Claudio Uribe Photography

Rounded Mirrors

Claudio Uribe — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 20:30:10 +0000

We’re getting closer to the driest season of the year and yet we had some rainy days last week, after the rain the colours and light were very soft so it was the time to get out and take some photographs, i didn’t have to go very far, i took this picture literally outside of my office window i reckon i could have taken it from my chair. Is an HDR and i was a bit surprised by the result, hope you like it!

Buddha’s Hand

Claudio Uribe — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 07:20:23 +0000

When i was in Thailand in 2001 i remember myself wandering around the streets of Bangkok and finding a poster on a travel agency, the photo on the poster caught my attention right away, it was a huge beautiful Buddha, i got in to ask where was that but nobody knew anything about it, i kept asking but I couldn’t find my answer. I came back to Mexico but never forgot about it, back then not many tourist had digital cameras so to look for it on the web without even knowing in which area was placed was a bit difficult. Few years later i saw a documentary on National Geographic about the north of Thaialnd and for my surprise they dedicated few minutes to that Buddha, it was in old Sukhothai Historical Park.

I had the chance to go back to Thailand and of course this time i visited Old Sukhothai, which ended up being one of my favorite places in this world, the capital of the Thai Empire for approximately 140 years. It is a place to really see and comprehend Thai culture.

Wat Si Chum - Old Sukhothai, Thailand

I don’t normally pose for photos myself, but i was so happy back then that i had to do it. Check out Wikipedia’s entry about Sukhothai.

West Pier Brighton UK

Claudio Uribe — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 23:33:11 +0000

I moved to the UK in 2003, ended up in Brighton in the south coast of England, unlike other towns in the south, Brighton is full of young people, is a small yet very alive town. Something that just can’t escape your attention is the West Pier, which unfortunately is reduced to a pile of debris, is a very capricious structure in the middle of the sea, destroyed and forgotten but too big not to see it and wonder what was it? One of those not very common English sunny days i got out and took this photograph of the sunset, believe me, a sunset in the UK is a big thing.

Here’s wikipedia helping me with the story:

The West Pier was opened in 1866 with a length of 1115 feet.^[1] The pier did not have much of a superstructure until 1893 when a pier head was extended and a pavilion added.^[1] A concert hall was added in 1916 and a new top-deck entrance in 1932.^[1] In 1965 the pier was bought by a company that owned some seafront hotels and entertainment venues.^[1] They had ambitions for the pier but as maintenance costs increased the pier was closed in 1975 when Brighton Corporation declined to buy it and the pier passed into the hands of the Crown Estates Commissioners.^[1] A trust was formed to save the pier and in 1984 they bought it for a nominal sum. ^[1]

The West Pier had been cut off from the shore (partly deliberately, for safety reasons) since 1975, but the West Pier trust offered regular tours of it until the structure suffered a serious partial collapse during a storm on December 29, 2002, when a walkway connecting the concert hall and pavilion fell into the sea. On January 20, 2003 a further collapse saw the destruction of the concert hall in the middle of the pier. On 28 March, 2003 the pavilion at the end of the pier caught fire. Firefighters were unable to save the building from destruction because the collapsed walkway prevented them from reaching it. The cause of the fire remains unknown. On May 11, 2003, another fire broke out, consuming most of what was left of the concert hall. The Fire re-ignited on May 12. Arson was suspected: the West Pier Trust refers to the fires as the work of “professional arsonists”. On June 23, 2004 high winds caused the middle of the pier to collapse completely.

Check out this photos i found surfing the web:

Picture courtesy of Royal Pavilion, Libraries and Museums, Brighton & Hove.

Brighton West Pier on fire - http://www.flickr.com/photos/jasonryan/

My garden

Claudio Uribe — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 07:19:12 +0000

I found the bulbs of a wild orchid laying on the ground in the forest of Tapalpa Mexico, last summer, it wasn’t going to survive so i decided to bring it home and take care of it, surprisingly even with this very cold winter it bloomed, 2 months after i placed it on the trunk of one of the trees at my garden, I though it deserved an HDR. Did i mention i love Orchids?

Monterrey Beach

Claudio Uribe — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 21:14:18 +0000

Last November I had the chance to visit this amazing private beach in the coast of Nayarit Mexico called Punta Monterrey. Is amazing to think that this hidden gem is so close to a major tourism hot spot like Puerto Vallarta and yet not many people knows that even exist. This is an HDR of the northern part of the beach. I did an HDR tutorial before with a photo taken at that same place, check it here.

I’ve been thinking for a while now about making a short film all made out of still photographs, i did my first test there, check it out:

November 09 @ Monterrey Beach from Claudio Uribe on Vimeo.

A day at Monterrey Beach, November 2009

This is the hotel’s website www.monterreybeach.com.

Have a great Christmas!!

Morning at the Himalayas

Claudio Uribe — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 06:01:10 +0000

While i was in Nepal, my colleague Sajani kindly took me to this fantastic place called Nagarkot which is the highest point at the Kathmandu valley, perfect pristine blue skies, the Kathmandu valley around you and a glorious view of the Himalayas on the eastern Nepal. I arrived just in time to watch the sun setting behind those immense mountains. The next day i woke up before sunrise, wore every single piece of clothing i had in my backpack, got my self black tea and rush with my camera to see the sun coming up from the Kathmandu Valley, probably one of most beautiful sights I’ve ever seen, i even forgot the freezing and dry -4 degrees.

Padma पद्म

Claudio Uribe — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 06:46:36 +0000

Thailand is a beautiful place, full of cultural and religious symbolism. Lotus flowers can be seen everywhere, according to legend, Gautama Buddha was born with the ability to walk and everywhere he stepped, lotus flowers bloomed. This photograph was taken at Sukhothai Historical Park in northern Thailand, a stunning place where i spent some days riding my bike around, and pretty much everywhere you look you’ll see some sort of religious symbolism like the lotus flower in this picture which was placed on the hands of a statue of Buddha long before i encountered it.

Karen Tribe girl

Claudio Uribe — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 20:36:23 +0000

The Karen tribes widely known as “Long Necks” are originally from Burma. In the 80’s the Karens participated in demonstrations against the military dictatorship in Burma, becoming enemies of the state which led to persecution. Some have accused the military government of Burma of ethnic cleansing and suppression of religious freedom. The Thai government have created refugee camps for the Karens where they live in peace living by the land and creating beautiful handcrafts. This photograph was taken in the north of Thailand near Chiang Mai.

“Karen Tribe Girl” won the “Travel photography daily contest” at Photoburst. Thank very much for your support:

Click here to go to Photoburst

White Dreams (HDR)

Claudio Uribe — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 02:10:20 +0000

This is a particularly tricky shot, this white flower is surrounded by more white flowers and is getting direct natural light, the sensors of my camera were going crazy. This was the perfect situation for an HDR. It was quite windy which makes bracketing pretty difficult if i were going to try the usual multi-exposure HDR. I decided to use RAW, back to my Mac I processed the photograph to get 3 files with 3 different exposures in order to extract a bit of detail from the main subject. It takes a little longer than the Bracketing method but the results can be as good. I have written a tutorial on this blog about HDRs where i explain how to create them using bracketing. I also tried to avoid the excessive “HDR ish” look and have a more natural result.

Multishot

Claudio Uribe — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 19:20:41 +0000

Here’s another example of the Multishot Technique, the set up in this one is specially difficult cause the subject is moving really fast and is only a couple of meters from the camera, check my Multishot Tutorial here. The camera was set in a tripod, Sigma 17mm – 35mm