Finally, got a weekend to get up to the city to take some pictures of the sites (thanks Mom). There is so much to see and do in the city it’s overwhelming. This post is just a highlight of some of the great places and things that help make San Fran as awesome as it is.

Website – Sightsmap. Cool site if you wanna scout for sites based on photos taken by other people.

Music – Avicii – Fade into Darkness. On a huge techno, dubstep, and club kick lately, and this song gets my head nodding and toe tapping every time.

Tower view of the Bridge

Sky views of San Francisco

Coit Tower and San Francisco

Inside the Palace of the Fine Arts

Outside of the Palace of Fine Arts

View up to Lombard Street

Cars coming down Lombard Street

Dog graffiti on brickwall

Street Car in San Francisco

Legion of Honor at Twilight

Waves crashing near the Golden Gate bridge

Been a long time since I’ve posted. My buddy Sam has been putting me to shame with his latest posts (pics are amazing, check them out here).

On the rare free nights in China, I’ve been able to walk around town and snap quite a few pictures of the architecture and people. Though I still really want to get outside of Shanghai to see the rest of the country (and Asia for that matter), it’s been an eye opening experience that has given me a reason to want to see more of the Far East.

Monument to the People's Heroes in Shanghai China

Father and song at Monument to the People's Heroes in Shanghai China

Light fixtures on the Bund in Shanghai

Food carts late night in Shanghai

People walking alone

Noodle Restaurant on Nanjing Road

Shopping on Nanjing Road

Tram inside the Bund Tourist Tunnel

Couple sharing a moment on the Bund

Rows of trees in the Pudong district

Grand Hyatt inside Jin Mao Tower

Pearl Tower, Jin Mao Tower and Shanghai World Financial Center

So this post is long overdue (sorry Kyle). A bunch of my college buddies and I went to Las Vegas in June for a three day weekend. It was a typical Vegas trip with lots of money lost, and far too many mornings where you never wanted to touch another drop of alcohol. I did get the oppurtunity to go take some pictures, something I have promised myself to do for a very long time.

Music: Midnight City – M83.   Heard this song at the end of the latest episode of “How to make it in America”. The song was just a perfect way to end the episode, and I have probably listended to it 10 times already.

Penny Slot machines

Side lobby to the Encore hotel

Wynn and Encore hotels

Siding on Strip building

Front of Caesar's Palace

Siding to the Las Vegas Shopping Center

Shopping center and Gucci Brand

Light Bokeh at New York New York

Hotels along the Las Vegas Strip

I was sorting thru pictures to upload to Shutterstock for stock purposes and came across this picture I shot last year near Mt. Vernon. Abbey, Andy and I had intended on going to see the buildings, but when we realized how expensive it was and that we couldn’t bring in their dog, we decided instead to take a nice stroll around the property. This picture kind of sums up my life these days, as work becomes more and more challenging (which I am actually enjoying), and trying to have fun at the same time.

Song:   Rusko – Hold On  – Great song, I’m starting to get more and more into techno-ish songs. Still learning the genres and types, but I am slowly broadening my horizons.

Other: City Fabric – I helped this company start up a t-shirt line thru Kickstarter. I got the Philadelphia and DC shirts, and I am really happy I could help these guys make such great wearable art.

New York City and Shanghai, have two of the coolest Apple stores in the world. New York’s is the iconic one that most American’s know and have seen at least once. But Shanghai’s is equally if not cooler due to the fact that it uses curved glass, which in itself is an impressive architectural achievement. I feel blessed to be able to have seen both of them up close and in person.

Apple Store in Shanghai

Apple Store in New York City

When I took my trip into San Francisco a few weeks ago, I originally intended to visit all the Banksy works around the city. Unfortunately, most of them have either been painted over or removed. The only one I could still find, was the “Peaceful Heart Doctor” piece in Chinatown. To protect it, plexiglass was placed over the work, which was good in allowing it to be preserved, but bad in the fact that it defeats the purpose of graffiti art as an ever changing medium. The book “Untitled” that I picked up at the American Visionary Art Museum a few posts back, delved into this topic a lot and talked about how street art has become as sought after as real art and people are actually removing pieces from the walls to take home (like the Banksy pieces in LA).

Latest Likes:

Books:  The Killer – It’s a graphic novel series; just really well written with some great art work. I got the Comixology App a few weeks ago for the iPad and it has rekindled my love for comic books.

Music: Let It Burn (Red) – I get suckered into liking Christian rock so easily. It’s just like the Mike Birbiglia song, and I hate how much I end up loving it :)

Chinese Pagoda in San Francisco

Dragon closeup at the Chinese Pagoda

Peaceful Heart Doctor piece in San Francisco

Posting some older pictures.

For July 4th, I spent the weekend with some of my buddies outside of Austin in a town called Liberty Hill. I posted about their beautiful ranch in an earlier post, and as always the hospitality and fun were exactly what I needed for a relaxing vacation.

An added bonus was going to Round Rock Donut, a great place featured on one of the Man vs. Food episodes. Though we didn’t end up getting the Texas donut (it was insanely large), we had enough of the glazed ones to consider it one of the best donuts I’ve had.

Line outside of Round Rock

Lines outside the Round Rock Donuts Store

Putting together a box of Donut holes

Texas Donut at Round Rock Donuts

I had posted one of my firsts a while back, when I finally got to see Chukar back in Boise. Well another bird that has aluded me for a while is the Northern Shoveler. Every winter, a ton of them would come to Boise to feed in a pond on Park Center, and they would always just stay right out of the reach of my glass. Even the 200-500mm with the 1.5 crop couldn’t fill a frame the way I wanted it to. Two years worth of standing in the cold went by before I moved away, without a single shot that showed them the way I wanted to.

So imagine my surprise when I went for a bike ride on Saturday on the Bay Trail and saw them all over the marsh area. I made up my mind to get pictures on Sunday, and did just that. There was a great dock that placed people out in the water among the birds, so posted up and waited. Sitting there for a little bit they finally got comfortable enough to come within 10 feet of me, and I got some great full frame shots, just what I had wanted.

I’m trying to get back into this posting thing, so hopefully more pics to follow this week!

Power Transmission lines over the bay

Sea Gulls and Sign collage

Pipers on the marsh mud

Waterfowl on the San Francisco Bay

Pipers flying over the water

American Wigeon

Shoveler digging in the swamp mud

Godwit picking at items in the mud

One of the nice parts about traveling for work so frequently is the opportunity I get to see new and exciting places. Even though most of the time I am working, there is always time to stop and smell the roses and check out some of the local scenery.

Last week, I was flying back from the East Coast and passed thru Chicago O’hare Airport on the way. I have flown thru the airport multiple times and had seen pictures of the one connection tunnel between the B and C terminals. The lights above the moving walkways are called “Skies the Limit” by Michael Hayden, and taking a few minutes to check it out was a nice way to break up an otherwise long and tedious long day of travel.

People on Moving walkway at Chicago O'hare Airport

So I finally got my lazy butt up and went in San Francisco today. And man was it worth it. There is just so much to do in that city it’s staggering. Since I don’t want to take forever to post I’ll just post singles this week instead of making one longer post (and I figure this is more what I will do in the future again so I can get back to regular posting).

One of the more random (at least to me) things about my trip today was discovering the houses from the opening scene to “Full House” (skip to 0:37) . I didn’t realize what a nice and easily accessible place the Alamo Park was and seeing the famous “Painted Ladies” as the houses are called. After biking around the city for a few hours, it was nice to sit down and take a break in the style of the Tanner family.