Viera Wetlands, Central Florida part 2

Captured this lurking alligator while shooting with my Dad at Viera Wetlands in central Florida. I was using a Canon DSLR with a Canon 100-400mm usually racked out at 400.

Viera Wetlands, Central Florida part 1

Captured this Great Blue Heron while shooting with my Dad at Viera Wetlands in central Florida. I was using a Canon DSLR with a Canon 100-400mm usually racked out at 400.

Christmas 2015

First live tree my wife and I have had together in our 7 years of marriage.

Buick Beauty

I went to Old Town in Kissimmee, Florida for a few hours on Saturday night to photograph some of the Saturday Night Cruise. This is one of the few images I came away with.

Hood ornaments like this always catch my eye and usually make for a great photograph. Once I saw it, I then looked for a nice background to place behind it, which is when I decided to shoot the side that had this blue Pontiac in the background.

Bulova 96c35 "The Honeymooner"

"The Honeymooner"

When I got married on December 28th, 2008, I purchased this Bulova 96c35 on my Honeymoon in Clearwater/Tampa, Florida. One of the first nicer watches I purchased up to that point.

This one is a quartz movement that features a retrograde day of the week. The date of the month and 24 hour clock are presented on subdials.

I later had the caseback engraved with "Chad & Sandy 12.28.08"

It's a piece that I rarely wear because it's a bit small for my curent tastes (38mm) and it's a quartz movement. I really only want to collect mechanicals going forward, but, this piece will always be in my collection and hold a special place in my heart.

Stuhrling Original Manchester Ozzie

My Stuhrling Original, Manchester Ozzie. Mechanical automatic movement with day/date complications.

It took two different kinds of Skittles to match the colors on the dial; regular and wild berry.

Citizen Eco Drive Calibre 3100 Big Date

My Citizen Eco Drive Calibre 3100. 

Eco Drives have solar powered quartz movements. This particular model features a perpetual, big date calendar that never needs reset.

The case diameter is only 42mm, which is on the smaller side these days for a guy. So, this hasn't gotten much wrist time on me lately, but, it's still a great piece to have in my collection.

Sottomarino Pilotare Automatic Pilot's Watch

My Sottomarino Pilotare pilot's watch that I've had for a few years now. 46mm case with mechanical automatic movement.

Scott Kelby's Worldwide Photo Walk 2015

On Saturday, I participated in Scott Kelby's 8th annual "Worldwide Photo Walk". The walk in my area was held at Walt Disney World's Magic Kingdom.

I invited one of my friends from my church, Omar Vasquez, who is a photographer as well, to join me. We both used Canon's 50mm 1.8 lens, the "Nifty Fifty", and really put it through it's paces all day long.

Above is one of my favorite images that I captured. Omar had suggested that we go into this candy shop to see what images might present themselves. I'm sure glad we did. I love saturated colors and patterns.

You can view my entire gallery of images from that day by clicking this link to my Flickr gallery.

Color, Texture, Light; It’s All in the Details

One of the things I love about smartphones and Instagram, is the ability to create and share spontaneously. Because of my current schedule, I don’t always get the time to go out and shoot with my DSLR, but I always have my iPhone with me. I find that even when I do have my DSLR along, I still shoot a few things with my phone. Certain subjects or compositions just make more sense for the Instagram realm. Sometimes, I’ll shoot the same thing with both my phone and DSLR. If you look at my Flickr and Instagram feed, you’ll see evidence of that.

One of the ways I keep the two separate visually, is any time I post something on social media that was shot with my phone, I keep the framing square. If it was shot with a “regular camera”, the final cropping will usually still be within a rectangular frame. That’s just my personal guidelines of how I try to categorize my art. Although, I believe the chasm between those two mediums of technology is getting smaller and smaller every year.

As far as what I use to edit my iPhoneography, I use Google’s Snapseed app a lot. I usually bring the image in there first, then I may put a few final touches on it once in Instagram. Both apps have their strong points and do certain things better than the other or just offer something the other doesn’t have.

The things I like to shoot for Instagram are very similar to what I like to shoot with a DSLR; bright colors, patterns and interesting textures. If you enjoy my work and are on Instagram, give me a follow!

“Color, texture, light; it’s all in the details.”