I90 Night Bridge – Seattle

29. August 2012 · Comments Off on I90 Night Bridge – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , , ,

Wednesday’s are a bad day for me lately.  I get to work at 7:30 and stay here until gone 9 at night.  So I really don’t get much time to take a picture and post it.

So to overcome that I now get two pictures on Tuesday (clever eh?).  Then all I have to do on Wednesday is write something about the image and I’m done.

So last night I drove to Seattle and photographed the Seattle Boat Club (not to be confused with the Seattle Yacht Club that is in a totally different place).  After shooting that image I went looking for today’s picture.

I was driving sown Lake Washington Boulevard and I saw the I90 Bridge all lit up.  It was pretty dark by this time so they had these red lights along the bridge, and loads of traffic headlights and stop lights on the bridge itself.

So I found somewhere to park and took the image below.  When I took this I was a little worried it may be a little boring as the sky on the back of the camera didn’t look that great.  But when I got home I was pleased with the image.  This was I think a 10 second exposure (or something like that), so you can see the lines of lights from the cars on the bridge.

I managed to get some cloud detail in the sky so it looked ok.  Not bad for a Wednesday image.

Tonight Cater and Master Chief wanted a Caesar Salad, so we made them make it themselves!

Coffee Cup – Seattle

25. August 2012 · Comments Off on Coffee Cup – Seattle · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

Sometimes to get ideas of what to shoot I’ll look on the internet.  Putting in the name of a city or region can display images and views you’ve never noticed.  I guess this could be construed as cheating, but I’m not looking to totally plagiarize an image, I’m just looking for locations and things to shoot.

Anyway, I had to go to work today and I was looking for something I could shoot tomorrow.  So I put “Seattle” into Bing and loads of really nice images popped up.  A few times the image of the coffee cup outside Post Alley appeared.  It would seem that this neon cup is kind of a Seattle iconic image.  Anyway I looked at the pictures and thought “I’m sure I captured that”.  So when I got home I looked in my back-log and sure enough I have the picture.

Obviously Seattle is famous for it’s coffee, it is after all that city the gave birth to Starbucks.  So this large neon coffee cup at the entrance of Post Alley in Pike Place Market represents Seattle quite well.

When I took this it was pretty dark and the market was deserted.  This was a long exposure and the dark sky came out blue.  I think the blue sky and neon sign look really cool together.  Anyway I hope you like the image.

The guys wanted to climb something today, so I pointed them to this – well it’s kind of a glass fake flower display thingy – and up they went!

Marina – Carillon Point

15. August 2012 · Comments Off on Marina – Carillon Point · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

I would bet I could post a year’s worth of picture a day with just “night shots”.   They are starting to be my favorite images, because they are super easy to do (you just set up a tripod and shoot), and the results are always good.

They do say that the perfect time to shoot landscapes is the magic or “Golden” hour that is an hour around sunrise and sunset.  It’s true that you get great pictures at this time but in summer it requires you being up and about at 5:30 in the morning or out waiting for the sun to go down at 9pm!  And when you work for a living that quite frankly is a pain.

That said when the daylight saving goes and we get darker nights I will probably go back to nice sunsets, but I’m digging night shots in the interim.

Today’s image was taken at the Marina in Carillon Point in Kirkland.  This part of Washington is pretty affluent and there are a lot of boats.  So to cater for the demand we have a lot of nice marina’s and this is one of them.

I do think it’s funny though that they put a lock on the gate on the pier, but I guess some of the boats are pretty expensive so it’s a deterrent against board kids, vandals and wan-a-be photographers looking for the perfect picture.

I liked this image when I got home immediately.  The green lilies on the water, the red light in the entrance and the blue sky make a great picture (I think).  Add to that the fact that any lights at night look cool and you get something interesting to look at.

If I’d had a flashlight with me I would have light painted the Marina sign so that stood out more, but such is life I guess.

Today Master Chief and Carter decided to enjoy a game of Jacks!

Grand Wailea Church – Maui

23. July 2012 · Comments Off on Grand Wailea Church – Maui · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , , ,

If you should happen to find yourself in Maui and staying at the Grand Wailea Resort and decide to either renew your wedding vows or even get married, well, the hotel has just the facility you need.  This small church is in the hotel grounds and is available for weddings and vows and I would imagine it’s a pretty busy place.

The church is nicely lit up with stained glass windows providing color inside so I thought I’d grab a shot for the site.  The large number of lamps that light the way to the from the church and the abundance of tiki torches add to the evening ambiance.

While staying at the hotel I’ve seen quite a few weddings, some people have large receptions at the hotel and there are loads of people who opt for a beach wedding instead of the church (it’s probably pretty pricey – everything else is here), and almost every night there’s some bride and groom having their pictures taken on the beach.

Having your wedding pictures taken on a beach really sounds nice, and I’m sure for the wedding party it’s great.  But if you want to take a picture and you have nothing to do with the wedding good luck!  The local professionals hog all the good locations and prevent you from standing in the best place for a sunset picture – that is of course unless you want to photograph the bride of the day as well.

Talking of sunsets… I can’t get a good one, and I’ll tell you I’ve tried, several times.  The main problem is that the sun sets over Lanai which is an Hawaiian Island to the west of Maui.  To make matters worse Lanai has a large extinct volcano in the middle (don’t they all) and all around the peak are puffy white clouds.  So the sun actually sets behind the white clouds, and the sunset lasts around 60 seconds.  Even in it’s best moment, it’s not great.  I’ll keep trying though and I may get one before I leave.

Anyway, back to the church.  I took this shot just after the sun went down and with a long exposure got the sky to look almost light blue.  Fortunately nobody was in the way and I got the shot below first time.

Cater and Master Chief hit the beach this afternoon, but Carter made a huge mistake and fell asleep, so Master Chief buried him!

Grand Wailea Grounds – Maui

20. July 2012 · Comments Off on Grand Wailea Grounds – Maui · Categories: Image a Day · Tags: , ,

We had a really busy day today visiting a sugar museum, water fall and a working plantation where the family went zip lining.  The result of all this is that I have around 500 pictures to sift through and it will take too long to find a good image, process it and post it to the site.  As a result I’m posting another “view from our hotel” image, that I took last night.

This one was taken just after the sun set from in front of the spa.  In the center of the image you can see a decorative pond with fountains and beyond that some dolphin statues – you’ll probably have to trust me on that one as they are quite small in the image.  Either side are some lit up gazebo’s that lead you down to the adult’s 18 and over pool.  Now I’d definitely like to spend some time there, but apparently that’s not the “thing” to do on a family vacation. so I’m not allowed.

Beyond the adult pool are some palm trees, duh yeah I know we’re in Hawaii.  And then there’s the sea.  Outside of this picture to the left of the adult pool is the family pool with 3 major slides, a rapids drop and a lazy river.  Oh yeah and a rope swing and water elevator.  Yup you read that correctly, a water elevator, apparently the only one in the world.  You swim in and they pump water in and you float on seats to the top of the elevator shaft, then you swim out and go down a slide – nice eh?

The sky in this image came out well and the lights around the gazebo’s made them look pretty cool too.  Add to this the lights on the fountains and you end up with a pretty picture.  And yes, Maui really is this beautiful.

It was really hot today the Carter and Master Chief started to over heat.  So when we got back to our room they found a way to cool off.

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