OK, I'm back.... I think

I've been busy since my last installment here so there is much to post, at least photo wise. After jamming through last minute Mother's Day orders, it was time for a visit from my sister and her family from Oregon. It was a house full of shutterbugs. We're quite a site on an outing, all of us with our gear out clicking away. Our poor children who become our defacto models, lol. So, without further ado, here is a select few of the photos from my camera at the various jaunts we ventured to.

Huntington Beach


Corona Del Mar - Remember what I said about our defacto models.... This is my niece Anna who is a good sport considering how often she is called upon to face the camera.





I had a little editing fun with these and the next series to follow. I'm experimenting with some of the presets in Lightroom. I used the Aged Photo preset to start off, then some tweaking of the Exposure, Blacks and saturation. On the second group of Anna and the others that follow, I used the same preset and tweaking but since I had errantly shot these in the wrong white balance setting (tungston), they all had a blue cast to them. I did do some correcting by adjusting the WB in Lightroom but there is still some blue casting. I left it alone because I liked the effect it left after applying the preset and tweaking. The effect adds some vignetting so I tweaked that a little too.

Nephew Eric Skim Boarding




Padraic trying his skills at skim boarding too




More later......

These are two posters I made this year. I've been quite busy of late filling orders, that's a good thing. I'll be back here to blog in a couple of weeks.

Big Sur and There'bouts

BIG SUR, CA
Last weekend we drove up to Big Sur and stayed at the Big Sur Lodge at Pfeiffer State Park for some much needed R&R. Joining us for the trip were Mary's sister Sheila and her Dad John.

Here are a couple of pics from the sights in the Big Sur area.

America's Favorite Pastime - The Oh So Small Version

ORANGE LITTLE LEAGUE'S SEASON BEGINS
Today was my first day of shooting for the Orange Little League. I started with the T-Ballers. They're probably my favorites to shoot not so much for their baseball skills but for their animation and oft non-baseball activities. It's almost hard to take a bad shot at these games. Here are a few from the first batch. I still have a lot of culling to do.

A Weekend Away, Just the Two of Us

BLUE LANTERN INN, DANA POINT
Mary and I celebrated our 17th Anniversary this weekend with our first childless weekend away since we've had children. Mary made all the plans including arrangements for the boys to stay with friends. I didn't know too much about the plans until shortly before we left, although Mary swears she told me. We drove down to Dana Point and stayed at the Blue Lantern Inn. When we arrived, we were informed that we had received a complimentary upgrade to our room reservation.
We had the best room in the place on the top floor with great views of Dana Point Harbor. On Saturday, I was treated to a Swedish Massage that was terrific. On Sunday, Mary had a facial treatment. Unfortunately I did not bring my camera so the photos here were taken with my Blackberry. It really was beautiful and the room was excellent, and the company... top notch. Thanks for a wonderful weekend sweetheart!

Into the Wild

SAN DIEGO WILD ANIMAL PARK
OK honestly, I can't remember when I took these and I didn't check the EXIF to find out. I was looking through some old files and came across these. This is another one of those locations that I'd like to go back to with the express purpose of taking pictures. They have a safari program there that puts you up close and personal with the animals on the back of a truck. It's on my list of things to do. There is so many different types of photo-ops here and not just the animals. All of these were handheld with the Canon 100-400L lens. A few of my favorites...