Spring At Last!

Posted on March 25, 2010 by Gary

Spring in San Diego is a beautiful sight to behold. For most of the year, this lovely city is usually blanketed in a layer of brown and tan, due to the fact that we normally have very little water to let things grow. With the high amount of rain this winter though and a general warming trend, things have started to sprout. This is a perfect time to get out and photograph the green and rainbows of colors blossoming all around.

This photograph, though taken in August 2008, reminds me of this time of the year. It's a great example of using bokeh to enhance an image, and is one of my favorite stylistic tools for general use in photography. It was captured in Julian, California behind the Julian Pie Company restaurant on Main Street.

The Magic of Bokeh

Posted on June 29, 2009 by Gary

I love trying to find bokeh in unusual circumstances. In case you don't know, bokeh is (in simplest terms possible) the word used by photographers to describe the circles of light found in the out-of-focus backgrounds of images. Though it is often found in night photography, especially those which feature city lights or something of the sort, bokeh can also come about in daylight shots as well. In the photograph above, the sun's positioning combined with a (relatively) dark background and an abundance of dewdrops on the pine needles create the magical light show in the frame. This photograph was captured while hiking in Snowbird, Utah.

Peacock and Bokeh

Posted on May 25, 2009 by Gary

The photo above was taken with a 70-300mm lens that was picked up on eBay for $5. Though minor adjustments were made in Adobe Lightroom, it just goes to show that getting a great shot depends on having a good eye, and being in the right place at the right time. Having a plethora of various lenses and expensive equipment might be great for some circumstances, but often times, simplifying your photographic kit forces you to be more creative. And creativity is essential to getting the perfect shot.