Pre-dawn in Grand Place, Brussels
Before the day begins in Brussels, Belgium
When I travel, I always try and get up before sunrise to get out and shoot, if possible. It can be hard, but it is always rewarding, and I always return with images that I am happy with. Especially in a big city, those early morning hours are perfect for capturing scenes that would otherwise be completely full of people.
Today’s photo is a perfect example of this. I was up and out shooting at around 5:30am in Brussels some years back. I wandered into Grand Place, their amazing and beautiful city square, and had it essentially to myself.
Any other time of day, this place is swarming with tourists, but way before dawn it was quiet, empty and perfect!
Incredible Iceland
My favorite images from Iceland 2022 - what a trip!
My favorite images from my Luminar Photo Camp trip to Iceland!
Back in November, my good friends over at Skylum included me as an instructor on their Luminar Photo Camp in Iceland. It was a week of fantastic photography and camaraderie with other photographers. We all walked away with great images and amazing memories - not to mention new friends!
Here’s a selection of my favorite images from the 2 weeks I spent over there. And while 2 weeks sounds like a lot of time - and in some ways it is - I feel like I have barely scratched the surface of taking photos of Iceland. It’s just an incredibly beautiful place and has a really strong pull for folks like me.
All of these images were captured with my Sony A7R3 and two of my favorite Sony lenses: the 16-35mm f/2.8 GM and the 14mm f/1.8 GM. These are fantastic landscape lenses and give me so much capability. And, I was using the Peak Design travel tripod too, in case you were curious. Small, light and compact - yet very sturdy. Works every time!
Nights in Bayeux
A couple of shots captured during the lovely, soft light of blue hour, in the small French town of Bayeux.
A few years ago, we took a trip to France, and one of the things we wanted to make sure to do was visit Normandy. It’s a beautiful area and there are several towns that looked interesting, but we settled on Bayeux and spent a couple of nights there. Of course, I hit the streets with my camera as much as possible, because shooting in foreign cities just makes me happy. It wasn’t crowded at all, which is great for me, and I was able to wander freely and shoot quite a bit. I just have a thing for street scenes, and doubly so when they are European. These two were captured on my wanderings. Nothing particularly spectacular about them - just everyday spots under the soft light of twilight.
Sunrise on Diamond Beach
Sunrise on Diamond Beach in Iceland, complete with flowing water and massive chunks of glacial ice. A dream come true for sure!
Diamond Beach is the famous beach in Iceland where all these chunks of ice lay about, and photographers like myself run around taking photos and screaming with excitement. Well, ok maybe I was the only one screaming, but still. It’s exciting.
We got up early one morning to make sure we were in place for sunrise, though thankfully sunrise was around 9:30am this time of year. Regardless, I was up around 6am to get dressed and fed, and we left by 7:30am or something like that. It was maybe a 30 minute drive, and when we arrived it was still relatively dark and of course we had the beach to ourselves. The exploring began.
I wandered around, taking stock of these ice chunks and trying to find a composition that I liked. While there were a lot of chunks of ice on the beach, based on the tide it was obvious that most of them would never get touched by a wave - and let’s face it, we were all going for those cool shots of water moving around these ice chunks.
So many of us ended up photographing this same huge chunk, albeit from slightly different angles. Regardless, I was very pleased to be standing there in the first place, capturing these two photos which I consider my best from that outing. Having seen so many shots from this place in the past, it was quite literally a dream come true to be standing there taking my own.
A quick teaser about my Iceland trip
I’m just back from Iceland, and about to head out again on a business trip. So until I have the time to properly edit my images, I thought I would share a little summary of the trip with some iPhone images sprinkled in for illustrative purposes. It was an amazing trip and I have some fantastic images to share. Here’s a teaser!
Oh my, Iceland truly is an epic landscape photography destination!
I have spent the last ~8 days in Iceland, and it is amazing. Epic. Unreal. All those superlative descriptions work just fine. It was an incredible trip and one that I will be digesting for a long time. I walked away with a lot to think about, and I intend to share it all here once I get a chance to really absorb everything that happened. (It was all extremely positive, just in case that wasn’t clear.)
In short, I was there with my friends at Skylum Software (makers of my favorite photo-editing app, Luminar). They hosted their first ever Luminar Photo Camp, and I was lucky enough to be invited along to help with the camp as one of their staff, as well as to deliver a couple of sessions on Luminar editing to the camp attendees.
Overall, it was an amazing trip filled with incredible and iconic photo locations, and led by some amazing photographic Masters. I was honored to be there with them, hang out with them and get to know them. Heck, I even consider them friends now. I learned so much, and I am eternally grateful to Skylum Software, the Masters, and of course all the camp participants. I feel like I owe every one of them a huge THANK YOU.
Until I get the time to really cull my photos, edit the best ones and write about all the adventures, I thought I would at least put out this quick summary with some iPhone shots that I took on the trip, from various spots around the country. Consider this a teaser of sorts, a preview of coming attractions.
You can follow me on Instagram, Facebook, Flickr and/or Twitter which I will use to share these shots as they are ready. But of course there is no better place to really write about something than on a blog, and I will make sure to share my thoughts right here. By the way, feel free to join my newsletter if you would like to stay up to date on these things. The subscribe ink is in the upper right on my main blog page. I just sent one out yesterday so feel free to check that out right here.
So in no particular order, here are some quick iPhone snaps from this amazing trip - enjoy!
A view over the lovely city of Reykjavik from the top of their church tower
The famous sculpture “Sun Voyager”
An interesting side street I noticed while wandering in Reykjavik
The amazing Skogafoss
The beautiful glacial lagoon Jokulsarlon
Sunrise at Blue Lagoon, their famous geothermal baths
We had a lovely sunrise at Diamond Beach!
One of the most interesting experiences was shooting sunrise from inside this ice cave.
An incredible cloud formation over the coastal village of Vik
Skulking about in London
Lovely long exposure work from lovely London…
I love to just wander the streets of London. It’s my favorite city and I always find beautiful things to aim the camera towards. This was one of those evenings. I was all over the place and whenever I see a busy street (at every turn in London LOL), I like to set up the tripod for a long exposure and capture some passing cars.
The Pantheon
The Pantheon in Rome, an amazing structure and well worth visiting!
Rome is just lovely. I would be really happy to go spend a week or so there, wandering and shooting like mad. So much history, beautiful architecture…I think I would skip as much sleep as possible! Here’s one I captured there a few years ago, just as blue hour descended on the Pantheon. I really thought it was more powerful in monochrome.
Lovely Llanrwst
The teahouse in Llanrwst, in Snowdonia National Park, Wales. Such a gorgeous setting!
I just fell in love with this view while in Wales. I came by twice to shoot it, and would have come back a third time if my schedule had allowed it. It’s just a beautiful little spot, and even though my compositions are essentially the same from both visits, I didn’t care. I just wanted to stare at this gorgeous little teahouse, take its photo, and revel in the fact that I was there.
Exploring Lake Ogwen
A lovely waterfall in Snowdonia National Park, in Wales…
When I was in Wales back in August, one particular area that I wanted to see was the valley around Lake Ogwen, in Snowdonia National Park. All the photos looked lovely and everything I read about the area made it sound just beautiful - and it was all correct. The area is gorgeous and I found all sorts of things to point the camera at. Not the least of which were several waterfalls, such as the one you see here. This was just under the bridge at one end of the lake where is spills into a lower valley.
A stunning Welsh sunset
A stunning sunset in lovely Conwy, Wales…
On my first night in Wales, I was treated to a really beautiful sunset. This was in Conwy, looking over the castle and enjoying the trip. I captured this using my 10 stop filter, in order to allow those clouds to streak across the sky.
The light in Italy
I had to get up from our dinner to go shoot this, but who can focus on a meal when this is happening??
This was an amazing sunset (I guess that is pretty obvious though). We were dining in Praiano, Italy along the Amalfi Coast, and sat on a terrace overlooking this beautiful area. As the light began to change, I got more and more twitchy until I just had to get up, leave dinner, and take photos. I just couldn’t miss something this spectacular. This is definitely in the top 5 sunsets I have ever witnessed, maybe top 3. Just so gorgeous!
Covent Garden
Night in London, and I was out shooting at Covent Garden…
Ah, lovely London - so much to see, so much to shoot! I do love London, and each time I visit I try and stop by Covent Garden for a least a quick visit. I find the main structure (pictured here) as well as the surrounding area to be quite beautiful and photogenic. I captured this on my trip there a couple of years ago, and did edits to this photo in On1 Software.
The stunning city of Prague
A gorgeous view over the equally stunning gorgeous city of Prague…
There are few cities more beautiful than Prague - perhaps none. Sure, Paris is gorgeous, but that’s probably the only other city that even comes close to matching Prague’s beauty. This is a famous view in Prague, looking over Tyn’s Church from the top of their city hall. It’s just such an amazing sight to behold!
Like a fairy tale
A little fairy-tale teahouse and bridge from Llanrwst, Wales - such a beautiful little spot!
When I was visiting Wales recently, I made it a point to stop in the little town of LLanrwst, simply because I wanted to see this bridge and the little tea house across the river from it. I had seen a lot of pictures of this place, and it was just something I had to see. It’s very quaint and beautiful, and immediately made me think of something you would find in a fairy tale. When it came time to edit the image, I just ran with that whole fairy tale theme and had a lot of fun with it. That’s the beauty of digital photography - you can do just about anything to your images. It’s so fun!
Morning on the Charles Bridge
Sunrise in Prague and I was on the Charles Bridge, firing away happily…
This morning in Prague started EARLY. I got up about 4:30am in order to get out and walk to the Charles Bridge, with plans to be in place before sunrise. Luckily, that was plenty of time and I nearly had the bridge to myself, which was exactly what I wanted. There were a few people here and there - mostly those returning from an extended night out - but otherwise it was blissfully quiet and I had some fabulous light, too. All in all, a wonderful way to start a day in Prague!