I was walking into a friend’s apartment, looked up, and was awestruck with this bright moon in the sky! This is the back alley right behind JP Wine Bar (I took this with my point-n-shoot). Pretty cool huh? Kinda eerie?

After coming home from a business trip last week, I was waiting for the bus at KCI (Kansas City International Airport, who is a client) and I remember turning my head- looking up- and being hit swiftly in the face with one of the most stunning skyscapes I’ve ever seen. I even uttered the words, “oh my god” when I saw this. This was taken at 9:00 PM at night (which is hard to believe right?) and the opening in the sky disappeared only 1-minute after I noticed it. I believe what happened here was a storm has just passed through Kansas City, and what I was seeing was a rare opening /break in the thunderstorm clouds, with the sunset bouncing and reflecting up and through the opening.

It’s an incredible shot, don’t you think?

I have a lot of fun with photography. Sometimes there are shots you take that are very contrived and staged. You position something, move it, adjust it, tweak it, and get it just right. And with enough practice, you can grab a good picture here and there. However, my favorite photos, are the ones you don’t setup or plan for.

Back in 2008, I got to meet one of my favorite local photographers, Mike McMullen. I have purchased a couple framed prints from him, and I’m a huge fan of his work. I had a chance to interview him in a video blog, and he said something, I’ll never forget, that I can especially relate to when describing how I came across taking this photo above. Mike shared…

“Sometimes you just happen to recognize something, and it’s very compelling, and as soon as you know it- there it is- all I can do is screw this up. It just happens to hit you over the head- and wow, I’m so lucky I’m here …all I can do is screw it up.”

I only could take 2 shots of this skyscape with my point-n-shoot Canon S90 before the bus pulled up. And I’m so lucky to have seen it myself and get to share this with you. It’s incredible don’t you think?
–

OK, so the story behind this photo… we passed by this place in Butler, Missouri on our way to skydive, and we couldn’t stop laughing at it …hence the picture! Pretty random huh? We sure had fun with it.

Cliche as it may be, at the beginning of each year, I’m one of “those people” who outline their personal goals for the year. Rewind back in January, I remember grabbing dinner, and having a casual conversation with my friend Adam, to talk about events we wanted to attend and things we wanted to do. We both agreed 2010 was the year we wanted to skydive. No questions about it. At the time, we didn’t realize what we were signing up for…

it.

was.

AWESOME!

I jumped out of a plane at 10,000 feet and fell at speeds around 150MPH. It was every bit of intense as you’d imagine it to be! The wind noise on the initial free-fall was the loudest thing I’ve ever heard. Oddly enough, the abrupt silence that follows catches you by surprise as well. There is no place in the world, more quiet and calm, than the moments up in the air, right after your ripcord is pulled on your parachute. The stomach sensation was nothing at all what I envisioned it to feel like, it’s a completely different feeling than when you dive into a pool or jump off a cliff.

I posted a set of photos from the jump to my flickr stream. If you’re wondering, we went to Skydive Kansas City. It was fantastic! And I’d do it again, and again. I can see how this could get addicting…

Do you remember how good Kansas City Royals were at baseball in the 80’s? How about the amazing KC Chiefs in the 1970s?

I want more than anything to have a hometown winning team again.

People talk about what an exciting time it was to live in this city during those years. Yesterday, was a glimpse of what it would be like to have a winning home team …and a soccer team at that! 52,000+ people watched the KC Wizards beat Manchester United. Sure it may have been their “B” team players (but there were at least 3-4 of their top tier players in the lineup for ManU). Below are a couple of my favorite photos I took with my point-n-shoot Canon S90. You can view the whole slideshow on flickr.

I’ve been working at Digital Evolution Group for 5+ years now. This is the card my boss handed to me today, how cool is this!?! So …where should I go?

You don’t need a fancy camera to take panoramic photos. I shot this one at the St. Louis Cardinals game this past weekend (below), with my point-n-shoot Canon S90 and used a free app to stitch 3 photos together (it comes with Canon cameras). So the next time you see a pano photo, think twice about it being shot with a super-expensive DSLR camera or crazy expensive lens. You can do this yourself in less than 5 minutes, it’s easy

You’re never too old to enjoy fireworks! Right?

I had an absolute blast this evening hanging out with my friends and enjoying some pre-July 4th fireworks. I also took my Canon 40D with me. Capturing fireworks with a camera is hard. It was a fun challenge finding that ‘just right’ setting in manual mode, with a slightly longer shutter setting (which i rarely shoot in). You can see the full high-res set on my flickr account.

Check out my new iPhone wallpaper! Super Mario is totally creeping behind my icons What apps do you have on your homescreen? Take a screenshot and share a link to it in the comments!

(press the sleep button at the top of your phone and the home button at the same time, the photo will then be in your library, and you can upload it to twitpic or flickr). Remember to link it in the comments!

Occasionally, I share on my blog photos I take with my cameras (aka my “babies” aka the Canon 40D or my S90). I love taking my 40D out for practice when I’m on the golf course. This shot in particular, made me smile because it turned out great! The detail captured in the shot is great (plus, it makes my friend Adam look like a super-professional golfer ) This was taken with my 40D, at 135mm, f/5.6, and a 1/500 exposure (I also used a polarized lens filter).

Two weeks ago, I shared with you sneak peek photos I shot from my very first newborn baby session. I wanted to share a few more with you. In the first photo below, I used a couple effects within Photoshop to get this “look”. This vintage film style is such a compelling way to frame-up a photo of dad +and his daughter. I really like it, don’t you?

It’s hard not to love all the aspects of “mini” when it comes to babies. Their clothes, shoes, hands, and feet…

I’ve been really impressed with the results of the photo apps I’ve been using on my iPhone. Which goes to show, you shouldn’t underestimate the power of a camera phone’s photo capabilities. These two photos below, I shot, edited, and uploaded entirely with just my iPhone. Total time to shoot + edit + upload? < less than 3 minutes. Pretty crazy huh?

If you’re wondering what apps I used, I edited the photos with the CameraBag app and the TiltShift app. Big shout-out to Glen for posting a comment on my original TiltShift app review blog post, it was how I discovered my fav’ed photo app, CameraBag! Check ‘em out if you haven’t already, they’re both great!

This shot I took at my birthday dinner with my sister sapporo + sushi = heaven on earth (it’s the little things in life right? beer is pretty awesome…)

I took this photo on a business trip, on my way to the hotel, late at night in Boston. Don’t worry, I wasn’t driving. Promise.

Many of you know that photography is a hobby of mine. I’m trying to get better at it. I had a chance to shoot my very first newborn baby session for close friends of mine (i wanted the practice, and they needed some pictures). So, here’s a preview of some of the images I took of one adorable, gorgeous baby, “Sydney”.

I will share with you, shooting newborns is not easy! I have even more respect for people who do this professionally. It was quite the challenge for me. A completely new experience and requires you to adapt quickly with the situation(s) and be completely flexible. I’ll post the whole flickr gallery at this link, when it’s ready. For now here’s a sneak peek.

I’m putting my new Canon S90 through the tests and I continue to be impressed. This weekend I took with me to a backyard BBQ birthday party. While my friends were lighting the candles on the cookie birthday cake, I snapped this shot (below). Perhaps it’s just me, but I was really impressed with the low-light capture. No flash was used and it was my first shot with the camera you can really tell the difference with an f/2.0 aperture.

I’ve purchased a new toy. My old school 2007 point-n-shoot camera has been officially retired, and it was time for an upgrade. My newest toy is the Canon S90. BTW, I keep an updated “living blog post” in which I share with all of you the tools and websites I like use. After doing a bunch of research on point-n-shoots, the Canon S90 was the best upgrade for me given the fact I love my DSLR, the Canon 40D and the manual controls are very similar but packaged in a much more compact size.

This weekend was my first chance to get out and play with the Canon S90. I went to a friend’s wedding + golfing this weekend and had a chance to put it through some tests. You can see the photo results below or on flickr (here and here). So far, I’m impressed. This camera is powerful given it’s size. BUT it’s not a camera that the average person can just pickup and start using. However, if you’re familiar with the Canon DSLR controls, a lot of the features and controls are very similar. Here’s a few of my favorites from the pics I took this weekend: