October 21, 2007, saw the beginning of a devastating fire that destroyed over 1100 homes and charred 198,000 acres. The Witch Creek Fire roared down the hills near Romona and into more heavily populated areas below, like Poway, Rancho Bernardo, and Del Dios. The fire reached portions of Rancho Santa Fe before onshore winds sent the fire back up the hills and into the mountains. While many homes have already been rebuilt, nature takes its own course. Winter rains soaked the once parched, drought stricken hills and mountains of California and helped to fuel the incredible spring rebirth in these wildfire burn areas.

My nephew Jalen turned 15 today. Happy Birthday, Jalen! In honor of Jalen, I headed down to the beach to shoot a colorful sunset. While not as colorful as the previous day's sunset, which I missed.... ugggh..... this one provided an opportunity to shoot some interesting rock formations that I have been eyeing for some time. In fact, I have shot these formations about a year ago, but this time I think I had better compositions and better light. Timing is crucial.

Recent storms have brought some nice clouds and great opportunities for spectacular sunsets. The storms are great, as they mix up the beach, bring in new rocks and kelp, and keep many people home. I am usually the only one on the beach other than a few surfers out in the water. The layers of clouds not only create the potential for colorful skies at sunset, but they also soften up the light before sunset. This soft light allows me to get some rich, detailed portraits of the coastal rocks and other scenes that would normally be difficult to shoot under harsher lighting conditions.

After a nice holiday get away to see my family in the Bay Area, I finally had an opportunity to shoot a sunset. What better way to start off the new year! Oh, and the sunset was to die for. The clouds really sang out as the sun dipped below the horizon. This shoot was especially nice for me, as I did not have a chance to escape work long enough to go on a photo trip with friends. Normally, this time of year allows me to head off to Utah, Yosemite, or Death Valley for a good 4-7 day trip. At least I was rewarded with a beautiful start to 2008 at one of my local favorite shooting beaches. Here's to a great '08.

Escaping the horrible fires that spread all over the nearby neighborhoods of San Diego County, I headed out to Zion National Park in Utah for a few days with a couple of friends. Although the smoke from the fires met us there, we were treated to some amazing peak fall colors on our hike to the Subway. I have been on the Subway hike about 5 times during the fall over the past few years and I have never seen the colors at their peak... this time, things were different, as the colors were just perfect.

I finally got everything together after getting Jack Brauer and Jesse Speer involved in this wonderful new launch of my landscape galleries. The timing was perfect, as I had just completed a fantastic two week trip to Colorado, stopping throughout the south central and southwestern parts of the state to shoot the fall colors and meet a whole bunch of great people.