Tulip Altered Art

This image is of a tulip taken at the National Arboretum in Washington DC last spring. I thought the colors looked beautiful, almost like a painting. In working with the image, I decided to isolate the colors of the single flower in the center and enhance it to look like a watercolor painting. The black and white flowers in the background are left as a photograph to provide contrast in both color and texture. The final image is most striking when printed on metallic photograph paper. I offer this image in my shop as a limited edition ACEO - I will only make 24 of these and then there will be no more!

Here is the original image:




Here is the altered image:

Texas Sunflowers

Our trip to the Hill Country of Texas for the family reunion last weekend was a lot of fun. While were were driving on Hwy 90 west of San Antonio, we came across a beautiful field of sunflowers. Of course, I had to stop for a quick little photo shoot. I think the pictures came out great. I put them together as a notecard set in my shop. Here are my favorite pictures that I got:

Hyde Park Tulips

When I was visiting Wes in London last April, I spent a relaxing morning wandering around in Hyde Park and surrounding areas of London. I had a lot of time to kill while Wes was in class. The spring weather was great and I got to take some great pictures of the beautiful flowers they had out in the landscaping.

Coral Tree in the Sky

This picture is very simple, but I love it. In the picture itself, I enjoy the color of the sky and the unique flowers of the coral tree. I think this tree is native to Australia, but we were in Carlsbad, California when this picture was taken.

The other reason that I love the picture is for what it reminds me of, although this may not mean much to anyone else. Wes and I were in California in March 2005 when he took me to San Diego for a surprise weekend trip. We were supposed to be spending the week at my parents house and he booked the flight from there! It was on this trip that he proposed (and I accepted) - he did a great job and it was very sweet. All of the pictures from the trip will always have a special place in my heart, despite all the other great places we have been together since then.

Vernazza - Cinque Terra, Italy

I thought it might be nice to move out of Asia and explore some of the other places we have visited. Last year for Easter, Wes and I traveled to Italy - we went hiking in the Cinque Terra for the first few days and then went to Florence and Pisa. The Cinque Terra are a series of 5 small villages along the Mediterranean coast of northern Italy (check wikipedia for more info). My sister and I spent time there years ago as well. It is a beautiful place!

This picture was taken on the morning of our last day in town. We got up early so that we could do a 2 hour hike before it was time to check out of our room. It was nice to be out when it was not too crowded. Easter was a busy time in Italy.

On a side note, this region is known for its pesto. We enjoyed all kinds of things - pesto pizza, pesto gnocci, pesto pasta...thinking of it makes me hungry.

Glass Ceiling

This is the ceiling in the lobby of the Bellagio Las Vegas. The whole place is nicely decorated, but it is important to remember to look up so that you don't miss the best part. It is fun to watch people standing around and pointing up when they first arrive.

Rainbow at Sunset

This bright red shot just goes to show that good can come out of what was otherwise not a great day. To keep a long story short, Wes and I had rented a car and were driving around the south island of New Zealand for about 10 days in January 2006. We had had pretty good weather most of the time and I was looking forward to the drive on our second to last day because this took us through the middle of the island - the guide book showed pictures of beautiful mountains reflected in stunning, glassy lakes. Just our luck - that day it rained and rained and rained - all you could see were clouds. No glassy lakes. No mountains at all. To top off the end of the drive, it was getting late and we were about to run out of gas when we realized the gas stations in New Zealand close. No 24-hour pay-at-the-pump options were jumping out at us and we started to worry where we were going to make it to our destination. Arriving in town on fumes, we were able to buy gas about 5 minutes before the last station closed. We checked into our hotel and then were off in the rain to find dinner.

Just as we were sitting down to eat, the rain let up and a bright rainbow could be seen over the water in the setting sun. It cast a red glow over the whole place. Everyone in the restaurant was getting up to take a look. Naturally, I grabbed my camera and snapped a few pictures. I was not sure it would capture the light correctly, but in the end it turned out alright. A nice end to the day.

Orange Flowers in Singapore

Most of the time, pictures do not have a dramatic story behind them but just result from finding a small slice of beauty in everyday life. This is one of those pictures, and I have many many more with a similar background. In this particular case, Wes and I were walking through Singapore in October of last year. It is a very urban city, much like Hong Kong, but there was a good amount of landscaping to keep things looking nice. These orange flowers were a bush in the landscaping just up the road from the statue of Raffles. It caught my eye so I had to stop and take a photo.

Hong Kong Bird Market

While Wes and I were living in Hong Kong, we spent most of our time on Hong Kong Island - that is where we lived, where I worked and where Wes went to school. We would often take Saturday trips to Kowloon, on the other side of Victoria Harbor, for shopping or just a little walking tour. One of our favorite places to visit, and to bring friends who came to see us, was the Bird Market. Because of the tiny apartments that most people in Hong Kong have, there is not a lot of room for pets. So, birds are a very popular pet for people to keep. The men at the market showed how much they loved their birds by bringing them out for a walk in small cages and often talking to them. It was not uncommon to see groups of men together with their pet birds, just passing the time on the weekend while the birds got some fresh air. The markets sold all kinds of birds, cages, and accessories. They even had live crickets to feed the larger birds. This picture is of one of the cages of birds waiting to be purchased. I felt like the one bird in the middle was looking at me as the calm in the middle of a hive of bird activity.

Faces of Bayon

The Bayon temple, built around the year 1200, is close to Angkor Wat outside of Siem Reap, Cambodia. The most significant feature of the Bayon are the face towers that dominate the complex. This is a close up of one of the large faces there. It is not completely clear what expression they were trying for 800 years ago, but it looks to me like he is smiling just a little bit.

Ancient Angkor

As promised, I have added some of our Cambodia trip pictures to the shop, as well as on flickr. I went with sepia on these because I think it best captured the feel of the place. I have also included the color versions above so that you can compare!

Oma's Garden

My grandmother turned 104 last month and is still doing very well. She has always loved gardening, a passion that was strongly picked up by my mother and that my sister and I are trying to carry on. Even though she has people come care for the garden these days (under supervision, of course), the garden still reflects her influence. When I was visiting there in June of last year, the garden still looked beautiful even though the winter was coming on and there was a serious drought. I was impressed by the wide variety of blooms that were there - there are more photos to come in this series!

Floating Flowers Note Card

This photo has a much less inspiring history. For Chinese New Year in 2007, Wes and I went to Siem Reap, Cambodia, to visit Angkor Wat and the surrounding temple complex. It was a wonderful trip - I am sure many of the photographs will be here soon. In our hotel's restaurant, there was a large container of floating flowers the entire time we were there. I could not say with certainty what they are, but I thought they looked pretty neat so I took this photo on our last day there.

Our first listing

The first picture I chose to put up on the shop is of a lotus flower in the garden of a monastery outside of Hue, Vietnam in September 2007. We visited the monastery after spending the day on a motor bike tour of the countryside surrounding Hue. The weather was perfect and the pond full of lotus flowers was a center point of the tranquil garden. On the way to the garden, we passed by young apprentice monks doing their studies inside.

I am not sure what thoughts this image inspires in you, but for me it conjures memories of that day and the feeling of peace and tranquility of the quiet garden.