July 4th Fireworks at Maunalua Bay - 7/4/2010

This is the third year I went to the July 4th fireworks show in Hawaii Kai. Erick, Celia, Jennifer and I managed again to find front row seat at the water's edge to see the great firework show that lasted for about 20 mins. It was a great show and seemed to be more elaborate this year than previous years. Since we got there around 6:45pm for the 8pm show, there was plenty time to try out different kinds of shots...like HDR of the sunset.
The firework show started fast and furious...with lots of blooms of fireworks..it was really hard to time when to press and release the shutter.
I read that you can capture multiple bursts w/o over exposure by putting something in front of the lens to block the light. I was trying to figure when to cover my lens and then open the lens..it was really hit and miss...
I could never figure out why the happy face is always upside down.. can't they just turn it right side up...
I caught 3 bursts..but when I leave the shutter open too long, I get the trails of the previous burst which makes it look kinda messy....
I finally got something that doesn't look too blown out and not too messy...I'll have to give it another try again next year!

East Oahu - 7/3/2010

My friend and I played tourist for a day touring around the East side of Oahu. I used my 70-200mm zoom lens instead of a wide angle lens to get a different perspective. We started going around Diamond head to see the famous lighthouse that was used on a postage stamp. I think this could've been a cool HDR shot but I didn't have a tripod or anything to steady the 3 shots.
I saw a fellow EOH photographer take an HDR of Hanauma Bay so I also decided to to the same. I steadied my camera on my camera bag along the railings.
It was an overcast day w/ some rain...but I thought I'd give Koko Head a try w/ HDR.
This WOULD'VE been cool w/ HDR..next time I go back to Hanauma Bay, I gotta remember to try it. Parking was $1...not too bad.
We stopped at one of the lookout along the way. As soon as I saw the brown colors in the rocks, I KNEW it'd make a cool HDR. It was really windy...and good thing that Photomatix has a feature to correct horizontal and vertical shift so it didn't look blurry.We stopped to eat later at Sweet Home Waimanalo and I thought the old wagon wheel would also make a cool HDR.. I really like how the red colors (wall, open sign, coke frig) came out so vibrant.
I never thought to take food shot w/ a 70-200mm, but I had to take a photo of the food. On the way at the same lookout, we saw a bunch of sail boats. From the large waves, I think it was a pretty bump ride!
We stopped at Sandy Beach and I got some shots of the boogie boarders.
It was cool to watch them...could probably stay there all day...but the tour had to move on so we left after a few minutes.
We headed to Kailua Beach where there were these cool Kite surfers.
Finally, we found our way to the Pali to head back to town. I took this out the windshield. I had to use some photoshop skills to remove some of the haze from the photo.
It was super windy at the lookout and very hazy. The wind was even able to move my heavy camera & lens...good thing I have a stabilized lens because I couldn't hold my camera still w/ the strong wind.
I think it'd be really spooky driving along here at night...even during the day, it's kinda eerie.

Photoshop Element Experiment - 6/28/2010

I learned something new today from the Eyes of Hawaii session on photoshop. Although I use PSE, I was able to do the same. You add a layer to Adjust Hue and Saturation, remove all color to make it turn B&W, click the link to remove the layer mask and then I use the Pencil tool to go over the area I want to colorize.. sooo very cool!!

Full Moon & Partial Lunar Eclipse - 6/26/2010

I decided to try using the zoom lens to take photo of the full moon and partial eclipse. I used ISO 200 manual settings at 1/200 and started around F8 opened up to F5 as the moon was being covered. Even w/ max zoom at 200mm, I had to crop the shot so the moon doesn't look like a spec of white dot. I took the first shot of the full moon at 9:30pm.
The eclipse started at 12:15am and I waited until 12:28am to take this start of the moon falling into the earth's shadow.
The maximum of the eclipse was to happen around 1:45am. There was a thin layer cloud passing in front the moon so I waited until 1:49am to take this last shot of the moon.

Valley of the Temple HDR - 6/19/2010

I've been to photograph the Byodo-In Temple before, but never HDR so this was time for new discoveries. Erick, Celia and I decided an afternoon outing to also make use our tripods.
Actually, this shot is not an HDR, but I did like the angle of the foot bridge.
HDR does great w/ dark areas and made this dark bell come alive. I was not able to get this kind of clarity w/o HDR. I had to wait a while for all the tourist to be done ringing the bell.The afternoon was a bit overcast, but it made it a bit more serene. With HDR, I was able to get the shadows and the grooves of the Koolaus to appear.I tried to get some new angles w/ the zoom lens instead of the wide angle lens.
This swan swam in front of me as if he wanted to be photographed.HDR also worked great for the shady areas.
I've never noticed this walkway to the small pavillion before...
A real closeup of the small buddah made it look like it towers in comparison to the temple.

Pan Pacific Festival Parade 6/13/2010

After spending two days watching the entertainment, the finale of the Pan Pacfic Festival is the Parade. I tried to take different angles w/ the wide angle lens.
This street dancer stopped to perform right in front of us.
He twirled this large flag effortlessly. It looked so cool.
This is what we call the cockroach view of the parade. :-)
I had just seen her and her steel drum group perform earlier in the day.
Hey, I think I've him on this year's Pan Pacific Festival performance schedule leaflet.
The final float was this huge lantern tower.