Destination Google!

On Monday Feb 1, I’m speaking at Google for their Authors@Google program. The whole thing will be recorded, so I’ll be able to share it back with the world here once it goes up. You can find out more by following @GoogleTalks. And thanks to Mike Wiacek @MikeWiacek who is the head of the Google Photog Club and to Cliff Redeker @mcrsquared for getting the whole thing set up… I am excited!

Later that afternoon, I’m giving a private photography workshop to people at Google back in one of their secret rooms… That should be a lot of fun too. I’ll be going through, in person, what I have in the HDR Tutorial here on the site.

There is a public photowalk on Thursday, Feb 4 at Stanford.  We’ll meet at 4 PM at the The Oval. There may or may not be a talk after — it depends on if we can secure an auditorium!

Private Tour at Hearst Castle

I’m driving up the coast towards Silicon Valley, and I decided to take my time and leisurely drive up Highway 1.  I’m doing my best to fill the trip with planned and unplanned adventures.

I spent a big chunk of the day up at Hearst Castle.  I was given a private tour whilst guarded by one of LAPD’s finest, who is now a security guard at the castle.  I had carte blanche to go anywhere and shoot everything – it was totally amazing!  I got into the wine cellar, into the top two spires where there are tiny bedrooms, and all over the place.  It was just amazing — I have not had time to process the photos yet… but… you won’t believe it!

Daily Photo – Big Sur in the Morning

5:30 AM.  Alarm goes off.  It’s always painful.  People that say they are “morning people” — I think they are lying.  But, when in a beautiful place, I always force myself, military style, to pop out of bed.  There are hikes to be made and photos to take!

I stayed at the Ragged Point Inn.  My room had a little fireplace and everything (which made it even harder to get out of bed!).  After I got downstairs, I started a little hike to get a good vantage of the coast and the sunrise.  Of course, there was a fence blocking the best bit, so I jumped over it like Carl Lewis (a much older, whiter, and less jumpy Carl Lewis), and edged along the rocky coast to get a good spot.  I forgot to put on my hiking shoes and mistakenly donned my Cole-Haans while in the dark.  Big mistake.  Those don’t make for good hiking shoes, especially after five minutes of getting soaked in morning dew from the foliage I was ripping my way through.

But, I had on my earphones and was blasting away music…  all was good… the sun came up, the clouds were perfect, and I took this photo.

Filed under the categories: Big Sur, California, Nikon D3X, Travel

Want to see other popular reviews?

The Reviews section of the site is filling up fast! I only review stuff that I actually use, but I find myself using more and more stuff! Also, I figure that most people don’t have time to wade through a hundred reviews, and you just want the best stuff out there… that’s what I focus on – The Best Stuff!

Some recent popular reviews include the Nik Software Review, the Woopra Review, and the still-growing Nikon 85mm Review.

Nikon D3S

It’s a great camera. It’s so great I bought one to be a backup for my D3X. Truthfully, it’s more than just a backup — well, rather than repeat myself, you can read the full thing on the Nikon D3S Review page.

Here is a sample video taken with the Nikon D3S.

The D3S is very fast with low noise, so it makes for a great hand-held HDR weapon in your arsenal… and, with that, here is a new photo for the day:

This is a 5-exposure HDR of the Enola Gay at the Air and Space Museum in DC.  It was shot with a 14-24 lens and the Nikon D3S.  The aperture was F/8 and ISO 200.

Last, here is a picture of my daughter Isabella in very very low light, where the D3S really excels

Here is my daughter in downtown Tampa.  How’s that for low-light performance?  Shot with an 85mm 1.4 lens.  This is ISO 1250 on an 85mm lens shot at f/1.4.  1/90th of a second.

Filed under the categories: Nikon D3S, Travel, Washington DC

I Approach my Quarry! Six days ago I was up at 3 AM, listening to Hans Zimmer while editing photos, and then I had an idea for a project with him, so I made a blog post. Now, less than a week later, I was in his studio in California! For those of you that don’t know who Hans Zimmer is, he’s, like, the Liger of composers. He did the soundtrack for The Dark Knight, Pirates of the Caribbean, The Lion King, Gladiator, Sherlock Holmes, and many more! In fact, back when I was in college and had a double major in Computer Science and Geophysics (I dropped the Geophysics bit after a fight with the professor), I commandeered the SGI machine in the Geology department to make a computer animation, and I set the whole thing to one of Zimmer’s songs from Backdraft called “Burn it All”. So, in short, I’ve had Hans Zimmer’s music in my head for about 20 years.

The Story of How I Got Into Hans Zimmer’s Studio

It’s because of you! We have millions of visits here on the blog every month, and you all know how thankful I am for your repeat patronage. It’s tough to get a pretty photo up every day, and I thank you for all your feedback! So, when I put out the call in my newsletter, I got a ton of responses. My math-guess was that I was one or two degrees away from Hans, especially since there are many creative-types that are regular visitors.

Also, many of you hyper-active types (like me!) talk to me, ask questions, and follow me on Twitter — thank you for being responsive to real-time requests and news.

About an hour after I sent out the newsletter at midnight, I got a response from a German gentleman (name private) who is friends with Hans! In fact, he told me he was going to see Hans the next day at his studio near Hollywood! He did a few things to help out, and, although I could not meet Hans today, I did get an amazing opportunity to take photos of his studio. I knew I could make his studio look the way it feels — I had a sublime confidence I could make it happen. Anyway, I was like a kid in a candy store. I got a ton of shots… I only had time to process four of them.

Hans Zimmer’s Studio

I don’t know if words do it justice, but I hope these photos do.

The studio is even bigger than I thought, and I was reminded of the Crimson Lounge in Chicago. In fact, I pulled up the image on my laptop there on the table to compare textures and light. I thought everything worked well together — the decadence and richness of the decorations integrated with the technology. I don’t know if there is a word for such a look… It’s something out of a Phillip Pullman novel, somewhere between Steampunk and Techno-boudoir. Again, words fail.

The first two photos I have placed on Flickr. You can click on them to go to Flickr and then zoom into the full-res size.  Amazing details — especially in the chair photo. I’ll post more in coming weeks, months, and years, as usual.  So, stay tuned… my ongoing quest continues!

Filed under the categories: California, LA, Nikon D3X, Travel

Great Photowalk in San Clemente!

Thanks to everyone that came out for a beautiful sunset in San Clemente! I was happy to meet you all and hope you had a good time. Victor from Typical Shutterbug put up a post with a link to a Flickr group where you can share your photos.

Photo Mystery of the Week

What is the mysterious blue light in the photo below?  Who can guess?

Daily Photo – 1,000 Red Gates

What a wonderful and unique place on earth this is! In Kyoto, Japan, there resides the unique shrine of Fushimi Inari. It consists of thousands of red gates that wind up and down the mountain. I walked through it deep into the night…. I was the only one around and it was downright eerie. Every now and then, the gates would stop and there would be a mini-shrine off to one side or a graveyard to another. Both of these added to the creep factor.

I had a serious worry about an hour into the hike through these gates — what if they turn off the lights? I had no flashlight! I considered my two options — I could strobe my SB-800 to find my way out, which would be a totally surreal experience through these gates. Or, I could do what one of my Israeli hiker friends did in Argentina, use the back of my camera display for light (he actually used his to set up his tent)!

Filed under the categories: Japan, Kyoto, Nikon D3X, Travel

Open Photowalk and Speech at Stanford, between San Jose and San Francisco

Come join us!  It starts at 4 PM on Feb 4.  We meet at The Oval on the Stanford campus. We may or may not have a speech after the photowalk – my man there is having trouble setting up a venue – we will see!

Daily Photo – The Church in Limelight

This is Le Sacre Couer in Paris. It’s a beautiful old Catholic church that sits in the Montmartre section of Paris. I tend to walk around these places 5-10 times as the light is falling… looking at various angles and the like. I see some of the same tourists on every trip around the horn, and they always wonder what the heck I am doing. Of course, this doesn’t bother me, since they’re just annoying tourists, and they barely register as human beings.

Filed under the categories: France, Paris, Travel

Workshop review from Jim Caldwell

At the Florida workshop, a nice gentleman named Jim Caldwell came up to interview me on camera during the first lunch break.  He was a heck of a nice guy, and today he sent me this HDR workshop review that he just released.  Thanks Jim!

First Nikon D3S Photo

I’m still writing my Nikon D3S Review, so get ready for that.  I think I’ll give the first look to people that subscribe to the newsletter.  So, far, I’m very impressed.  In prepping for the event, below is an HDR photo I took yesterday with the new camera.

Daily Photo – The Shuttle in Spacedock

I finally got to see the Space Shuttle!  It’s one of those things a young boy always dreams of seeing, don’t you know?  I’m still waiting on that phone call from NASA where they invite me to see one blast off.  I’d love to do a creative shot there…

This was shot in the new Air and Space Museum on DC.  Yes, not that old one that I used to think was cool when I was a kid.  This is a new and improved center that is completely unbelievable. I had a small argument with a security guard that would not let me take my tripod.  He said I needed a “blue card”.  I asked how to get that and he said the only person that could possibly give it to me was probably at home.  There were a number of bureaucracies where I could have filed a series of complaints, but only if such complaints were filled out in a way as pre-approved by other bureaucracies.  I did send out a self-serving Tweet to @Smithsonian asking them for special dispensation — I hoped to sway them since, after all, one of my photos did hang in the Smithsonian.  They did indeed respond, but one day late. So, I’ll still keep @Smithsonian on one of my Five Twitter Lists.

So, I was forced to take my HDR shots with a hand-held pose.  How barbaric and depressing.  I would try to wedge myself up against a beam or a foreigner when possible, but that rarely works out as good as a tripod.  Those things are never placed in the right compositional spots, sadly.

But, I did have the Nikon D3S as a backup, and I fired this one off.  It was a 4-exposure HDR from -2 to +1.  ISO 400, 23mm, f/6.7 and 1/6 second shutter speed. The +2 exposure was too blurry, and I got most of the light I needed out of the +1 anyway.

Filed under the categories: Nikon D3S, Virginia, Washington DC

Newsletter Soon

I’m working on a new newsletter… all sorts of interesting stuff. I try to give newsletter people sneak peaks, and I have a few things in mind for this time. As always, it’s free… something pretty for your inbox!

Silver Efex Pro

The shot below is a black and white HDR that had some treatment in Silver Efex Pro. I posted one of these not too long ago, but here is a pointer to my Silver Efex Pro Review for you. Even if you think you are not into B&W photography, you will be after using this! The coupon code of “STUCKINCUSTOMS” saves you money too, in case you decide you love the free trial and want to get it.

Daily Photo – The Raised Bones of Arlington National Cemetery

My friend John P from One Man’s Blog suggested that I visit this place while I am on my little trip to DC. It was already on my list, but he bumped it up! I went there to shoot at sunset, and got back to the hotel in enough time to process.

To be honest, it’s quite difficult to make 365 images per year that pass my quality standards! Really! Maybe it looks easy or something… but I assure you it is not! Hehe…

Anyway, it was just my young son and I wandering around the cemetery for a few hours as the sun was going down on a dreary and rainy day here in Washington, D.C. Arlington National Cemetery is considered hallowed grounds around here, and it was a life-changing experience for my son.

After a long walk in a nearly empty cemetery, we made our way to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. The entire facility was closing, and the guard told us it was time to leave. I talked to him for a moment, and he let my son and I through. We went to the steps of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier and sat there for a long time. We were totally alone except for the solitary Honor Guard who was guarding the tomb. There was a light rain and not much day remaining. The Honor Guard walked towards one end of the path, clicked his heels, checked his gun, stood guard, then strode back and forth along his short route. It was completely amazing to be there alone in the rain… just watching this happen again and again.

Filed under the categories: Nikon D3X, Travel, Washington DC

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

Los Angeles Photowalk, Sponsored by Bay Photo, evening of Jan 27!

You are all welcome to meet me at 4 PM on at the San Clemente pier! We will have a nice photowalk through sunset, which is around 5:20 PM. All skill levels, from beginner to master are welcome. A photowalk is just a laid-back event where we stroll around, take photos, and discuss the art of life and whatnot… I was considering giving a talk that night as well, but we don’t have a nearby venue in mind. Maybe one of you has an idea for this…

A big thanks to Bay Photo, who is sponsoring the event. I’m going to be looking deeply into their metal prints very soon and give you a full report.

If you want to come, please leave a comment below… all are welcome – no charge! A big thanks to Candice Cunningham (her twitter) for organizing the event. I first met her when we and Jason St. Peter invited me to speak at the first Smugmug event in Austin.

Hans Zimmer, we Must Meet! Has anyone read Atlas Shrugged and remember the great composer therein named Richard Halley? One of the heroes of the book mysteriously follows him around the world… I envision this dream-state with Hans Zimmer. In fact, I have a most wonderful project in mind that would be unique and right up his alley. I saw this Hans Zimmer Video Interview about his new Sherlock Holmes soundtrack. It was very interesting to hear him talk about this stuff… I have all of his music starred and in special playlists, depending on my mood… In fact, I made a Hanz Zimmer iTunes iMix there on the right for you of some of my favorites. On occasion, I meet a fellow photographer that also loves Hans, and we have an instant connection that is difficult to describe. Look at Zimmer’s recording studio (Thanks @Tatorandtots for the link).  Amazing.  Of course, I could take a much better photo of it… but that is neither here nor there.  My photography studio (only on paper for my upcoming home in New Zealand) will make a wonderful attempt to be a tiny bit cooler, only insofar as I want a window that looks at a beautiful landscape (which can be closed for absolute darkness whilst the post-processing is in full swing).

See my other mixes on Trey’s Music List – Coming up soon – Ambient New Age, World Music, and other unexpected things…

Speaking at Google HQ, Stanford, and errrrr – something in the “Cupertino area”

The topic is “The Unexpected Art and Science of HDR Photography”.

Although I can’t discuss the latter, I can describe the talks I have at the Google HQ and Stanford.  If you know someone at either institution, perhaps they can get you in.  These are all closed, private events, but if you have some good Silicon Valley contacts, maybe you can make it happen. The presentation will be quite different than one might expect… I think it might prompt everyone to see the world from a slightly different perspective – I think we are finally getting to a spot where art and science can come back together in a natural way.

The talk at Google will be recorded in High Def and put on YouTube (thanks @GoogleTalks!) for the you all to see after everything gets edited together. I’d like to thank Mike Wiacek @MikeWiacek, who heads the Google Photog Club and Cliff Redeker (@mcrsquared) for setting this up.  I’ll be giving a short workshop there on the Google campus that afternoon…

Daily Photo – California in the Morning

I woke up early one morning in the hotel to drive down to the seaside in San Luis Obispo to catch the sunrise.  It’s really beautiful and peaceful there.  I’m not really a morning person — this much should be known… more of a night-owl.  But, maybe if I lived in California I might actually wake up early to catch the light of these sunrises.

I know I get many requests to be my assistant — but you don’t understand how bad it would be… I’d make you do things like wake up even before me, get me coffee, warm up the car, and all other sorts of things that you’d probably resent after a while…  People seem to get over-enthusiastic about being my assistant, so I try to tell them bad things like this to dissuade them!

And below is a shot from a hotel I stayed in last time I was in LA… they have this cool outside firepit. I need more firepits in my life….

Filed under the categories: California, San Luis Obispo, Travel

My Biggest Photo Ever and Flickr can’t handle it

The TIFF of the photo below is 984 megs, and the JPG is 124 megs! It’s about 16,000 pixels across and very fun to zoom in on as you go down the lane. I dropped it to 12,000 pixels so I could upload, but, I feel a little short-changed!

You can see the Original Size below, zoomed into 100% down the middle of the lane…

I wish Flickr would offer a premium subscription where I could post huge photos. I’d gladly pay $200 a year for a premium subscription that gets me all sorts of extra features, like big photos, high quality videos like my Vimeo sub, tier 1 tech support, and all sorts of other goodies.

Another Forest Photo, Hanging at HQ of Flickr Competitor

The fine people at Smugmug (see my portfolio there at StuckInCustoms.smugmug.com) have chosen my Bamboo Forest photo to hang inside their headquarters in California.  They are actually building a 60″ lightbox behind it.  I’ll see it in person in a few weeks when I go visit the crew there.  I’m looking forward to it!

Daily Photo – Wormsloe, the Endless Forest of Savannah

My friend Scott Kublin (who made it to my Favorites page on my iPhone… he was at the bottom, but I just moved him up above the babysitter) lives in Savannah, so it was good to visit him on my little road trip. He commented that regular visitors to Stuck In Customs would probably like to see current shots while I am traveling around!  So, here it is! However, this one took about 3-4 hours to edit, five cups of coffee, and several pieces of pie. Did you see my little “Buy Trey Chocolate For Energy” there in the right column? Yes, I burn through copious calories to create these things. This one almost broke my back, but I am very happy with it.

Some of you may remember this place from Forest Gump… A lot of it was shot down in Savannah. Besides Wormsloe, I also visited some amazingly moody cemeteries, draped in mossy trees. I’ll get to editing those photos another time… maybe when I get back home to Texas!

The photo above, zoomed to 100% in Photoshop, right down the lane…

Filed under the categories: Georgia, Nikon D3X, Savannah, Travel

Another Nice Workshop Review

Thanks for all the nice emails and tweets everyone; I’m glad you had a good time. That is right, I still have no plans for future workshops, but I do appreciate all the feedback and kind requests.

Chris Stamper wrote an HDR Workshop Review on his blog that was very nice. Thanks Chris – I am happy you enjoyed it! Keep up the good HDR work and fight the good fight for us!

Nikon D3S Review Continues

I have a Nikon D3S still on loan from BorrowLenses.com, and I’m putting together some images for my Nikon D3S Review.  I don’t have it finished yet…. these things take a while, but, so far, I am very impressed!

In fact, I’m so impressed, that I am going to B&H Photo tonight to buy the full thing as a backup to my D3X! (You can see more info there on my Nikon D3X review)

The Taj Mahal from Akbar’s Palace

This image below was made with some textures from my Textures Tutorial. This is the only time that I “color” photos. Many times, I think people might think that I “paint” on top of my photos, but I do not. Sometimes, however, when I have an image that came out, ummm, a little more boring that it should be, I will give it a texture treatment. Maybe you are like me, and, on occasion, you take what you think will be a great shot. Then, you get home, and it just came out sort of boring.. that is always a bummer feeling. To get around that, I often use textures that I have collected from around the world.

Akbar’s palace has about one-tenth the number of visitors of the Taj Mahal, and it is almost just as stunning for photography. There are so many interesting and fun compositions, you just can’t go wrong. I recommend a full day here and a full day in and around the Taj Mahal. Besides these two major locations, the city streets, alleys, and everything in between are also highly recommended!

Filed under the categories: Agra, India, Travel

My Music Playlist – What are some of your favorites?

As I travel around the world, I’ve picked up an amazing collection of unique music. It’s not for everyone, but if you like eclectic stuff that gets you in a right-brain mode, I think it’s great. This first list I am releasing is my “World Lounge Mix” – I made an iTunes iMix of it and added the mix to Trey’s Music List! Coming soon are some of my favorite songs from other categories, like Ambient New Age, Spanish Guitar, World Music, and more. What are some of your favorite songs? Share them with me – I’d like to know!

Daily photo – The Olde Organ

Okay, if you were in one of my workshops, you are not allowed to guess, because you heard the unexpected answer.

But, of the rest of you, who can guess where this photo of this ornate organ was taken?  Those in my workshop know because I worked on it during the festivities.  It’s so funny whenever I zoom into 100% and people ooh and ahh at the details.  It’s funny because I do the same thing!  I know a lot of people say that 24 megapixel is overkill, but… well… it’s just cool.

I plan for the future when many people have 70 inch wall displays at 10,000 pixels across.  I want to make sure my images are ready for them!

Filed under the categories: Chicago, Illinois, Nikon D3X