Somewhere in the world is an elephant seal named Rustin

Yesterday I promised to tell you why I was sorry I didn't have my camera in hand the whole day when we were visiting the Central Coast. While my wife, Victoria, and I were scouting a location to photograph the sunset, we saw a team from The Marine Mammal Center of California headed down the bluffs to the shore. We followed and saw what they were after: a stranded Elephant Seal pup. They carefully loaded the 100+ pound baby into a crate, and then asked for my help to get it back up the cliff. Afterwards, they asked us to help think up an unusual name for it because they track thier rescues by name (not number) but cannot reuse a name for ten years. My wife suggested "Rustin". The folks from TMMC were kind enough to take a picture of us with Rustin and sent us an update on his condition later that evening. You can track his progress at thier website under the Current Patients link.

Here are the other pictures from Saturday. I took these earlier in the day when we stopped on the beach in San Simeon, CA to see the Elephant Seals. I wish I could have gotten a better angle and had better light but I am pleased with the results. All of these images were taken with my Canon 40D and 70-200mm f/2.8L IS lens with the Canon EF 1.4x II Extender attached.


This is what baby Rustin will look like one day

Here are some other great shots of the Elephant Seals

First outing with the 5D

Since I don't have any weddings or engagements to shoot until next month, I took out my Canon 5D for a test run this past weekend. My wife, Victoria, and I drove up the coast of CA to San Simeon to see the baby elephant seals. After seeing the seals we started driving back down the coast towards home and stopped just north of Cayucos to watch the sunset. We arrived with a little over an hour to go before sunset so we went for a walk to scout out a good location to photograph the sunset. I will tell you more about that walk tomorrow and why I made a big mistake by not bringing my camera.


Here are some images with my 5D. All were shot using my new Canon 24-70mm f/2.8L lens except for the last one which was taken with my Canon 15mm f/2.8 fisheye. Enjoy!

New Toys

I finally picked up a Canon 5D body last week after contemplating the purchase for nearly a year. Canon released the 5D in September 2005. The 5D is equipped with a full frame 12.8 MP sensor. Even though this model has been out for 2.5 years with no replacement, it is still considered on of the top cameras out today due to its low noise and great color representation. I had been hoping Canon would announce the 5D replacement at PMA in Vegas this year but it didn't happen. They could announce it this summer or early fall and I will be curious to see what they do. The main reason I wanted to get a 5D is so I could really appreciate the shallow depth of field the 85mm f/1.2L II can deliver on a full frame body. I also enjoy getting the full fisheye effect using my 15mm f/2.8 fisheye lens now.


I also picked up 2 new Canon L lenses for my 5D. I got the 24-70mm f/2.8L and the 17-40mm f/4.0L. Make sure you check back later today of tomorrow for my first outing with my new camera and lenses.

Thirst Relief Mentor Auction

Today was an awesome day! This afternoon I found out I was the top bidder for a mentoring session with Dane Sanders in the WPPI Thirst Relief Mentor Auction. Thirst Relief's mission is to provide pure drinking water to those in need across the world. We take it for granted that we can turn on our faucet and get clean drinking water in our own home. Many of us don't even use that option but instead go out and buy bottles of water. A donation of $5 to Thirst Relief can save a life by protecting them from water borne illnesses. Please consider contributing to this great cause. I was able to save 101 lives today with my donation. I am so thankful for Dane and many other leaders in the Wedding and Portrait Photography industry for giving their time and knowledge in exchange for our donations.


Make sure you check out these links.
Dane Sanders Photography
Dane's Blog
CutFrame Tv - a YouTube for photographers created by Dane Sanders

Sunset from this weekend

The weather has been amazing the past couple of days here in Southern CA. On Friday night we drove up to an overlook in Pacific Palisades to see the sunset. Here are a few images I took while we where there.