Free London PhotoWalk Details!

Everyone is welcome to come on out.  I look forward to meeting you…  If I don’t have a chance to introduce myself personally to you, please do not hesitate to come up and say hello whilst we wind about the streets of London together!

• Facebook Event: See FB Event Here
• Cost: Free! Like all my PhotoWalks
• Time Start:  Friday, Sep 10, 6PM.   (Critical sunset is at 7:30ish)
• Location: South Bank right outside the National Theatre (Google Map)
• Getting there: How to Get to the National Theatre.
• PhotoWalk End: We will end about 8 PM or so at a nearby Pub / Light Eating place…  And just hang out there, look at photos on the back of our cameras, geek out, talk, you can come over and introduce yourself, etc etc.  Very casual…
• Plan: After a quick hello, we will walk together and take photos.  I’ll stop 5 times or so and set up formally for a shot and talk through it.  You are welcome to listen, ask questions, or meander about.  We will start by going past the Festival Hall and down to the London Eye, where we should have a good shot of the Westminster / Westminster Bridge / Big Ben.

And thank you to Greg Annandale (@greg_a on Twitter), who will be joining us at the HDR Workshop in London as well, for helping to set this up!

By the way, do you have professional video equipment and want to do a little extra during the PhotoWalk? Let me know !

The Ultimate London Photography Poll!

Thanks for all the suggestions on places to shoot a few days ago! I’ve done my best to compile them here into a poll… (This is not for the PhotoWalk, but instead for my week or so in London). Also, maybe others can use this list in the future too!

You can select ONE to TEN (10) of your favorites!

What are the best subjects for remarkable photography in London?

• British Museum (including great court and roof)
• "The Gherkin" building
• Piccadilly Circus & West End in the evening
• London Wall
• Bishopgate
• Battersea abandoned power station
• Under London Bridge - secret artsy club inside abandoned train tunnels
• Canary Wharf near Strata tower & Elephant and Castle
• (near London) Epping Forest
• The Monument
• Borough Market
• Globe Theatre
• Tate Modern, Millennium Bridge, St. Paul (all nearby)
• Primrose Hill for view of entire city
• Fleet Street, the strand
• Victoria Embankment
• The Garage City Hotel (remains of orig stone wall at dusk, well lit)
• Serpentine Gallery Pavilion
• Central Saint Giles
• Leadenhall Market
• The Monument
• Greenwich Park (and Observatory)
• Ye Old Cheshire Cheese (Dickens pub with underground part)
• Hyde Park
• Regent's Park
• Harrod's
• St. Paul's Cathedral
• London Eye
• Bar on top floor of Tower 42
• Highgate Cemetery
• Imperial War Museum

View Results

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Daily Photo – The Lotus Sunrise

These delicate shapes are seen on a variety of temples all over southeast Asia, India, and other parts of the Far East. It is the shape of a Lotus Blossom, a timeless symbol, and it is repeated over and over here at Angkor Wat.

The lotus represents the purity of body, speech, and mind. Like the lotus, these should float above the muddy waters of attachment and desire.

The shot below was taken around 5 or 6 AM in the morning. While shooting, I was attended to by a small Cambodian girl that would bring me strong Vietnamese coffee whenever I ran out, which was often. I don’t know where she would go to get it — she would disappear off into the jungle and come walking calmly back every 15 minutes or so, smiling.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

Updating the D3S Review

As I take more and more photos with the D3S, I add them to the Nikon D3S Review here on the site.  Whenever possible, I try to include info such like the ISO, shutter speed, and this sort of thing.  I hope it is helpful, even if you are not going to get the camera!

Daily Photo – Wrapping Around Time

The ancient ruins of Angkor Wat are wild and unprotected.  I think the country just cannot afford to properly keep the sites maintained.  This is both good and bad.  It’s good for me, since I can go anywhere, climb anywhere, and take photos of anything.  I’m very careful when I am near these places, and I don’t disturb the natural order of things. The bad part is that graverobbers are everywhere, snatching this and snatching that.

These old banyan trees grow up and around everything.  The roots become crazily and beautifully entangled.  If I’m not mistaken, I believe that these are also sometimes used as bonsai trees.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

Processing Photos Out of Order

Some of you that have heard me talk have heard my discussions of why you should process photos out of chronological order. I was reminded of this because of these Cambodia photos, like the one below.

Boiled down, here are some reasons:
1) It is silly to feel “overwhelmed” by processing one group of photos before you can process the next.
2) If you process them all right away, then you will not know all the processing tricks you will learn in the next few years
3) There is a lot of excitement in going back to revisit places you have been… it keeps all memories in a constant tumble-dry.

Daily Photo – Under the Ancient Skies

Sometimes, an HDR image of a cool place can come out a little boring, even in an interesting place such as this.  So, often times I will run the image through a black and white treatment (see my Silver Efex Pro Review).  That tool is a lot of fun and can help take a boring photo and make it more interesting.

As I begin the processing, I sometimes discover a photo is more about shape, line, and contrast than it is about color, light, and saturation.  It’s all still there, in all it’s HDR glory, but the emphasis has had a bit of a correction.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

What’s in my bag?

I try to get into my suggested equipment area in the Digital SLR camera secion to keep it fresh every few months.  I added a few new things this weekend and generally cleaned it up.  Maybe you will see some goodies in there!  It’s sort of a text-version of what’s in my bag.

Bamboo Forest Print, Finally Available!

This has now joined the small selection of Limited Edition Numbered Series prints.  We only do these in series of 250, so that they remain scarce and unique. In fact, this is now the only way we release prints..  You can get a smaller on fine art paper for as low as $99, and then it scales up from there.  I suggest the stunning 72″ giant canvas size that will go in your living room. Look, I don’t really want (or need) to oversell these things… If you want it, then you can easily get it… I just post soft reminders every week to let you know which new print has come available, and this one is a highly anticipated release.

Daily Photo – The Lotus Mystery

You perhaps have seen this “lotus” shape on the top of many SE Asian temples (and India as well as many more places).  It’s a peaceful and beautiful shape that has deep meaning to many of these cultures.  There is something naturally soothing about its contours.

While I took this photo in Cambodia, a small Thai girl would come bring me hot Vietnamese coffees every 15 minutes or so.  These are strong coffees that are mixed with sweet condensed milk.  They are thick, sweet, and tasty. I remember it all fondly…

On most of these little trips, nothing goes as planned… but I go into the adventure knowing this will be the case, so I effortlessly roll through most of the mishaps because interesting and unexpected things always end up happening.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

Tinychat Video Interview

Yesterday, we did a little video interview with @Peachpit, the book publisher. It went pretty well, except for the Porn Spam. But…. that drifts away after a few minutes. Special thanks to Pat O’Brien who uploaded a recording here.

Daily Photo – The Forgotten

This was brought up in the chat session yesterday — Black and White HDRs! Yes, they are possible, and they are a lot of fun!  I don’t do it that much because I am so in love with vibrant colors.. but sometimes, on a lark, I’ll do it.  The one below, of a forgotten temple in Cambodia, is a simple black and white with a bit of a sepia tone.  Enjoy!

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

One morning when I was walking around Angkor Wat, I saw this monk there, chatting away on his mobile phone. I thought it was just all so unusual — I had to take a shot! Many monks from all over Asia come here on pilgrimage. I suppose he could have been talking to someone in his home precinct. Are they called precincts? I don’t know.

Also, if any of you have read the new Neal Stephenson book, you will get the “Jeejah” reference. It’s a very interesting book about, well… I am not ruining anything here, but it starts out with the tale of a monk. They are not familiar with all the technologies used by the outside (extramuros) world, and they call mobile phones “jeejahs”. There is a whole array of new words in there for the new world he has created… his books are thought provoking as always.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

These places were a joy to explore. My friend Ben Willmore is heading to the temples of Angkor soon, so I am hooking him up with some of the locals there that helped get me around. I’m sure he’ll have as much fun exploring these places as I did. While it was fun, there was sometimes not a stable place to step. I don’t have the strongest ankles in the world (thanks to a bunch of soccer injuries), so it got a little sketchy in spots! When you see some of those distant mysterious doorways, it’s hard not to want to trample over to have a closer look.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Stuck In Customs Textures, Travel

This was my driver in Siem Reap, Cambodia. He’s a heck of a nice guy. We had a growing retinue as the weekend wore on, and he was always there to help out! First it started out with just my guide, Ratanak (who recently set up his own Cambodia Tour Guide site here – I recommend him!), and then we added one monk and then another. By the end, we had five us piled into his car and we were having a great time.

He was there every morning at 4:30 AM to pick me up for first light and there every night until sunset. We kind of bonded because of the one-eye thing… (I also only see from one eye). I asked about it and he said it happened when he was a young boy. It’s been gradual, but he has gotten used to it; He seemed to be at as much ease as the monks in the backseat with me. Below are a few of the places he took me… thanks again mate!

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

Morning at Angkor Wat was a very cool experience. It was very muggy — the kind of muggy that makes you just give up and give in to being covered in sweat. I wasn’t going to any dinner parties, so I figured it was okay. Moving around the complex to get photos from many perspectives was a lot of fun… this place was a treat to compose.

In vaguely related news, a friend of mine in Shanghai just opened a new spa and used my images throughout. The one that is linked here at “Spa City 5.5” is another from this area of Cambodia. It’s not the highest quality photo of a high quality photo, but you kinda get the gist… If you want to see the original of that photo of the Angkor Wat Temple, just clicky click there!

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

The temples sprawl all around Cambodia. This is quite the holy spot for Buddhists who travel here from locations all around the world. You can tell what sect they are from based on their robes. I was able to sit with one for a few hours and we watched dozens of monks walk by and he could tell me exactly where each one was from based on the slight color variation in their robes and the way it was folded.

Also, if you all want to see some of the behind-the-scenes activity here and see the book-cover selection process for “A World in HDR“, visit the Stuck In Customs Facebook Fan Page, where we have a discussion forum. Once you are in there, just click on “Discussions”, and you can see the four images we were considering for the cover. Feel free to give your opinions in there… I put one of the other favorites here below!  These were all designed by the great Fabian Barral, who I feel very lucky to work with on the book.

That FB Fan Page is also a good place to have “General Discussions”. The only bad thing about the blog is that each discussion is tied to a single post. That’s great, and people always seem to have interesting ideas and experiences to share. But I wanted you to know that you are more than welcome to start up any discussion you wish inside the FB Fan Page Discussions area…

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Siem Reap, Travel

This is an old library found in a remote temple complex in the wilds of Cambodia.

It’s hard for me to imagine what a library was like back then.  A library in the 12th century must have been very interesting.  Almost 1,000 years ago, I imagine it was probably filled with all sorts of fascinating scrolls and documents.  Without the Internet, it must have been the most interesting thing to do on a boring day.  I wonder what it would be like to rip back in time and show them the iPhone and then show them some ancient-scroll app from the App Store.  I’m pretty sure the AT&T connectivity would be about as good as it is in 2009.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Nikon D2XS, Siem Reap, Travel

These are the kinds of places that are too cool to be true. I think these are called “banyan trees” (no doubt one of my smart readers will correct me if I’m wrong!), and their seeds fell centuries ago on top of these old tombs. Although not part of the main complex, the temple of Ta Prohm is still considered part of Angkor Wat. It’s a distance away, but, in many ways, cooler than the main temple.

Maybe I was lucky, the the days I spent there hardly had any tourists around. There were a few monks, but most of them were not Cambiodian and had traveled there from other monasteries all over the world.

Probably the coolest thing about the place was the ability to go anywhere and do anything. No little chamber, passageway, doorway, or underground mystery was off limits. It was definitely one of the best places for spontaneous adventure that I have ever been.

Note this was made with Lucis Pro 6.0… a few months ago, I did Lucis Tutorial, in case you want to know more.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, LucisArt, Nikon D2XS, Siem Reap, Travel

It’s sort of hard to find time to meditate nowadays, eh?  I mean, there is a lot of stuff going on.  I wonder if the old-school Buddhists would be as good at meditating if they had broadband.  It’s quite easy to distract yourself online.  By the way, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you for distracting yourself with the blog!  I guess I’m happy to be a source of distraction for you.

And, should you find the inspiration to meditate a little, maybe this shot from Siem Reap, Cambodia will help.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Nikon D2XS, Siem Reap, Travel

Thank you for all the feedback yesterday. I appreciate it very much; indeed the negative feedback was quite constructive and helpful. Thanks for taking the time, as usual, to share your thoughts.

Now that we are getting back in the normal groove of posting beautiful places and beautiful things, here is a nice one for your Sunday!

This is Angkor Wat in Cambodia at sunrise. I think I went there every single morning around 5 AM to see the clouds and light in different formations. I got to know some of the locals there. A small girl from a family would see me in the dark by the lake, and come over to say hello. She would then bring me a chair and some Vietnamese coffee (quite thick and sweet with condensed milk). I would pay her just a few dollars and she was thrilled… I paid extra to keep the coffee coming in dangerously quick intervals. The sunrise lasted for several hours, and I was in no hurry…

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Nikon D2XS, Siem Reap, Travel

This is an old temple near the main complex of Angkor Wat that sits high on a hill.  At the bottom, a man gave me an option of riding an elephant to the top.  I don’t know why I didn’t!  I think I might have been in a hurry to see the sunset and the elephant looked old and ponderous.

It was a bit sketchy up there with the storm, but there was nothing metal so I didn’t feel like there was much danger of lightning.  I was used to Texas thunderstorms with big lightning, but maybe they didn’t have those sorts in Cambodia – who knows?  Not me.  Anyway, it was too cool to stay up there and watch the storm as it rolled in…

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Nikon D2XS, Siem Reap, Travel

Angkor Wat was really more of a fortress than it was a temple.

There is a massive moat that encircles the complex.  I can only imagine how long it took peasants to dig a thousand years ago.  I also wonder how they all drank fresh water back then.  I know I couldn’t go more than 10 minutes walking around the area without needing a drink.  The massive heat, humidity, and standing water was a perfect recipe for cavalcade of bacteria to rise up and fight back.  I don’t suppose they all boiled their water.  Maybe everyone was just more hardy back then…  Luckily, when I was there, there were plenty of little children running around selling me bottled water.  Which, upon further reflection, I probably should not have drank.

Filed under the categories: Angkor Wat, Cambodia, Nikon D2XS, Siem Reap, Travel