Hamilton Pool in Austin Texas

I've been wanting to go to Hamilton Pool for a long time. Today was nice so I took advantage of it to get some fresh air, a bit of hiking and some photography done. There is this very nice clearance in the park where water has eroded the rock formation into a half moon shape. This is the spot where people swim in the summer period.


I'm learning how to apply the traditional photography techniques that I like with the new digital SLR; stuff like depth of field and playing with different exposures and shutter speeds to affect crispness, darkness and focal point.


Since this is not a matt painting blog, I'm doing very little post editing on these. When any, post editing is done on the following: brightness, contrast, saturation and cropping. Even thought I'm not going in and painting any stuff in these, I still feel like the process is very similiar to painting; choosing how much shadow occupies the space and leading the eye with directional lines, color & value.

Hi, 

I've finally bought a decent Digital SLR camera today; Nikon's D40. 

I was used to taking photographs with a traditional Yashica 35mm Film camera years ago until I moved on to a cheap digital camera which was, well, disapointing. I remember being able to snap moments with the film camera and do special effects with exposure and shutter speeds and found that the cheap digital camera always missed the 'moments' because of its delay.

Well with the new D40, you get the best of both world. Even though it's the lowest end camera in the Nikon family, it is more than I need. I am by no means a professional photographer; most of my picture taking goes into building libraries of bricks, bark, tree leaves and other interesting texture references.

So these pictures are a first night out with the camera. I plan on regularly taking motorcycle rides to cool places at different times of day to find interesting observations in nature. 

As a closing note for this post, check out Ansel Adams at theanseladamsgallery.blogspot.com, a remarkable American photographer with a love for nature and life.