All images © 2007-2013 Aaron Meyers
I spent the last couple days on a photovacation taking photos of beautiful things around northern Arizona. My photo buddy Willie and one other friend and I flew into Phoenix and drove 5 hours north to Page, Az. We arrived in the evening, just as a storm started blowing in. We immediately went over to Horseshoe Bend to see if we could get some nice photos. Although we knew that this spot was *completely* over-photographed we hoped that the storm would give us a fairly unique shot of the bend in the Colorado River. About an hour before sunset the lightning starting getting pretty close and the rain got a little heavier than we would have liked -- we sprinted back to the car to protect our gear. Luckily monsoon season in Arizona means the storms only last about 20 minutes and we were able to head back to The Bend before the sunset light started. Fortunately for Willie and I, another storm was right behind and rolled behind Horseshoe Bend just as the sun was setting. The incoming storm created an absolutely beautiful sunset, filled with light shafts of the setting sun reflecting off the rain. The water was also calm enough to reflect the sunset in the river. We definitely had a treat of a sunset! I rented a D700 for this trip from LensRentals.com. The D700 was absolutely amazing. With my 17-35mm lens on it I could finally go really wide and this place absolutely needed a wide angle lens. We scoped out a couple locations for this shoot and eventually decided we liked this spot because it was a little bit different than most peoples photos (who take their shots a bit to the left). I liked the two rocks on the left and right from this spot -- they point into Horseshoe Bend and frame it really nicely. Couple other notes about Horseshoe Bend: It's right off the highway and really easy to get to. There's about a 0.75 mile walk along a sandy trail to get here and pretty much anyone except a 90 year old parent could make the trek. Once you arrive at Horseshoe Bend there's a really long stretch of land that you can scope out to get your shot (there's not just one or two spots). The edge of the cliffs drops 1,000 feet down and there are no railings preventing you from falling off. We got right up to the edge to get this shot. I was afraid to let go of my camera for fear that the wind would blow it off the edge! Additionally, there's no way to get rid of that little rock on the bottom (left/center) that sticks into the river. It's a huge rock (that only looks small due to the 17mm lens) and no composition gets rid of it. Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 17mm, f/11, 0.4 sec, ISO 200, Tripod Lee Filter Holder w/HiTek 3-stop Reverse ND Grad
In May I traveled to the Big Island of Hawaii for a week long vacation and there were 2 things I was most looking forward to: scuba diving with the Manta Rays and seeing hot scalding lava. The trip delivered everything and more! A lot of back and forth decisions finally led my friends and I to sign up for an evening lava tour with Kalapani Cultural Tours. The hike out to the lava wasn't too bad -- about 2 miles along mostly flat lava. Our guides LOVED to talk about the lava but unfortunately they couldn't seem to do it while we walked. We spent so much time stopped 'resting' that our arrival time started getting dangerously close to the best light. At first we came upon the surface flow -- where some of the lava had bubbled over and began to creep along the surface. After taking my picture 2 feet away from 2,000 degree lava I decided I wanted to go see the ocean flow. The lava conditions change every day. A lava bench that was around yesterday may have fallen off and will be completely gone the next morning. When I arrived there was no safe viewing spot close up to the lava. I had to stay far back, high on a cliff, and used the 80-200mm telephoto to get nice and intimate with the lava. On this evening the lava was flowing so fast that there was a TON of steam everywhere. More steam than I would have liked. As we watched 2 new streams of lava broke through the tube and made their way down into the ocean (you can see them on the far right of the photo). Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 80-200mm: 145mm, f/6.3, 0.4 sec, ISO 800
After 7 straight days of being wet I can’t even begin to describe how great a feeling it was to arrive at Godafoss and to be *dry*. Even getting this close to the waterfall didn’t get me wet like many of the other falls I visited in Iceland. The rain had finally stopped earlier in the evening when Andy exclaimed “I’m going to Godafoss while it’s dry — who wants to come?!” I think we left our campsite sometime around 11pm and spent almost 2 hours at the waterfall. Iceland doesn’t believe in installing railings like we do in the United States. Perhaps they just don’t care if people die, or because there’s no railings, people aren’t as dumb. Perhaps people in the US just really are more dumb? There’s nothing preventing you from going right to the edge of the waterfall, as you can see in the upper left and most of us did exactly that! I decided, however, that I would stay below the falls and shoot it from down below. I loved the way that Godafoss curves around in a bowl shape. Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 17mm, f/14, 30 sec, ISO 100
