Winter Beach Reflections - Black and White Photography

  Pinnacle Gulch, just a short hike through a little valley with a creek below. Well worth the hike :)

Colorful Streets in Lisbon

 It's so easy to wander around Lisbon there is always something interesting just around the corner.

 Lisbon is very hilly and meandering around town can be like a full on hike up and down stairs all day long. Just meant I got to have more queijadas for fuel to get around town :)

A lone orange tree

 View of the Tagus river beyond the houses

 

 oh the tiles.... so lovely

 

loads of street art everywhere!

 .......and people popping out of windows.... In the bright sun it's kinda hard to see them too, like this image, I didn't even notice the woman in the window until I got home and was editing photos. As a woman traveling alone, Lisbon felt very safe and easy. I did however like the added watchful eyes of the moms and grandmothers in the windows keeping tabs on the what's going on in the streets.

I went to Lisbon in the late spring hoping to have some mild temperatures but while I was there,  there were many days in the 90's. Luckily once mid day was past there was plenty of good shade in the narrow winding streets. 

A Few Windows of Lisbon

Many balconies are packed with flower pots, plants and often a birdcage or two. 

Beautiful little lush gardens.

A few windows from my visit to Lisbon Portugal this spring. What a fun place to photograph and experience. So much color and texture. More pictures to come and also an album on my Flickr site of the rest of my Lisbon photographs here. 

California Academy of Sciences, with the Fuji x100s

 

Nature is so amazing!
The CalAcademy must use use black lights on the sea anemones, they look so psychedelic.

A few years ago I was trying to find a camera a smaller than my D7000, but with great image quality, to bring with me on days where I may be doing alot of walking or traveling. After a ton of research I decided to take a risk and get a Fuji X100S. I had been using almost all Nikon cameras up to that point. So it was a big switch. It has been such a fantastic camera. I brought it with me to the California Academy of Sciences and it didn't disappoint. The Fuji x100s has a 2.0 f-stop but it can be soft for macro at that setting so it's is better at 4.0 for sharp edges, so I was surprised how well the pictures turned out since it was very low light and things were moving all over, either underwater or butterflies that don't stand still.

Partly Cloudy - Sonoma Coast

Seems like just about any time of year I check the local webcam for the coast (Bodega Ocean Observing Node)  BOON to see the weather, it's 'partly cloudy' which can be great in the summer since where I live inland about 15 miles, we hardly see a cloud all summer.

 The diffused light is great for capturing all the great textures of this rugged coast

 It started to rain as I was out, luckily it didn't last long

Thought I would just go with the mood a little more, it can be so gloomy in a beautiful way on quiet cloudy days at the coast.

 (Nikon D7000, 18-140mm)

Pink Ranunculus

(Nikon D7000 and 35mm 1.8 lens)

Coastal California

Just wanted to post these few photographs together from recent outings locally here in Sonoma and Marin County. I hope everyone is having a great weekend :)