Not of this World - Crater Lake National Park, Oregon

Let's kick things off with a free eBook! 3 Tricks for Focusing at Night, is digitally published and ready to go. I'm excited to see what you think! Contained within the book are 3 of my favorite methods for focusing at night or in low light conditions.

Click Here to Access Your Free eBook

On to some other free goodies. Focus Stacking is a technique which I often use for an array of different shooting situations. This latest tutorial will take you step by step through the entire process, starting with shooting and ending with post processing. Best viewed in 1080P.


Summer is full swing here in the Pacific Northwest which means lots of backpacking, teaching star photography workshops & exploring / scouting new locations. Here are a few Behind the Scenes Shots from the past couple of months.

Paul Weeks Shooting in the Rain Forest during a 3 Day Backpacking Trip || Olympic National Park, Washington

Solo Hike Under the Super Moon Light || Mount Baker Wilderness, Washington

Another Successful Night Under the Stars - July 2014 Star Photography Workshop Group || Mount Rainier, Washington

The Shot
After 8 unsuccessful attempts the weather finally allowed me to take this shot. I've always loved this composition, but there is considerable light pollution which is usually seen in the same location the where Milky Way is rising in this photo. There is one solution to this light pollution problem, wait until extremely dense low lying fog / clouds cover the valley below the crater.

On this particular night the sun had set and the fog started to roll in very quickly over the valley as seen just above the horizon of this photo. These conditions removed a considerable amount of light pollution from the skyline & allowed me to finish off the rest in Lightroom & Photoshop.

The photo is composed of 4 different shots, all taken with my tripod in the exact same place. The first two shots are for field of view. The entire Milky Way Core and the Crater won't fit into a single frame of the Nikkor 14-24mm lens ( @ 14mm ) so a vertical pano was used. The last (2) shots were taken 30 minutes before the first two shots capturing the immediate foreground / mid-ground using focus stacking techniques. Using a long ( 2 min ) exposure for the last (2) shots it was also possible to keep nice detail without using a high ISO and inducing noise. Some of these techniques are covered in the Focus Stacking Video Tutorial provided above.

As always click the photo to see it full size on a black background

What Dreams Become - Crater Lake, Oregon

Over the past 2 weeks I've been working on a few projects which include an exclusive / in depth Star Photography Tutorial for PetaPixel & an interview with Astrum People. Make sure you head on over and check them both out when you get a chance.

For anyone else that may be interested my Summer Star Photography Workshops @ Mount Rainier National Park still have a few open spots for August. There are about 5 left so grab one while you still can! Both July workshops are sold out, but you can email me to be placed on the wait list. 

The Shot

My buddy Paul Weeks and I drove from Seattle last Friday night and arrived at Crater Lake around 3AM. This gave us just enough time to snowshoe out for some predawn and sunrise shots. The next day we ended up hiking a few more miles and camping on on the top of the Watchman Lookout which gives a full view of the lake from above. This time of year at Crater Lake is amazing as there are hardly any people up there.

As far as shooting goes I took 2 shots for depth of field, and another shot for the stars about 30 minutes before the other 2 shots. The (2) focus shots were blended by hand in Photoshop for depth of field, and the shot for the stars was blended using Photoshop Lighten Blend Mode with a few extra adjustments.

Flyin' High - Crater Lake Oregon

For all of you star photography fanatics out there,  I'll be on the Drink and Click Show with Lotus Carroll this coming Wednesday discussing the subject. You will also have a chance to win a free copy of my Star Photography Post Processing Video Tutorials & Presets.

Click here for event time and details

As promised in my last blog post I just updated my Free Star Photography Tutorial to include a section on Star Trails. Of course the Milky Way stuff is still over there as well.

While in Big Sur last week I recorded a bunch of new Behind the Scenes Videos which include tips & tricks you can use while out shooting. I have included the first of these videos below which covers the skills required to get nice dynamic water movement in your landscape photography shots. I shot this on my Google Nexus 5, but just ordered a Go Pro that will assist me in making even more of these videos. I still think the Nexus 5 does pretty damn well @ 1080P so click that option for the best video quality! Don't get scared of my buddy Paul that pops in at the end haha!

The Shot
Crater Lake has a bunch of great destinations in which to shoot the Milky Way & it seems that over the years many of the compositions have been exhausted. Looking around online you will find a bunch of pictures of this same tree, but I haven't seen any from this exact angle as of yet:) We arrived here an hour before dawn as the Milky Way was starting to face in the Northern Sky, thankfully there was still enough darkness left to snap off a few shots.

Click to buy a print

If Only Time - Crater Lake, Oregon

Are you from Seattle or visiting the area? Twenty of my pictures are currently hanging on display at the Triple Door in Seattle. These are big, colorful and vivid prints of 20 x 30 inches and larger, printed on an array of mediums from canvas to Satin Thin Wrap and ready to hang on your wall. If you come down and buy one, I'll sign the front or back of the picture for you depending on which you prefer:) The prints will only be up til the start of November so come down and check it out while you still can!

Time is running short and so are the remaining spots ( 2 left ) in my Online Star Photography Post Processing Group Workshop. We will work through one of my Milky Way shots from star ( RAW file ), to finish ( portfolio JPEG file ), you'll even receive the RAW file to work along with me. Try something new this month and signup, you will be glad you did:)

I have been looking for a compact way to transfer photos from my memory cards to external hard drives while on the road without taking my bulky Macbook Pro. Well the solution is solved, a Nexus 10 Tablet arrived in the mail yesterday & allows transfer of files from my memory card to a single external hard drive, once that transfer is complete the action is repeated with another external hard drive for duplicate backups. Using the Nexus 10 is slightly slower than a laptop, it takes around 40 minutes to transfer 32GB of data from my card reader to the external 1TB hard drives. In turn I can now travel very VERY light without a laptop. A full review on how to do this yourself will be added to this website in the coming weeks, after testing the setup on a two week trip to China. PS: I've never tried Android before, and it's pretty damn awesome, especially with the new ( crap ) IOS 7, it may be time for a mobile change too.

The Shot

This one comes from the latest Oregon Coast trip, where we swung over to Crater Lake on the way towards Samuel Boardman State Park. Actually, I don't know if 600 miles out of the way is considered a swing, but none the less the weather was great, and so was the Milky Way. In this shot I really wanted to capture the nice colorful blue hour that the location almost always produces, and some stars on the side never hurt anyone right?

Check out my Free Star Photography Tutorial & learn how to take this type of shot on your own. There is also a gallery for you to share your star shots included on the tutorial page.

Post Processing Info ( Grab some discount codes to the programs below at bottom of About Me Page )
Processing Time: 35 Minutes
Music: TJR Set live on Diplo & Friends
Drink: White Russian ( Muhahah! )

Lightroom 4

• Two RAW files, one for the stars, and another longer exposure for the rest of the scene. 
• Adjust white balance to accentuate the blues and bring out stars using "Highlights" slider. 
• Adjust highlights and midtones to bring out the "frosty glow"
• Minimal sharpening and clarity adjustments
• + Vibrance & - Saturation

Photoshop CS6

• Apply Tony Kuypers Luminosity Masking Actions & Techniques to blend the stars into the longer exposure file.
• Apply color correction using "Color Balance" adjustment.
• Selectively adjust contrast using "Curves" adjustment.
• Nik Color Efex Pro Contrast
• Nik Output Sharpener ( selectively )
• Noiseware Professional by Imagenomic, the best NR software out there...
• Slight global vignette application
• Save to JPEG.

Hang a print of this picture on your wall

Rise - Crater Lake, Oregon

Just a heads up! onOne Software is having a 50% off sale for the next few days. Head on over to their website to buy! I love this stuff and use it to process most of my pictures, otherwise I really wouldn't promote it:)

It looks like summer has finally arrived in Seattle, knock on wood! After 3 weeks without touching Photoshop it's about time to dust it off and get things going again. Hopefully those creative juices are ready to pump out some awesome photos! I also have two updates for my workshops as follows, just click the title for full details.

In the Field Star Photography Workshops July 13th - (1) Spot Remains

Online Star Photography Post Processing Group Workshop August 4th - (4) Spots Remain

The Shot

Last year around this time I ventured down to Crater Lake on a quick 4 day push through the Oregon Coast and on to the massive lake. This year will bring the same, but hopefully some better skies. It was clear and beautiful the entire time, but as a photographer, this is not always my wish:) The moon on the other hand was just awesome as it danced through the evening sky.

Click to Hang this shot on your wall!

Night Falls on the Crater - Crater Lake, OR

WOW these star workshops are selling faster than I thought possible, thanks for your support everyone, we are going to have a blast out there this summer:) Half the spots are gone, the other half are for anyone that grabs one. More info at the link below:

 In the Field Star Photography Workshops @ Mount Rainier

I might be working on a package of textures that I will eventually provide to the general public:) I thought it would be easy to do such a project but it ended up taking a lot more time than I had planned. None the less they are coming along nicely, I have 200ish so far. You can see one of them in the following picture & get your hands on them in the following months.

The Shot

My first trip to Crater Lake was a random trip down the Oregon Coast, while down there I was to close (within 5 hours) not to visit this awesome landmark.