figure!

This is just a quick post to let everyone know that all my family and friends have made it through this fire storm mostly in tact. My workplace is in Poway and we have many Poway and Rancho Bernardo clients who have been directly effected by these fires. My heart goes out to them.

We took many donations down to Qualcomm stadium the first day of the fires and I realized my photographic calling is definitely not of a journalistic nature. I felt completely guilty trying to take pictures of someone else's misfortune and I know there is a place for that type of portrait but I feel intrusive. So I took the few pictures I took out of the car window with no flash. The people working at Qualcomm were very warm and friendly and I am glad I was able to contribute in a small way by bringing the donations.

Today one of the news stations was talking about how he watched some still photographers sifting through the personal things of fire victims so they could "set up" the perfect shot (like a baby doll amongst all the destruction) and he thought it was wrong.

I agree with him.

Enough said.

President Bush comes tomorrow to Qualcomm stadium tomorrow. Arnold Shwarzenegger (our governor) has been here since Monday. Brian Williams and Katie Couric are doing there national news from here. Geraldo Rivera and Matt Lauer are here. It all seems surreal in a way, a spectacle in a way, yet...they are doing a job to bring this disaster to everyone in the country.

San Diego has really banded together and taken care of our own. I suspect then next few weeks we will receive many phone calls at the studio from our clients who have lost pictures. I know that every time I hear people talk about what they took with them when they evacuated...the first thing they say is their pictures...their memories. I am honored to be a photographer who daily captures these memories for them. Memories of moments in time that can't be replaced.

Enough of my ramblings!

Enjoy!

Kikki and Patrick's Wedding video

Kikki just emailed me this video montage of her wedding and I wanted to share it with you. Her pictures are posted earlier on my blog and it was a storytale wedding. If you watch the video you can tell Kikki was meant to be a bride...it's too bad she will only be one this one time!!!

Saturday was her one year anniversary. Congratulations again to the both of you!!!
Enjoy!~

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40741_eBRPU

Rachel and Lathen's fabulous wedding!

All of the details at Lathen and Rachels' wedding were highly detailed. This signing album was handmade and beautifully personal!

Her garter...
The amazing dress she wore
Something old...
Something new...(actually her something new were a gorgeous strand of pearls from Lathen. This little flower girl ran down the aisle once she got going. It was a funny moment.

After the ceremony some fun shots of the bridal party.

Rachel looking stunning after the ceremony on the golf course.
Flower girl number two rocking her basket. I don't think she could have posed any sweeter!
The M&M's say Rachel and Lathen and I have always loved solving word problems and so I thought my "Lathen heart Rachel" was a cute way to show the rings.

I have so many more images I want to share! Grandpa brought tears to my eyes more than once, the father of the bride did a strip tease, there are cool cigar shots of the groomsmen, the wedding was emotional and beautiful, each detail was so cool, and of course the bride looked radiant and the groom happy to start this part of their lives together.

I have had an extremely busy weekend and I want to try and get in bed before some ridiculous hour tonight (it's already 10:40!!) so I thought I'd quickly post and show some of the images from their wedding on Friday.

It was a perfect SoCal fall day weather wise and every detail of this wedding was well thought out. The people were amazing and Rachel and Lathen were the calmest wedding couple ever! I loved the pink and orange color scheme and they had a candy bar filled with about everyone of my favoritist candies! I will post some of those delectable images at a later date once I have gone through the daunting task of editing all the pictures from that day.

So for now...

Enjoy!