San Diego

  1. Low Sunset at Solana Beach

    This beach sunset photo is from Solana Beach which is in San Diego California. This is one of the coolest beach cities in North County San Diego in my opinion. It's just a different vibe than Oceanside, or La Jolla or Pacific Beach. 

    This sunset was interesting the night of this photo. There were some unique clouds but only off in the distance which created very cool negative space in the skies. 

    Today's Beach Photo

    Solana Beach SunsetThis beach photo was taken in Solana Beach in San Diego California. The angle of the clouds were very unique that night, and the use of negative space in the sky made for an interesting perspective of this sunset. See more of my Beach Photography at AlikGriffin.com

  2. Sunset at Solana Beach

    When I lived in San Diego this was one of the main beaches I would surf at. Every year it seems San Diego gets more and more crowded and more of the cities are trying to doing the L.A. thing where they put a parking meter next to any place that could possibly fit a car. This is one of the last beaches I know of where there is still relatively easy to find parking in the middle of the summer that's free. The spots known as Cherry Hill located directly behind Frogs Gym. And in the winter you can get some great sunsets and there are many abandoned stair ways that once led up to the houses on the cliffs above that you can take photos around. Like this one. Except this one was still in use.  

    Today's Photo

    Sunset at Solana Beach CaliforniaThis is my old surf spot back when I lived in San Diego. This area is kind of a secret spot known as Cherry Hill. It's right behind Frogs Gym in Solana Beach. It's really one of the few places left in San Diego where you can still find free parking in the summer.

  3. Downtown San Diego From Coronado Island

    The other night, I think it was Christmas eve me and my brother and our wives drove down to Corona Island to scope out the views. Around this time of year is great to drive around San Diego or Los Angeles since there is hardly any traffic. Going down to Coronado from Del Mar during rush hour at any other time of the year would take hours, but we were able to do it in a few minutes.

    I lived in Del Mar which is in San Diego country for about eight years and always wanted to get some cool shots of San Diego. I shot down there a bit when I was in college with my old film camera but I've yet to take any of my current DSLRs there. On this trip I wanted to get a great Downtown San Diego skyline and the best and most obvious place for that was Coronado Island. I wanted to get a cool shot of the bridge too but we couldn't really figure out where to go for that. Usually I research this kind of thing a little better but I just figured there is so much in San Diego that we'd find plenty of other cool things to shoot.

    Today's Photo

    Downtown San Diego from Coronado IslandThis shot of Downtown San Diego was taken while on Coronado Island. San Diego is a very clean a beautiful city but being from Los Angeles it just feels so quiet. I actually lived in San Diego county for about eight years and always sort of took downtown for granted. Now that I take photography more serious I'd like to spend a lot more time there with my camera. There is so much to see and shoot and the city has such a great skyline.See this photo at AlikGriffin.com

    This is a single shot raw Processed using Lightroom and Sharpened using the Highpass filter. Check out the High Pass Filter Tutorial

  4. The Creole Cafe of Old Town San Diego

    Last time I went to Old Town San Diego I went and took some photos of the Whaley House. Behind the Whaley House I found this little place. The Creole Cafe. It's probably one of the most photogenic buildings of Old Town. It's an old New Orleans style cafe that matched the same old style vibe of the rest of the city. It even had a gas lamp out front. Also it's right on the backyard of the very haunted Whaley House. I really wish I ghost would have given me a sign of it's presence. 

    This is a Night HDR photo. It's more difficult shooting HDR once it's completely dark. The color balance gets really hard to get right since there is no point of reference. You have to experiment a lot and go for more of a look. I guess that's true for a lot of HDR photography. 

    Creole Cafe Old Town San Diego, Night HDR

    I processed this photo using the Exposure Fusion Technique. You can see my HDR Tutorials at my Complete HDR How To Guide.

  5. The Whaley House of Old Town San Diego

    The Whaley House of Old Town San Diego is the most haunted house in the United States. It's also the oldest brick house or the first of its kind in San Diego. I've actually been to the Whaley house a few times now. Once I went inside and did the whole tour. It didn't really feel haunted or anything. I guess someone was hung out by the tree in the back before the house was built and a few people died there.  A little girl is known to tug on your cloths, and people that work there will often times smell cigar smoke. 

    If you hang this photo on your wall the spirits of the Whaley House will come out of the photo and haunt your life. Just like in that one movie with Ethan Hawk. But only if you believe in ghosts.

    Besides that, Old Town San Diego is pretty cool. Probably worth checking out if you visit San Diego. The most fun I had yesterday was ordering the suicide pork burrito. It was so hot they make you sign a waver. It's this amazing shredded pork burrito with habanero sauce in and on it. It's so spicy it made my ears hurt. I was able to finish it though. 

    Whaley House, Old Town, San Diego

  6. Lesser Flamingos - San Diego Wild Animal Park

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    Lesser Flamingos from the San Diego Wild Animal Park. Did you know the pink and reddish color in their feathers comes from the carotenoid pigments in the algae and crustaceans they eat? I didn't know that until I read it on a little board posted in front of the Lesser Flamingo exhibit. Now I do. And now you do too. It's kind of freaky how red their eyes are. Almost looks like they could have built in lasers. 

    This photo was part of my lens review of the Canon 70-200mm f2.8L IS II. You can check it out here: Canon 70-200mm f2.8 USM IS II Lens Review. 

  7. HDR photo of Northern White Rhino - 1 of the 7 still alive

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    Northern White Rhino - 1 of the 7 that exist in the world

    This a HDR photo of one of the two White Rhino's at the San Diego Wild Animal Park. This guy is 30 years old. All of the northern white rhinos are over 30. Too old to breed, and too few of a genetic diversity for the species to repopulate.

    They will be extinct in our life time. All thanks to poaching.

    He looks sad doesn't he?

    I shot this Northern White Rhino on the Canon 5Dmkii 70-200f2.8L IS II. Three shot bracket HDR at 2 stop intervals.