Beautiful Video

I tweeted this out recently… I thought it was so unique — I wanted to share it with you here.

Lilac Wine from Matthew Landa on Vimeo.

Daily Photo – Forever Skies

The beautiful and endless skies of Iceland are a constant source of inspiration. Have you ever seen that movie, “What Dreams May Come”? Do you remember how it had these flowing, impressionist scenes? Iceland is kind of like that all the time! I wonder if the people that live there get used to it over time… I can’t say for sure. But I was keenly aware of every hue and color in the sky throughout the roadtrip.

If you recall, I also used to double-major in Geophysics, so I am into the geology of all these places. But, I end up getting frustrated when I can’t recognize different formations. Like, for example, that wonderful mountain-plateau there on the left… not sure how that was made. It’s different than all the other bits of these glacier-carved fjords. Anyway, I’m sure that one of the clever people in this audience can tell me what it is!

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

I jump from a plane today!

This is a big lead-up to OpenCa.mp on Saturday and Sunday. I am speaking on Saturday at 11:30 AM — I hope if you are in the area you can stop by!

We’re giving away some awesome prints at the show as well. I’ll try to snap some shots of the event so get can get the vibe.

Today (Thursday), I’ll be jumping from a plane with the Golden Knights. It’ll be very exciting… I’m jumping out with Cali Lewis, Frederick Van, John P, George Ruiz, and several others… it should be a great time. Watch Twitter for live updates from the event!

The Horse of Sagas Print

I got so many requests to make this a print that we changed around our planned list of releases. This is my favorite HDR of an animal I’ve ever shot. These Icelandic horses with their wild hair prance around all night long, probably thrown off by the strange day/night cycles. This was taken around 1 AM, very near the summer solstice. The photo was totally blown out from behind, and I did not use a flash. Flash tends to upset the animals a bit… so I used the HDR technique instead on the RAW to bring out the true colors and light on his face. Of course, these were the actual colors and light levels I saw when I was there… it just reminds you of how limited a camera is by itself.

More Favorites of Icelandic Horses!

Aren’t these horses awesome? I wanted to take the opportunity to put together my other favorite two horse photos from Iceland below for you. Enjoy!

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

Live Video with Leo tomorrow (Sunday)! 1:30 PM PST

Hey everyone! On Sunday at 1:30 PM PST, I’ll be on The Tech Guy with Leo Laporte. You can tune in live to see me at Live.TWIT.tv. There is also a very easy to use Chat room there (see where it says “Popout Chat”?). We’ll be talking a lot about HDR, Photography, and other awesome geeky things.

A World in HDR, now in Chinese!

The book is now out in a new Chinese version! We had some very good talks with Chinese publishers about this through Peachpit, and I think the final product looks pretty good! Now, I’m not totally sure (since I can’t read Chinese), but it looks like you can order it through this site.

The Black Rock

I spent a several hours on a huge black sand beach. This was in the volcanic area of southern Iceland, not too far from the recent volcano eruption. Parts of the nearby town of Wik were still covered in ash while I was there, so it had sort of a light feeling of an Icelandic Pompeii.

There were no roads in this area, but I wanted to explore, so I drove my 4×4 boldly out into the black sand expanse. It’s strange just driving in a blue, soft morning light across an endless horizon of black sand. It’s almost like being in the middle of a huge black asphalt parking lot, with no lines, no curbs, and no end. Every few miles, enormous black rock structures would shoot up out of the flatness. I stopped at every one, almost like it was calling me.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel, Vik, Wik

Did you get your free upgrade?

About a month ago or so, we put out a free upgrade to the “Top 10 Mistakes in HDR Processing” book. There were so many sold — I think immediately we sold over 1,000 of these things. Our system sent out an email to everyone who purchased and gave them a free upgrade code. If you did NOT receive that email (perhaps it was blocked), please contact Support @ StuckInCustoms.com and the team can get you one. Just let them know your name so they can properly find you in the existing customer database.

I got a lot of great feedback on the Top 10 book — people wanted more examples, more sample photos, and a more detailed how-to. So it has been extended to 55 pages and should get every nook-and-cranny of your questions answered!

New eBook VERY Soon

This new eBook is really awesome. I’m super-proud of it.

It’s all about Composition and beyond. It’s called “How to Compose Photos: Creating Order from the Chaos“. It is a deep description of everything that I think about when composing a photo on the scene and later in post-processing about how/where/when/why I choose to crop.

This one is the longest eBook yet. It’s jam-packed with a ton of editorial text, descriptions, tips, and a deep discussion of many things that should be new to people. I know you all have high expectations, especially after the upgraded eBook above, and I think this will really be a nice addition to your growing collection of downloadable knowledge! (We’re almost to that scene in the Matrix, yes?)

Daily Photo – Alone at the Raging Waterfall of Gullfoss

After two weeks of being alone I was getting a bit, shall we say, lonely.

I was getting in the habit of waking up around 4 or 5 PM, having a leisurely dinner, and then jumping in the car to explore new parts of Iceland throughout the white nights. On this particular day, I decided to head deep into the center of the island. My goal was to go to the parts where all the major roads do not.

Along that path, I arrived here at Gullfoss about 11 PM. I’ve been here many times before, but there was always a few people around admiring the falls. This time, I was alone. It’s so strange walking around a place like this while the sun is setting and no one is around. The feeling is like those apocalypse movies where all humans have just disappeared… just me… my gun… a trusty dog… maybe a few Icelandic elf-zombies lurking about… the more and more time I spend alone, the more reasonable this begins to sound…

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Travel

Free Stuff on the Site

First, you can look forward to a free eBook coming soon for everyone.  We’ve taken some popular content here on the site and packaged it up for something you can take with you!  It’s in the works and should not take too much longer to finish up.

I know there were some complaints on the HDR DVD page that that some people could not afford it (I should be more sensitive to a bad economy, more expensive than other instructional products, etc etc). Thanks for the feedback and, as with everything, it will drop in price over time until it finds a sweet spot for everyone. Until then, we hope you continue to enjoy the free resources here on the site.  (…and this is not a way to get you to feel bad for me… hehe… the DVDs are selling just fine… simply letting you know I understand the nature and origin of the comments.)

I guess most people don’t know this…  but there are costs involved with running the site, and we have a support team here for you too.   So, if you don’t want to buy anything, that is fine and dandy… doesn’t bother me at all!  I do invite you stay around to enjoy the following goodies:

Videos – Many hours of videos, tips, and tricks.
Reviews – A growing collection of my experiences with cameras,lenses, and software.
HDR Tutorial – Now we have three languages, and more coming soon!
HDR Spotting – a free site where you can post your photos and drive traffic to your portfolio.
Stuck In Motion Tutorial – a guide on how you can create a new style of slow-motion movies
@TreyRatcliff – and, as usual, I’m on Twitter for you to answer most questions… I have a 99.9% answer rate!

Also, of course, we have the daily photo in maximum resolution that is uploaded every day along with the EXIF data. I do my best to provide tips, conditions, and this sort of thing to help you in your own personal photo quest!

Daily Photo – The Solstice

This came from one of my favorite nights in Iceland! This was shot around 2 AM, right when I started feeling loopy.

I was on the edge of some precipitous volcanic rock, and there was a waterfall behind me. It fed this little area of rapids that emptied out into one of the fjords. There had been a light rain for a few hours, but the setting sun cut underneath the clouds to unleash some godly colors.

About 10-20% of my HDRs are in portrait mode. I am just usually in landscape mode for some reason. Part of it has to do with the way people consume these things — on monitors. I don’t like making people scroll up and down to see a photo. That’s kind of a drag. That’s another reason I don’t like those super-wide panoramas. They are so difficult to pan around, even though there are a lot of slick tools. It’s just not a “viewing” experience while you are busy using a tool to manipulate the photo itself. Do you know what I mean?

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

About to get a new Android Phone

See the “Android Exploration Post” from a few weeks ago.  I’m leaning toward the HTC Desire.  You all are so smart about these things… seems to let me use any sim card when I travel.

Daily Photo – The Sheep and the Lonely House

The countryside is filled with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of little sheep farms.  I think they are all charming and fun to explore.  Luckily, no one seemed to mind when I would jump over fences and galavant across the meadows with my tripod.  The sheep would notice.  After spending a vast amount of time with them (not, “Oh I was just helping this sheep over the fence” time, btw), I can see sheep have two states of mind:

• Confused – In this state, they look at you with an empty stare.  You can see this in spades below.
• Scared – In this state, they simply run towards the nearest sheep and roughly at the same vector.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

London Workshop Registration in a few days!

Be sure to go to the HDR Workshop page on Monday, Aug. 2, at 10 AM London Time.

If you live somewhere else and are going to London for the big event, be sure to figure out your own local time for the big registration event!

We will also have a free photowalk in London the on Friday night before the workshop.  Everyone is invited.  Details to come soon!

HDR DVD – Out in the Wild

We have a few testers out there that have the HDR DVD. There have even been a few leaked tweets out there. We expect it to go on sale pretty soon. Of course, since we know many people will be ordering it, we want to make sure we do some good Quality Assurance on it to ensure we’re in good shape. Sorry for the delays… but this is important and we want to make sure it is as perfect as possible.

Because the premium package is 4 DVDs (!!!), it takes a long time to stamp them out, put in cases, ship, etc etc. It’s a big production! So, be sure to get on the list so you can order right away before we hit a supply logjam.

The Long Road Home

I took this on perhaps one of my best days in Iceland.

I woke up around 5 PM at Hotel Edda Laugar in Saelingsdal.  Many of you already know I was sleeping days and staying up all night to take photos.  This was my last day/night cycle in Iceland, so I wanted to make the most of it.

Anyway, after waking up, I went out to the natural hot springs for a dip.  It was a perfect little rocky spring filled with steaming-hot sulfur-smelling water.  As usual, I was totally alone and didn’t see another soul.  I stayed there, looking at the afternoon mountains for about 30 minutes until I reached a dangerous dream-state.  And then dragged myself out and walked back to the hotel.  I had one of those post-hot-tub shells of heat around me to protect from the cold.  I didn’t even feel it.

I got back inside, put on some warm clothes, and then went down to get dinner (breakfast).  Actually, I got two of them.  The second one was to-go because I would eat it around 1 or 2 AM, when there is absolutely nothing open.  Besides, I knew I would be way out in the boonies where there was not even an option for anything to be open!

Around 3 AM, I started driving back to Reykjavik.  As I was going down one of the fjords in the northwest, the sign lined up in my view, so I pulled over to take a shot to share with you.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

HDR DVD Soon! Get Early Notice

I know you guys love HDR as much as I do… The DVD is pretty much done… The Premium version is clocking in at over 6 hours. That’s a lot of time watching me work through these things, step-by-step. We are in the middle of testing these to make sure they work inside many different DVD players.

Even though the team is making a bunch of these, we are not sure how many will be avail in the first batch, so be SURE to sign up to our newsletter so you get early notice!

My HyperMac Comes Through!

A few months ago, I did a HyperMac Review here on the site. This is a really cool external battery that will charge up your Mac, iPad, iPhone, or i-anything. Sometimes, I am away from power outlets for far too long, and this thing saves my bacon. I find I have an inexhaustible need of electrons to power my life. It’s just the way it is… having this thing around while on the road was a real benefit. It hasn’t let me down yet… I highly recommend it!

Daily Photo – The Mountain Storms of Time

Ahhh… I’m so excited to be posting these two photos!

During my recent expedition in Iceland, I revisited an old favorite. This area is wild and incredible. I can’t get enough of this particular vista, and I waited patiently for things to get just right.

It was bitter cold outside, and I had all manner of warming clothes on.  Even though I brought my sweet special gloves where the fingers peel back, it still was not enough to keep my whole person warm.  Upon landing and going into Reykjavik to have breakfast at my favorite French restaurant, I bought a few strange-looking woolen Icelandic hats.  Maybe I should have captured photos of myself in all this garb… but I am sensitive to taking too many photos of myself on the blog.  When people do too much of that it gives me the heebie-jeebies.  This is probably just in my head.

Now, you may remember this exact spot from another photo, several years back. The lower photo was taken around the middle of winter, and this new upper photo was taken in the middle of summer. I’ve put the two below so you can compare and contrast.

This was shot in the middle of the summer of 2010, not too far from the solstice.

And this photo was taken in the dead of winter about 2 or 3 years ago.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

The eBooks are Selling Great!

Click on either of the two book covers to the right for more info. And thank you very much everyone for trying these out! I’m glad you like these, and I do need to make more. But who has the time? I’d like to churn more of these out, but they do take a lot of thought and work… For now, these will have to do. But thank you for all the feedback and keep it coming!

Daily Photo – The Cavebirds in the Gentle Evening

How awesome is his little gem in Iceland?

It’s a small town not too far from that big volcano called “Vik”. It is the home to many different birds, and a lot of them nest inside these tiny caves in the cliff walls. In this area just north of the town, the local residents decided to light the side of the cliff at night to give it a special feel.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel, Vik

New Main Level Article

I did a piece for Smashing several months back called Ten Principles of Beautiful Photography. Since the recent re-design, I made it one of the top-level articles for new people that are just discovering the site. Thanks for all the comments on there. I don’t always get a chance to respond, but I do read them all!

Daily Photo – When the Songs Were Forlorn

Today we have another new Iceland shot!

By this time, I had been in Iceland for about two weeks. Again, this was just after midnight and I was up, quite alone, in the northwest fjord area. I listen to music all the time while hiking and shooting. I had started to enter a non-stop dreamy state after so long out on my own, sleeping days and staying up all nights. When you are surrounded by constant strange-light, everything feels like a waking dream.

And when I reached this point, my iPod playlist started getting into the forlorn songs. It did nothing to help the reality of the situation, if there was one to begin with.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

Daily Photo – The Boiling Heavens

The weather was wet and heavy. It had that feeling that it will rain any minute, and every minute it did not rain felt like a lucky break.

This church sat up high on a hill in NW Iceland and could not be seen from the street. I happened to turn up a little driveway and found it at the top. You can’t see it from this angle (it was impossible to compose), but those homes on the left have grass roofs. There’s another cool shot of that I will sprinkle in during a later post!

I made a point of randomly driving up and down different roads while there.  Sometimes it’s tough, because I got in the habit of driving straight down these highways and ignoring everything.  I occasionally have a rough destination, and the side roads seem like a strange distraction.  Anyway, it takes real discipline to be distracted!

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

What I Like

I have this new bit there at the top with some menu options. You can see one of them is “What I Like“. I get questions from time to time about what inspires me, what kind of music I listen to when taking and processing photos, and this sort of thing. I don’t have much on that page now, but I’ll add more stuff over time (when I get some).

Daily Photo – Over the Top of Iceland

When I am by myself for weeks on end, I think I probably make bad decisions. I lose all sense of perspective and what is “normal”. I can’t decide if this is a good or bad thing… I guess some of both.

Anyway, I was driving along the coast in NE Iceland along the fjords. It was about 11 PM and the sun was setting. I was about to lose it behind the mountains, and then I saw a dirt road that went right up one of the mountains. So, I decided to take it for a bit to see if I could get a good photo of the sun.

So, I went up a few miles, and then a few more, and then even more. I could not stop and was chasing the sun across the highlands. I was getting higher and higher into the ice layer.  And then I found this little snowy river and stopped over to take this photo a few minutes after midnight.  What did I find next?  You’ll find out in the next few Iceland shots perhaps!

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel

The New eBook Cometh Sooneth!

When I was working on this new eBook, I was faced with quite a problem. I know all the common mistakes, but I did not feel like going out to grab random images off Flickr to critique them. As I point out the mistakes, it might be thought of as too mean-spirited as I rip apart other people’s hard work.

So, instead, I decided to grab 10 of my very first HDR images where I made all the same mistakes! It was a lot of fun, actually, to back trough all my old photos and point out everything I did wrong, and what I do now to correct these problems. Even though it is quite embarrassing to fill an eBook with so many awful photos, I am doing it for the good of the world!

I hope to get it out in the next few days… been working on it at night for the finishing touches!

Daily Photo – The Silent Horse in the Fog

Every night around 2 AM in Iceland was like a dream.

I’m always enjoyed staying up late… As Sarah McLachlan says, “Night is my companion.”

Sometimes, after midnight is when things really start to flow, so my two-week sleep reversal of staying up all night to drive around Iceland was a trippy experience. The weather was always strange. Sometimes sunny, sometimes cloudy — but always with a tinge of the surreal.

On this night, I was driving along the south of Island about 100 km from the recent volcano eruption. I could see bits of ash here and there when the light was good, but then a nightfog rolled in and covered the ground. Streaming past countless little farms, the horses floated about while the mists swirled underneath them.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3X, Travel, Vik

Leave a comment to Win My New eBook in celebration of the New Website Design!

Update: the random winners are commenter #40 Nora, #61 Gordon Brown, and #407 Lauren Blackwell! Congrats!

I have a new eBook that will pop sometime soon.  It’s called “Top 10 Mistakes in HDR Processing, and How to Fix Them“.  It’s 37 pages long and filled with all kinds of great info.  To win, just leave a comment here and I’ll pick three random people the day before release. Good luck!

All of this is in honor of the new site design!  Here’s a little rundown of what you are seeing:

• New site design by the world-famous French designer Fabien Barral and coding by Bill Erickson
  • Visit his site at FabienBarral.com and see his famous movie posters, packaging designs, and other innovative works.
  • Bill Erickson is quite the WordPress genius – find out more about him at BillErickson.net
• The site is exactly as wide as before, optimized for people with big monitors and high resolution.
  • It is important to me that the daily photo is shown at 900 pixels across
  • Although this cuts out some people, according to Google Analytics, over 80% of people view this site at least over 1280×800 resolution – Wow!
• We have a new rotating ad section there on the right, where I will be rotating in fresh stuff from time to time
• A full new “Footer” area that contains some of the most common business/licensing questions we get
• A new smart top nav bar that contains links to the most important bits
• Site optimized to load 40-50% faster
  • Images more efficiently loaded
  • “Double-page-loading” problem fixed (some of you may remember this annoying one!)
  • Upgraded Apache to Lighttpd, which is a faster solution that is used by Wikipedia and many other sites
• And, last but not least, The Biggest Header Ever On Any Website.  Hey, it’s a scrolling website anyway, right?  hehe….

New Video – Behind the Scenes in Iceland

Here is a bit of footage I took a few days ago.  I hope you enjoy it… and let me know if you’d like to see even more behind-the-scenes stuff.

Daily Photo – The Lonely Fishing Hut

Most of the details behind this photo can be ascertained from the photo below.  This place really was in the middle of nowhere…  It was my goal to make it look as lonely as it felt.  As hinted at in the video, I have a full how-to video inside The Clubhouse.

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Travel

Two Worlds in HDR – National HDR Day!

Rick Sammon launched something big and fun over at his website. It’s called “Two Worlds in HDR“. Pop on over to that link to take a look!

There is a fun contest too where you can win a free print of the winning images. Good luck to you!

Daily Photo – The Horse of Sagas

I was in the middle of a beautiful drive in Northern Iceland just past midnight. The sun was about to dip below the horizon, and I was in the last hour of a five-hour sunset. Unbelievable!

I passed a perfect grassy farm filled with perfect Icelandic horses. They are all super hairy and very friendly. The horses have no fear of humans or elves. So I walked right into a group of them and started taking photos. I waited a bit until this fine horse got into position with the setting sun just behind him.

This was taken with a Nikon D3S (Nikon D3S Review) with a 50mm prime lens (Nikon 50mm Review), shot at F/2.8. The ISO was 800 and the shutter speed was 1/1000th of a second. The focus was at 1.1 meters from the lens. Usually I don’t put this information in the post, as it is readily available on SmugMug. But, I figured a lot of people would want to know the specifics on this shot immediately. And yes, this is an HDR — a single exposure HDR from a RAW file.

For more info, see my free HDR Tutorial or get the scoop on the upcoming HDR DVD!

Filed under the categories: Iceland, Nikon D3S, Travel

New eBook from David DuChemin

David just released a new book about shooting in Venice that you might want to check out! Even if you are not going to Venice, he talks about how he took each and every shot… good data that is easily transferable to any situation. Besides that, he’s got a good selection of eBooks on there… maybe something will meet your fancy?

Daily Photo – The Impossible Mountains

I spent a wonderful day and night on a farm in the far north of Iceland with fellow photographers Helga Kvam and Völundur Jónsson. We went out to do some shooting together, and then they made me a fantastic meal… I took a bunch of photos of that event that I will post at a later time.

Völundur and I were discussing one particular mountain that was extremely difficult to photograph. I can’t pronounce the name since I can’t speak dolphin, but it’s about two hours outside of Akureyri. The mountain is very spiky and narrow, and it’s embedded in a very rough patch of peaks.

So I did my best to capture it in context. There are great super-hairy horses everywhere, and four of them were playing on one side of the river. I set up… and waited….waited….waited…. for them to get in the right spot and then finally took a photo.

This shot was taken around midnight. Incredible light for that time, eh?

Filed under the categories: Akureyri, Iceland, Nikon D3X