Last week we returned from our too short of a stay in Key West to the Connecticut cold. In our absence, a huge winter storm dumped about 2-3 feet in New England. I guess you might say that we timed our trip perfectly. The only good thing about going back home is that winter only has a little more than a month to go. I thought I would post an image that I took this past fall of a farm that is about 15 minutes from my home. While the foliage was not at its peak, I really liked the color contrast and reflection of the barn.
Deserted Streets
I have posted numerous photos from one my favorite places in Europe -- Kotor, Montenegro. A major attraction of Montenegro is sailing the 15 miles from the Adriatic Sea through the Bay of Kotor and reaching the town of Kotor. The huge bay is surrounded on all sides by towering mountains that dwarf the towns and boats on the bay. We spent most of the day on a tour boat that took us onto the bay, visiting Our Lady of the Rocks (a church on a small island in the middle of the bay) and neighboring towns. When we returned to our cruise ship, we decided to head into Kotor. Kotor is surrounded by an impressive city wall built by the Republic of Venice. Venetian influence can be seen in the city's architecture. As there are only about 5,400 people living in Kotor, the streets were pretty deserted as we walked the town, giving me an opportunity to take photos without having to deal with crowds.
Golden
This image is another one that I decided to re-edit as part of my transition to my new site. Although I had been to San Francisco a number of times, I had never been to this side of the Golden Gate Bridge before. I took this image toward the end of our trip, which started in Yosemite followed by King's Canyon and Sequoia National Parks. After that, we headed down to Morro Bay and spent the rest of the trip driving and staying at different spots along the coast. We hit San Francisco and I had found out that the best perspective from the south side of the bridge was from Baker Beach. We headed there late in the day and arrived in the fading light. My wife, who is not a fan of sand, watched as I set up and took this shot. Her only comment to me was, "That is the most sand I ever had in my shoes."
Wall Peelings
Every winter, I try to escape the cold and head somewhere warm. We landed in Florida yesterday afternoon and plan to spend some time in Fort Lauderdale before we head to the Everglades and Key West. I will still be posting unless I have internet accessibility issues.
Today's image is from Philadelphia's Graffiti Underground located on an abandoned loading pier jutting out into the Delaware River. The underground is a favorite spot for paintballers and graffiti artists (as well as urbex photographers). While there are so many opportunities to shoot unusual compositions, I was really taken with this "wall covering" that had peeled away from the wall. The textures and lines in the covering led my eye toward the terrific vanishing point made by the column openings.
Golden Reflections
When my website was infected with malware earlier this month, I transitioned to a new website. One of the tasks that I needed to do was to export my previously published posts and import them to Squarespace. As part of going live, I had a chance to review my images and realized that there were a few that I really wanted to re-edit as my processing skills have improved since I initially edited them. This is the first image that I have re-edited.
This image was taken on a Scott Kelby Worldwide Photo Walk a few years ago. Photo walks are a terrific way to meet new people and spend a morning walking around a location taking photos. The year I participated, about 30 photographers were set loose in downtown Hartford and took photos of everything they could find. This reflection on Hartford's Gold Building caught my eye and it turned out to be my favorite of the day.
Ten Centuries and Going Strong
Taos Pueblo is truly a testament to the culture and history of the Pueblo people. The Pueblo is approximately 1,000 years old and is located on a reservation of 95,000 acres. The Pueblo today appears much as it did when the first Spanish explorers arrived in New Mexico in 1540. There are approximately 150 people living at the Pueblo and do so with no running water and electricity. The residents are artisans who produce and sell traditionally handcrafted wares, such as pottery and silver jewelry. They are friendly and willing to tell you about their culture, art and way of life.
This image is of the Pueblo's most prominent architectural feature - a multi-storied residential complex built with reddish-brown adobe. The buildings are amazing for their age considering that they are 1,000 years old and are still occupied.
Reservoir Beauty
Fall in New England can be a wonderful time to visit to take in the glorious colors of the foliage. The only problem with visiting during foliage season is guessing exactly when the peak of the season will occur. Some years it is early October and other years it waits to November to peak. The weather and rainfall have a lot to do with it as well as where in New England you go. Elevation also is a factor along with the type of trees in the area.
Living in Connecticut, it is easier to tell when the foliage is peaking but it still isn't an exact science. My ritual is to take multiple drives around the state (usually in the northwest corner) to check out where and when the foliage will peak. This image was taken on an early drive when the foliage was still beginning to turn. The location is the Barkhamsted Reservoir which is about 20 minutes from my home. The reservoir was created in the 1940's with the building of the Seville Dam. It took 8 years for the reservoir to fill.
The Chapel
One of my favorite photos that I took last year was featured in this blog post titled "The Miraculous Staircase." I liked it so much that I sent the image off to Image Wizards to have a metal print made of it. For those of you that have never had a metal print made, I highly recommend doing so as the metal makes prints look absolutely awesome. The print now hangs proudly in my home.
The staircase itself is the dominant feature of the Loretto Chapel in Santa Fe. It stands 22 feet tall and makes two 360 degree turns from the floor to the small choir loft above. Perhaps the most amazing thing about the staircase is that it was built with no glue or nails -- only square wooden pegs with no center support. Once a Roman Catholic Church, the Chapel now serves as a museum and can be rented for weddings.
I wanted to show a different view of the staircase than in the original post to better show its relation to the rest of the small chapel. If you are ever visiting Santa Fe, make it a point to spend some time at the Loretto Chapel.
Irish Green
Yesterday's post of the North Sea was from our British Isles cruise that we took a few years ago. I thought I would post today from the same trip. One of our ports of call was the wonderful city of Dublin, Ireland. We elected to take an early morning excursion to Powerscourt Estate before we spend the rest of the day in Dublin.
Powerscourt is a large country estate which is noted for its house and landscaped gardens covering 47 acres. The gardens are arguably the most beautiful gardens in all of Ireland. The grounds are meticulously maintained and the building, as seen in the image, is in excellent shape for a 13th century castle. I chose this perspective under a huge tree as I like the play of light and shadow on the lawn as well as the color contrast with the sky.
Intensity
Sometimes you get lucky and get a great shot when you least expect it. On this occasion, we were on a cruise around the British Isles and we had left the Orkney Islands around 6pm. Being summer and being so far north, it stays light very late into the evening. We ate dinner and retired to our room about 10pm. I laid down and began to doze off when the phone rang. Our friend Nancy was on the phone and said "Look at the guy, quick!" I jumped off of the bed, ran to the door, looked out the keyhole and saw...nothing. The hallway was empty. I called her back and told her there was no one there. Her comment was, "What is wrong with you? I said look at the sky! Bring your camera with you." I grabbed my camera, slid open the drapes and captured this image. Nice to be lucky and have a friend to help when you are not thinking or hearing straight. Thanks Nancy.
Welcome to My Revamped Website
As I outlined in yesterday's post, I have made the move from my self-hosted (Go Daddy) Wordpress website to a Squarespace hosted website. For those of you who receive my posts via RSS, subscribe to www.lensaltiel/blog to receive new posts from the new site.
So why did I pick Squarespace as the the new home for my site? First a little history. When I first launched my site, I picked Wordpress because it was a free platform and was very customizable. After loading Wordpress and buying a theme, I found that customization was not as easy as it sounded. It took me a long time to get the site the way I wanted it to look and function because I had no idea how to code. I struggled to figure out how to do so and literally searched the theme's forums looking for other people's requests who were trying to do what I wanted. I literally copied code out of the forum messages, tried it on my site to see if it did what I wanted it to do. If it did, great. If it didn't, back to searching. After finally getting the site looking like I wanted, it was off to find Wordpress widgets to try and see if I could get some functionality that I wanted. The whole process was daunting and I swore that I didn't want to go through it again and so when I launched the site two years ago, I avoided making any additional changes to it.
When the old site contracted malware a couple of weeks ago, it was the impetus to make a site change that I had been avoiding to do. In picking a new platform, I wanted one that did not require me to use code and was tighter from a security standpoint (while I don't know how my old site contracted the malware, I am convinced that the use of a customizable platform like Wordpress was a factor). I had heard of Squarespace through their sponsorship of several podcasts that I listen to. It sounded like a platform that met my needs so I signed up for a trial and gave it a go. Obviously, I liked what I saw and migrated my Wordpress site there.
For those of you who are thinking of trying it out, here is what I really like about Squarespace. Most important to me, you really don't need to to know how to code. The new site has been built by using their Layout Engine, which is really powerful. Changes can be made by dragging blocks of information around a webpage. The Layout Engine also allows for just about anything to be placed on a webpage from images to galleries to video to audio. You can even use code if you are so inclined. How it all works together does take a little time to learn but once you grasp the concepts, it gets pretty easy. Because it is more of a self-contained solution, there are not as many "widgets" available as the Wordpress platform. In my case, it helped to have the site be less cluttered and have a cleaner look. The other cool feature is Squarespace's new mobile application that keeps my galleries and images in synch with my iPhone and iPad. Pretty slick app although they need to build in slideshows.
There is one puzzling aspect to the site which I hope they fix in an upcoming release. Being a photographer, I want to use my photos in blog posts, galleries and other site pages. Rather than upload the image once, you must upload it every place you want to use it. Seems like a storage hog for Squarespace and an inefficient process for users.
Anyway, that's a quick look at my revamped site. Having only used it for about three weeks, I am sure that I will learn other ways and functionality that will help me to enhance the site. If anyone has any questions, I'd be happy to answer them.
Website Woes
I am sure some of you may have noticed my absence over the past couple of weeks. I wish that I had been traveling to some exciting locations shooting new images but that was not the case. My self-hosted Wordpress website was the victim of some vicious malware and was blocked by Google. Fortunately, I was able to get the aid of a friend to get the site to what we thought was malware free. That only lasted a couple of days, whereby the site came crashing down with a Wordpress programming error. Again, my friend came to the rescue and the Wordpress problem was taken care of. Mere minutes after the Wordpress problem was fixed, the malware reappeared and the site was again attacked. After about a week, the site has been now functional again.
Right around the time that the malware first appeared, I was considering changing the site design to something more clean looking. I took this opportunity to take a look around and see what I could find that would be a viable alternative to my Wordpress site. If you are reading this, the new site, hosted on Squarespace, is alive and well with my URL pointing to the new website. My next post will address why I chose Squarespace and how the transition went, both positive and negative.
In Bloom
Just a quick post and run for today. This image of a flower was taken at Powerscourt Estate just outside of Dublin, Ireland. It is a large country estate which is noted for its house and landscaped gardens. The house was originally a 13th century castle.
Venice Alleyway
Thanks to all who let me know that my site had some viewing issues. The issue has been fixed and is now back in action. Walking around cities in Europe often transports you to a different time. The age of the cities and architecture add so much character and feel to them. My favorite city to walk around is Venice, Italy. Here the city's character is enhanced by the labyrinth of canals that replace streets in other cities. I am always looking down side "alleyway" seeing what beauty lies there. Almost every little side "street" is a photo opportunity. This photo is representative of what a visitor might find walking around. While some other European cities have beautiful canals, there are none with them everywhere one walks.
Yoho Majesty
Yoho National Park in British Columbia is often a side trip from nearby Banff National Park, at least it was for me. After my visit there, I know that the next time I visit the Canadian Rockies, Yoho will more than just a side trip. The main attraction in the park is Emerald Lake which is the largest of the 61 lakes that are contained within it's borders. The lake is surrounded by the mountains of the President Range, as well as Mount Burgess and Wapta Mountain. The lake derives it's name from the color of the water which is most vivid in the summer. Due to its high altitude, the lake is frozen from November until June.
Shooting Through the Raindrops
I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season and a great start to the new year. Today's photo is from our cruise down the Rhine River in Germany. There is a stretch of the river in Germany that features twenty-eight castles and too many little towns to count. Many of these towns have beautiful churches that dominate the surrounding buildings. About an hour after entering this part of the Rhine, the heavens opened up, making shooting a bit tough. Despite this, I was determined to get a few shots despite the fact that everyone on the observation deck had abandoned it (at least there was some cover). I was able to get this shot of the Church of Our Lady in Oberwesel, Germany through the raindrops after which I headed below decks to have some refreshments while enjoying the scenery.
Cape Elizabeth Icon
No visit to Portland, Maine is complete without a visit to nearby Cape Elizabeth and its iconic lighthouse, the Portland Head Light. While there are numerous lighthouses along Maine's rugged coast, this is one of the largest and arguably the signature lighthouse of Maine. The light is surrounded by a huge park where visitors can picnic and engage in recreational activities. Although I didn't shoot this in soft early morning light (I was actually scouting for the next day), it is still a pretty impressive structure.
Olde Mysterium
Late last year I posted this image of "The Old Book". This past spring, I was contacted by an aspiring writer whose wife had seen my image and felt it would be perfect for his first published book. He sent me a copy of his book and it is an uplifting story about broken relationships, forgiveness, and faith. After reading the story, I saw why my image resonated with them. This is my first published book cover and I am pleased that my image is associated with such a fine book. The author's name is Douglas Patten and information about the book can be found at his website.
Osborne Family Festival of Lights
Christmas at Disney is an amazing time with all of the decorations and lights on display. Perhaps the most amazing display that we saw was the Osborne Family Spectacle in Lights in Hollywood Studios. Today's post (as well as yesterday's) features a small part of this wonderful display. I had never heard of the Osborne display prior to our visit and the story behind it is quite interesting. In 1986, a daughter in Arkansas asked her father (Mr. Osborne) to decorate their home in lights. Osborne complied, stringing 1,000 lights around their home. Each year after that, Osborne tried to outdo the previous year and even purchased the two properties next door to expand the display. By 1993, the display had over three million lights and had gotten so big that cars were backed up for miles to see it. Six neighbors filed a lawsuit, saying traffic congestion made trips to the corner store take two hours, and they feared emergency vehicles could not get down the street. Osborne responded by adding three million more lights. The Arkansas Supreme Court ultimately ruled to close the display.
Disney World contacted Osborne about moving the display to its Hollywood Studios Theme Park. Osborne accepted Disney's offer. In 1995, the display was set up in Disney and was known as "The Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights". Today, the display is made up of over 10 miles of lights connected by another 30 miles of extension cords. It takes 20,000 man-hours to install the display each holiday season, starting in September. The lights are turned on at dusk each night, starting in mid-November and runs into the first week of January. In 2004, Disney added 33 snow machines to create an artificial snow effect to the display. In 2006, the park added over 1,500 control switches to the display to enable the lights to switch on and off electronically. The switches were choreographed to a musical scores.
Suffice it to say, the Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights is an overwhelming display that must not be missed. I can't imagine that a more impressive display exists. This image is a small microcosm of the full display.
Merry Christmas
Just a quick post wishing you and your families a wonderful Christmas. I hope Santa delivered the presents that you wanted.