This is Trigg Beach off the coast of Western Australia, just north of Perth. I spent many a weekend at this beach and at many other beaches along this coastline growing up and it was a real pleasure to return to the coast here and photograph the ocean lapping the shore as the sun set.

I scouted this particular location from Google Maps before I returned to Perth over the last week. I knew exactly what time the sun was going to set and how far ahead of it I needed to be to capture this shot. From this location there are many different scenes you could capture – beautiful sunsets, crashing waves, tide pools, and so on. I ended up opting to go wide on this and capture a wave crashing over a rock, with the coastline framing it. Overall it encompasses the sheer beauty of the WA coastline and many memories from my time spent growing up there.

As usual, the wallpaper is available for download at 1280 X 800 or 2560 X 1600. Enjoy!

I owe this shot to my friend and shooting buddy, Rod Hoekstra. We spent one day of a weekend the other week shooting up around Snoqualmie Falls and after we got done with the falls, spent some time driving through nearby townships that ran along the river. Being the driver, it was very hard for me to actually notice spots to stop and shoot. Rod saw this particular view from the car as we drove up along the river chasing another particular location. We made a point to stop and shoot it on the way back.

It was pretty random to see what looked to be an abandoned wooden cabin in the middle of this forest, stricken by winter. It looked so alone amongst all the trees without their leaves and reminded me of a scene from possibly dozens of movies I’ve seen over the years in a similar setting to this. To complement this feeling, I opted for a dark, contrasty feel in post to help tell this story that I can’t quite put my finger on.

Thanks for spotting this, Rod. It was a great way to cap off a fun day’s shooting.

This is one of those images that has eluded me for the longest time. A sunrise from this particular vantage point, with an interesting sky, Mt. Rainier in the background of the city skyline with the Space Needle… the shot really has it all. For some reason though, every time I’ve come up here for sunrise, one of those elements has been missing.

In the summertime it can be too hazy to see the mountain. Sunrise is also very early so actually making it out to shoot sunrise is a challenge in and of itself. In the winter, the sun rises much later in the morning so it’s far more acceptable an hour to wake up and get out and comfortably shoot. That said… it’s winter. You don’t often get a clear sky. In the last week, there was consistently somewhat clear nights so I chanced it on a couple of days and went out to shoot.

The image here came from the first of two days… the second I’ll be posting at some point here in the not-too-distant future. I couldn’t be happier that I’d finally been able to experience such a view come to fruition. It feels pretty good to stick at chasing a vantage point long enough and have it actually pan out. For all the sunrises I’ve woken to inopportune views, this makes it all worth it.

Ahhhh the warmth of summertime. This is the time of year where I start to get fed up with the cold weather and start to really wish for the heat of the summer sun. I can’t find it outside in Seattle right now… so photographs have to suffice.

I took this over the summer of 2011 in Mt. Rainier National Park. I was in the park to shoot sunset and found myself there about forty-five minutes early. I wasn’t just going to sit in the car and let this gorgeous day go to waste… so I went for a walk and started shooting. I crossed into a field off the road where these tall wildflowers (or weeds? I’m not sure what they are exactly) were glowing in the light of the setting sun. It was so small a thing, but I’d really never seen anything like it. It made me really feel the warmth of the light. I had to shoot it.

I opened right up to f/2.8 for this shot, and metered off the plants to catch the glow. The point of focus is somewhere around about the middle of the frame, but at f/2.8 there’s a wide enough depth of field to blur out the surroundings and catch some sweet bokeh and blurred sunlight.

A little over twelve months ago I spent some time in a town called Peterborough, about 2 hours north of London. The town was rather small and right in the middle of it stood a cathedral from the middle ages. It took a little while for me to come to grips with just how old that made this cathedral. I knew that I had to photograph it – at least from the outside.

Upon entering, I met with a caretaker who said for a small donation I could take photographs inside. Awesome! As I walked through the building, I encountered a lectern with an open bible, set amongst an area for a choir to sit and sing from. The lectern was in the shape of an eagle, pointed straight down the hallway through the middle of the church.

I knew I had to photograph this in some way, though I struggled with how to bring it all together. Isolating the lectern just wasn’t working so I threw on the fisheye. I had my shot. The entire hall began to encircle the eagle-shaped lectern with the open bible, framing my subject perfectly.

The image above is my original tonemapped (from 7 brackets) and unprocessed image. To get the final look, I took this image into Perfect Photo Suite from onOne Software. To achieve the effect, I processed the lectern and the background separately. I wanted to bring out the gold in the eagle, so by masking that out of the background it became its own layer. I could then process that independently of the background to accentuate the gold. Subsequently, I could then process that same background without impacting the lectern to bring out almost a gothic feel.

The Perfect Layers / Perfect Effects combination from onOne’s Photo Suite is very powerful. There’s a somewhat steep learning curve, but once you figure it out the abilities you have when processing your images are endless. It’s quite a powerful editing tool. You can download a free 30-day trial of the suite from the banner link below. If you decide you would like to purchase, use code JFLPHOTO for a 10% discount!

My first post of a photo from 2012 from my first shoot of 2012 taken from my first real outing with my new 70-200mm lens. Ahhh. That’s a lot of firsts. I’ve wanted to shoot a moody scene out at Snoqualmie Falls near Seattle for a long time. It’s not that far out of town really, about forty-five minutes drive. The catch is not really knowing what to expect from the weather. So, on a whim… I got together with fellow shooting buddy, Rod Hoekstra, and headed for the mountains and the falls.

A mild winter’s day in Seattle turned into a blustery, misty setting at the falls which made shooting somewhat difficult. The wind would carry the mist right into the front of the lens. This made long exposure shots, like this one, very difficult. Patience rewards you of course… it was a matter of waiting for the wind to dissipate briefly, clean the front of the lens, and shoot.

It’s very easy to get distracted by the vastness and sheer size of these falls. They’re actually fairly massive and are accentuated by giant cliffs on either side. Temptation would have you try to fit it all into the frame but I wanted to do something different (after I got that shot… ). I decided to focus on highlighting the sheer power of the falls themselves. By using the telephoto lens, it compressed the rocks and the water flowing over the edge all into the frame. I found an aesthetically pleasing orientation around the water and rock formations… and then I had my shot. I opted for the B&W processing to highlight the rocks at the top and the mist at the bottom, forged together by the power of the falling water.

2012 is here and Seattle welcomed her in the front door with quite the fireworks display last night. Before the show went off, I posted an image to my G+ feed that I mocked up with an empty sky and the G+ creative editing kit.

I’m stoked to be able to share a triptych right here on my blog of the real thing, as photographed by yours truly during last night’s festivities.

Happy New Year!!!

Welcome to 2012! I hope everyone had a fantastic night last night ringing in the new year. Thank you to everyone who followed my blog and photography last year, and to all of you who may continue to do so throughout this coming year.

At the beginning of each month, I offer up a free desktop wallpaper for download. Usually this is an image that I took during the past month, but not necessarily, as is the case this month. I took this image back in the end of the summer of 2011 in Mt. Rainier National Park just outside of Seattle, WA. The setting sun on the night sky was finally dark enough that I could set up for a long exposure image and capture some star trails. This was my last image from the shoot.

The wallpaper is available for download at 1280 X 800 or 2560 X 1600. Enjoy!

One of the great things about a substantial period of time passing, like a calendar year, is the chance at hindsight, for retrospect and reflection. Last year around this time, I wrote a post about my photography throughout 2010. While it’s easy to get caught up in looking back, as I said last year, a huge part of this for me is also looking forward. This gives me a chance to see not only where I’ve been but helps in identifying where I want to go.

To keep myself in check, these were my goals for 2011 (and if you’re really interested in more detail, the post I referred to above has all the details):

Goal #1: Cut Back On The Cruft. Shoot with intent, with purpose. Stop taking images that are always going to be wasted.

Goal #2: Step Outside The Box. Stop taking the same photographs. Expand. Be different.

Goal #3: Share, Share, Share. Come up with new ways to share my photography.

Goal #4: Give More Blog, Give More Insight. Pretty much just that. Blog more, and more on the why of my photography.

I think to some extent I worked my way towards achieving each of these goals which was cool. 2011 was a pretty decent year photography-wise, all things considered. Taking another look back at my 11 favourite images from the year, it was fairly evident that I started to see differently than the year before. Let’s see if that was the case based off some fun stats (just like last year!):

• I took 40,672 photographs last year.
• 1,512 of these were taken with my X100, 5,395 were taken with my iPhone, the rest were taken with my D700.
• 19% of all my photographs were taken at f/11. 37% were taken at f/2.8.
• I took twice as many photos in the second half of 2011 as I did in the first half of 2011.
• 2,748 photographs were taken with a focal length of longer than 200mm. That sounds like a lot, but it’s only around 7%.
• 16,059 photographs were taken with a focal length of shorter than 35mm.

It’s fun to dig into these things to figure out shooting habits. The most shocking of which to me is simply put, how far more active I was in photographing in the second half of 2011.

Going forward into 2012, I have some personal goals that I want to set for myself here too. You can’t look back and not look forward as well.

Goal #1: Travel more. Spend more time abroad. On the cards already are journies to Australia, Vancouver and Iceland, as well as hopefully Washington D.C., Montreal, and maybe even Alaska. At home here in WA I’d love to spend more time over on the Olympic peninsula. Experiencing life in other countries changes you as a person and I’m hoping will influence my photography.

Goal #2: Help others better their photography. I really enjoy helping other people discover what it is they love about photography and helping them to get better at shooting and post-processing.

Goal #3: Discover new ways to share my photography. Physically or virtually, I want to get my photography out there in more ways for others to see.

Goal #4: Refinement. I want my photography to say exactly what I want to say and nothing more. This means refining my vision and style.

Lastly, I want to thank a few people who have influenced my photography in one way or another over the past twelve months. In some cases, I’ve had the pleasure of meeting some of these folks which is pretty awesome as well. In no particular order, thank you:

• Stuart Sipahigil – your photographs and vision always inspire me to find my own.
• David Nightingale – great to meet you this year, and awesome to shoot with you in Seattle.
• Chase Jarvis – the man never ceases to inspire and motivate me.
• Jesse Pafundi – watching you grow into your photography and find your niche sincerely motivates every day.
• Annie Leibovitz – sometimes one sentence from someone is enough to inspire – I’ll never forget it.
• Brian Matiash – always great times shooting with you mate. always.
• James Brandon – for “the idea” we have. This is gonna rock the house.
• Alan Hess – for inspiring my concert photography.
• Rod Hoekstra – for being a great shooting buddy.
• Bob Lussier – always around for a photo critique.
• My Parents – for standing next to me and supporting me.
• and finally, everyone who follows me on Twitter and has me circled on Google+. I love sharing my perspective of the world through my photography with all of you.

2011 was by all counts pretty great and I’m very blessed and grateful to be in the company of everyone I mentioned above. I’m looking forward to working towards my goals and sharing my photography with all of you in the coming year.

Cheers to 2012!

During my visit to England last year I had some time to hit a couple of the popular tourist destinations like Westminster Abbey and The Tower Of London, as seen in today’s image.

The Tower has been around since the middle ages. It’s quite humbling to walk through a structure that is almost a thousand years old and has withstood medieval times and several wars and sieges. The architecture photographer in me was completely enamoured with the castle walls, gates, and stairways.

As a tourist, you are allowed a fair degree of access to the buildings inside the Tower. I wasn’t walking around with my tripod on this day, but I was never once bothered by security when shooting with my SLR which was nice.

As I was leaving the Tower, I walked through a gateway on one of the opposite sides to the main entrance. The path back up inside was one of those cobbled roads, with a very much medieval entrance guarding it. This was my last shot of the day, and one of my favourites from this location.

From me to you and everyone around the world, Merry Christmas!! This is by far and away my favourite holiday of the year. I hope you all have safe and wonderful holiday season with your friends and families, filled with love and laughter.

Around this time last year I had the chance to travel through England for a couple of weeks. It was a great opportunity to visit “the mother country” and take in some of the sights from one of the world’s biggest cities.

While there, I spent a few days wandering around central London taking in the sights. It’s a bit crazy right in the middle of London, people are just everywhere!. This made getting photographs a little difficult but as with anything, patience will reward you.

What you’re looking at are a set of doors that lead inside Westminster Abbey. I was simply mesmerised by the ornate detail around the arches and by the old double doors. The Madonna figure present there just made the scene for me. I set up my shot, and waited for a break in the crowds to actually get the frames I needed.

This image also happens to be somewhat relevant to today, Christmas Eve. I hope everyone has a fun & safe holiday season with their families!

I was flipping through some photos of Tasmania the other day and caught a photograph that I hadn’t processed yet. It was still marked as “to be processed” in my labelling system within Aperture, but for some reason I just hadn’t done. It’s been a year or so since I’ve opened this particular library, so I thought hey, why not process it now?

I’ve posted a panorama from further up this beach a while back. I shot this photo about 15 minutes prior to the panorama, mid-way through a hike around Wineglass Bay. I love the beautiful white sand on the beach and the small tide lapping the shore. This photograph reminds just how warm this day was and of the great time we all had hiking around the bay.

Of course, the other takeaway is never delete old photographs. You can always come back to them and give them a fresh look, no matter how long it’s been since you last looked at them.

I like to do a couple of things at the end of each calendar year, and this is one of them. Given it’s 2011… here are my 11 personal favourite images from the duration of 2011 that I’ve taken. I hope you all enjoy!

11.

Kicking off my top 11 is a collaboration with Bob Lussier in the Stone Mill in Lawrence, MA. This chair was resting quietly in this particular office just waiting for its owner to return.

10.

A sunset scene from Tipsoo Lake just near Mt. Rainier. It was a wonderfully clear afternoon come evening which presented some amazing light over the lake.

On Friday night, I received an email from a good mate of mine. His name is Sam Gabell and he wrote to me about a mutual friend from high school, Daniel Makin. The two of them and a group of friends had been on holiday to celebrate a friend’s wedding. With Sam’s permission, I’m reproducing the text of that email here today:

Hey Jacob mate. I know we haven’t spoken in a while (not directly at least) but I’ve got a massive favour to ask you. I’ve just returned from going to Cameron Fellows wedding in Vietnam this morning. I was travelling with Alex How, Terry Russell and Daniel Makin. You might remember those guys from St Marks. Long story short, Daniel suffered an epileptic fit and passed away in Singapore airport on our way home. I was the only one that took a camera with us and I’ve got a bunch of photos from the trip that are now obviously worth quite a lot to everyone here at home. I’d really like to do him justice and process a few in time for the funeral on Thursday but I still very much consider myself an amateur photographer and an even more amateur processor. I follow your G+ stream and you’ve been doing some amazing things lately. If I get a few photos to you somehow do you think you could either help me process them or guide me through how to do it. Let me know mate.

I was shocked at the news and didn’t really know what to expect. I of course replied that I’d help in any way that I could, even though I hadn’t seen the photos, or Sam or Daniel in years. The following day, Sam sent me the photographs and they were amazing. He’d done a great job photographing their holiday together and it was abundantly clear that Daniel was having the time of his life. All the images on my site today are not mine… they are Sam’s, and again, reproduced here with his permission.

On Saturday night I sat down, poured myself a glass of a fine 15 year old whiskey, poured one for Daniel too, and began to work on the photographs. What you see here are a selection of the images I worked on that Sam sent to me.

Last night, Sam emailed me back again, with this image. I have to admit this choked me up a bit. I was floored.

This is for you, Daniel. Rest in peace mate. I hope you like the photographs.