Ramona, California - July 2011

Schlemmer Family Reunion, Lake Arrowhead, CA

Michele and I headed up to Lake Arrowhead this past weekend for her Schlemmer family reunion. We both had a real good time and it was really nice to meet the rest of the family members I had not met yet. Family members flew in from all over the United States to meet up for a few days of laughs, reminiscing & relaxation.
It was nice to get out of town for the weekend and head up to the mountains with Michele. The entire weekend was packed with fun activities for everyone to enjoy. From our boat ride around Lake Arrowhead to taking hikes around the area, I am pretty sure everyone enjoyed themselves. A special thanks to Michele's Uncle Doug & Aunt Tammy for the good times and hospitality.
Below are a handful of images from the trip. For family members that attended I will keep you posted on all the final images and slide show.

Family Tree

Michele & I.

View of San Bernardino, CA

Boat ride around Lake Arrowhead.

Walk Around the Yard in Ramona

Michele and I were asked to house sit at her mother's house over the weekend and I got there early Friday. Showed up and I don't think the housekeeper was expecting me, she was wondering who I was for the first few minutes. After explaining to her that I was Dina's son-in-law we had a good conversation. Very interesting conversation about her first marriage and second. She told me her first husband liked cheeseburgers and she didn't. And he liked bread over her choice of tortillas. I suppose opposites don't always attract...
Thought I would stay out of her way while I waited for Michele to get there, so, I grabbed the camera of course. Took a walk around the border of the property just to kill some time and get some vegetative stock images for future projects. Below are a few images from my walk around the yard.

Cody (A.K.A. Code Man)

Midori living the rough life.

Tsunami Watch Oceanside

Weather made for some nice somber images of the clouds this afternoon. After hearing the bad news in Chile and listening to reports of Tsunamis I had to take a walk down to the water to check out the conditions. Before the rain started to dump on me I got a few images off. Below are some images from my wet walk down to the beach.
I have some friends taking off on Tuesday for a vacation to Hawaii and I wish them well on their travels.

-14 Degrees Fahrenheit

At least 2-3 times a week I like to take a walk down to the beach to take some photos or just to clear my mind. Being able to walk across the street and view the sunset dipping into the Pacific Ocean almost everyday of the year is pretty nice. My family is originally from Canada, so, winters down here are quite nice compared to up north.
Pretty sure my father still says, "I think I'm going to like it here...".
Looking at the weather in Winnipeg, Canada where I was born I think I agree with him 100%. Yesterday it was a whopping -14 degrees fahrenheit compared to our freezing 65 degree temperature.
I think I'm going to like living here as well....
All images by Joe Hamilton Photography.

Local Landscapes

Below are 5 local landscape photos I've taken in the past couple weeks just by having my camera in the car. You never know when you may come across a picture you just have to take.
All images by Joe Hamilton Photography.

Now back to the Chargers game... Go Chargers!

"Balboa Park Bridge" - San Diego, CA

"South of the Pier" - Oceanside, CA

"The Harbor" - Oceanside, CA

"Tamarack South" - Carlsbad, CA

"In the Sticks" - Lake Hodges, CA

Combining Multiple Exposures

Dr. Brown's Stack-a-matic is a quite a cool tool to check out. My father sent me a link to the Russell Brown Show a few weeks ago and I have been hooked since. There is a ton of information on his site for anyone interested in photography & photoshop.
Combining Multiple Exposures was the first tutorial I wanted to try out just because of previous attempts at capturing star trails. Dr. Brown's tutorial goes over everything you need to know to get the results shown in the images below. All three images were shot at f5.6, 119.0 seconds, ISO 200. The first image was a total of 123 jpeg images and took a little over 4 hours. Second image had a total of 70+ jpeg images shot for roughly 2 hours. Last image is 81 RAW files for 2+ hours. I was checking to see if file size would speed the stacking process up a bit, not really though. Have patience, it does take some time. The 123 image file took almost 2 hours to fully process into the final image.
Check out "The Russell Brown Show" for more information.
Images by Joe Hamilton Photography






Link:
http://www.russellbrown.com/tips_tech.html