from above

Got back in to Austin very early this morning. The Southwest flight from Vegas managed to get delayed then bounced around in turbulence the whole way back. Finally got home and to sleep around 2am, so I'm feeling a bit tired just now! I have a ton of photographs to work through from the trip. An interesting set really. Not much in the way of traditional landscape views of all the beautiful places Amanda & I visited. Mostly I took a cue from Steve Barth and his project Stephanie idea. The whole week turned in to a portraiture project based around pictures of Amanda in the various locations we ended up in. I had a great time trying to come up with new ideas and approaches for the same beautiful subject, over and over again. I think Amanda also enjoyed being part of it and getting to come up with concepts too. It was a challenge not to just repeat ideas and I suspect a harder challenge for her to find new expressions too! Expect to see a lot of these portraits over the next few weeks. The shot above was inspired by some of the portraits by Holly Sisson. Amanda and I were hiking through Yosemite valley in the middle of the Autumnal leaves. A lot of the trees were turning golden and red but there were also already many leaves on the ground. I decided to try and use them as a background and a yellow colour compliment for Amanda's green top. We found a large boulder, surrounded by crisp orange, yellow leaves and I clambered up on top. With a wide open aperture giving a shallow depth of field, this angle really puts all the emphasis on the face. having Amanda looking up at me also fills her face and eyes with the light from the sky behind me. It was a mostly cloudy day so the light is quite soft and even.