Stuck In Customs

Category Reminder

I’m usually pretty good about tagging the daily entries with categories.  If you see one that interests you, just click on the tag at the bottom.  For example, this one is in China, so clicking that will take you to all the China photos.  I only put up about 15 per page, so if you click “Previous” at the bottom, you’ll get another set of 15, and so on.

Daily Photo – Shopkeeper in Beijing on Steps

I carry around two cameras so I can get things like this.  I keep my main body affixed to my tripod with whatever lens fits the bill.  This is either a the 14-24 or the 28-300.  I keep my second camera with a prime — either the 50 or 85 prime.

I was taking photos of the festive street at dusk, and I noticed this shopkeeper out taking a rest.  I’ve always admired how people can rest in this position.  I can only sit in that position for about 15 seconds before I scream in agony and my patellas pop off at a hyperspeed tangent.

http://stuckincustoms.smugmug.com/Portfolio-The-Best/your-favorites/10668747_AuyBk#1329655537_bnBH

Travel Planning

Are you much of a travel planner?  I kind of am… I think I’m accidentally kind of an expert on this… people always ask me these questions and I should write a little ebook or something.  I have one loosely planned… maybe 2013 or something!  But I do have a title… it’s a quote from Buddha:  “It’s better to travel well than to arrive.”

Daily Photo – The Keyhole to the Old City

This is the second photo I have posted from Montpellier.  I have a lot more to process… it’s a beautiful town!

We were staying with a very nice older couple and had spent the evening in the city.  Before leaving, we were not quite sure how to get back to their home.  After asking, we got one of those very quick but complex set of directions.  They are the sort of directions people give when they have lived somewhere their entire life…  They mention landmarks that they are quite sure we have already seen and give dire warnings about going down the wrong fork in, oh, you know the place….so on and so forth… and then we were thrust out into the cruel city… not really having any sure way of finding our way home…  but, I figured, as long as we were lost, we would take photos along the way.  That is when I saw this…

http://stuckincustoms.smugmug.com/Portfolio-The-Best/your-favorites/10668747_AuyBk#1329641502_p

Free HDR Tutorial

I’ve updated the free HDR Tutorial with a bit of new information.  I also updated the link to the un-free HDR Video Tutorial that has the same sort of thing… just on video…  We now have over five languages and even more in the works for the free version… stay tuned!

Daily Photo – A Dusk Walk in Montpellier

We headed out on an evening walk with our wonderful hosts in Montpellier, France.  They’ve done a few nice things to the city to minimize car traffic. There is a lot of public transport on light rails, and that tended to keep congestion down.  You don’t really realize it until you compare it to someplace like Milan or Daegu, but there just aren’t a lot of cars driving around all the most interesting places.

Taking the “back way” to dinner, we stopped at this perfect little intersection so I could take a quick photo.  It was a highly recommended spot by my friend Jacques.  This is the Cathédrale Saint-Pierre de Montpellier an elegant and unique cathedral that has a castle-like feel to the facade.  Since I always get excited when I see a castle, this got a big thumbs up!

Tips for Immoral Activities in Church

This is an OLD one from 2007. Remember good old 2007? iPods were bulky and so was my camera. I guess it still is. Anyway, here is a Top 10 Tips list about how to take photos inside of a church….

Daily Photo – The Epic Cathedral

I got this shot right before the Catholic Notre Dame police told me to take down the tripod. So I had to be fast… fast like the withdrawal method.

With the wide-angle lens, people do get a little bit stretched, but I think that is okay in some circumstances. It doesn’t really affect my enjoyment of the photo. And, since all the columns are leaning in and whatnot, if the people were normal sized and looked perfect while all the architecture around them was wonky, THAT might look strange. So, by keeping everything a little bit wonky, it kinda works. At least, this is what I am telling myself.

Off the Grid

As you are reading this, I am kind of off-the-grid in Iceland. I will still read all comments, but I may be about 24 hours behind or so — not sure… just letting you know. I understand sometimes people ask a question here or on Twitter and get upset when I don’t answer within a reasonable amount of time, which seems to get shorter and shorter every year!

Daily Photo – The People Mover

This is London, right?

I’m embarrassed to say I can’t quite remember. I processed and edited this photo as part of a bigger trip. I’m too lazy to check the EXIF and cross-reference the dates… even though that would have taken less time than writing this sentence. But, instead, I’m saying it like this to let you know that sometimes my memory fades a bit. Some spots I remember perfect perfect perfect perfect… and others fade away and drift into others. I’m not sure why memory works like this… why there are some things that are perfect and some that are fuzzy. The way that memory works in this incomplete way is interesting to me.

Travel Days

Tips for Managing Airports:

1) Bring snacks from home – You can’t ever find just what you want at the airport… and, when pressed, you may end up getting crappy food that makes you feel kind of junky on the plane.

2) Laugh at the TSA – It is indeed “security theater” as you watch them pat down grandmas and children. I’ve seen so many stupid things they do just to give the “impression” of security, that I try not to get mad any more… and I just try to remember that TSA stands for Tub Stacking Authority. And, also, whenever possible, travel outside of US Airports, where they treat you like a human and not a guy in line at Taco Bell. Try the Japanese airports and you will have a happy experience.

3) Watch people’s eyes – I like to analyze people by looking at the way they are taking in the world around them. It’s very interesting… maybe you can see it too… when people just have a look in their eye like they’ve given up on life. You know what I mean… and then you see the eye of some other people and they look amazingly full-of-life and ready to engage in the world.

Daily Photo – Snowy the Snow Monkey

This little guy and I had a little friendship after a few days.

I spent time all over the hills and rivers here outside of Nagano taking photos of these snow monkeys. And you get to know them after a while… there are a few that you see over and over again. I started giving them names… the same way my daughter gives names to everything… and all the names were quite childish… Like I called this guy, “Snowy.” It wasn’t very creative, but he didn’t seem to mind.

He followed me around morning and night. And he posed… oh how he loved to pose. Some other monkeys I got too close too and they gave me the wide-mouth attack move…. but I never got too close to Snowy. I didn’t want to ruin the little grizzly-man thing we had a-goin’ on.

New Article in the Austin American Statesman

Omar Gallaga met me at Kirby’s here in Austin to have some food and talk a bit. He told me he was working on a new article, and it was just published at: “Austin celebrities try to keep up with fan love in the digital age.”

Book Suggestions…

I’ve been ripping through lots of books lately… here are some suggestions if you are looking for a summer read. I haven’t had a chance to update “Trey’s Book List” yet, but here are some newbies for ya… pop over to Amazon to get em… or Audible if you want the audio book, which I certainly recommend.

• Fantasy – The Name of the Wind by Rothfuss – It’s greatness… and I’m just now on the sequel…
• Sci-Fi – Pandora’s Star by Hamilton – it doesn’t get much better…. what a writer…
• Economics and History – The Rational Optimist by Ridley – Matt is a good friend too…I’ve read all his books… I was a fan way before we got to be friends

You reading any good ones lately you’d like to recommend too?

Daily Photo – Green Mountain, Red House

“Is the house really THAT red?” my wife asks me. Yes, oh yes, it is… But now I am taking her to Iceland with me, so she can see these bright colors for herself…

I don’t know if it’s a Scandinavian thing or what, but we just don’t see colorful houses like this in the states. I think we either have brick, or white, or slightly off-white, or perhaps a light beige, or maybe something daring like a mauve-eggshell-white… I mean, I’m just as bad… mine in stucco. I don’t even think my homeowner’s association would let me paint it red. But, knowing Austin, with a bright red house, we’d probably have a few commies show up in Che Guevara shirts, wondering where the free pizza is…

http://stuckincustoms.smugmug.com/Portfolio-The-Best/your-favorites/10668747_AuyBk#1329615804_BN4JG8q-A-L

Your Favorite Accents?

So I am a total sucker for the British accent… I think it’s so great… People can say the dumbest thing but it sounds like it actually might be intelligent until you have a chance to think about it. But maybe I like the Aussie accent even a little better. They’re always able to take you down a peg or two just with a few well-placed inflections…

What are your favorite accents?

Daily Photo – Grey London

The two greyest cities I have been to are London and Vancouver. But the architecture is so different in both. I prefer bright and colorful architecture, especially in those environs. Sometimes with grey/white/silver/black buildings, I feel like I’m in some futuristic dystopian techno movie… something like… oh Equilibrium. Have you all seen that one?

Anyway, this is kind of a cool building, despite it’s greyness! There is that greenish element in the glass (not sure what it is) that gives it those interesting aqua tones…

Thanks again commenting friends!

I wanted to take a moment here and thank you all again for your comments! I read them all, and I get to know you through your comments. Even better, my MOM gets to know you all even better than me… when we talk on the phone she just goes on and on about so-and-so…. you have no idea… I should record one of our conversations and let you hear! She’s very sharp, has an encyclopedic memory, and has a full psychoanalysis of each one of you! 🙂

Daily Photo – The Mighty Peaks and Soft River

I’m going up again soon to the northern part of Iceland to visit some friends, and it will be great fun. This time, I’ll have to convince them to come out with me on a little photo adventure…

Right before you get to Akureyri, the road twists along a valley that runs beside these mountains. They are beautiful and scenic, but very difficult to photograph. You keep looking and looking and looking for an angle, and it never quite works out. I found this one by accident.

There was a little side road that looked interesting. I took it, and then it almost immediately went off the side of a hill! It turns out it wasn’t a side-road at all, but some kind of fake-road meant to trick dumb people like me. So, after sliding to a stop, I went out to see if my 4th wheel was dangling over the side. It wasn’t, but I did see a little path that went down by the river. I thought there might be a good vantage point, so I took my rig down there to get this shot.