Sunset from the Sky As I was landing in Lijiang, China, I saw this sunset out the window.I tried not to panic the other passengers as I quickly stood up and hauled my massive camera bag out of the overhead. I tried to be smooth as I ripped open the bag in a frenzied way. I tried not to be too loud as I grunted to pull out my giant camera and jam it into the window.I was hoping this was a good indication of a nice week of photography in Lijiang — and it was! :)- Trey RatcliffClick here to read the rest of this post at the Stuck in Customs blog. - Trey Ratcliff | Stuck In Customs

Thank you again for all the comments and feedback - much appreciated and I read them all! A lot of requests come in for my tutorial about how I do these shots - you can find it here: HDR Tutorial

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StuckInCustoms > The Sorbonne
My friend (and website designer), Fabien Barral, met my wife and I in Paris to take us out to dinner. We left the hotel, and about 30 seconds out the door, we came across this street side cafe right by the Sorbonne, the famous university. Luckily, I think both of them were used to this behavior and chatted pleasantly while I snapped away.

I worked on this photo all day. People often ask me how long I work on photos. If you've seen the HDR Video Tutorial here on the site, you know it takes me anywhere from 15 minutes to three hours. This one was on the long side for sure... It was tough work, but I am happy with the results.

- Trey Ratcliff

Read the rest here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The Action of New York City
I just finished working on this photo. It was a difficult one, but it was a lot of fun. Shots in Manhattan are often filled with all kinds of complex activity, and Times Square amps that all up to the next order of magnitude.

The weather was perfect this day, and I know that isn't always the case. Since everything was more or less idyllic, I decided to make the most of it and see how many compositions I could squeeze into the afternoon. The only time I spent waiting around was watching for a few Yellow Cabs to streak by.

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The Alps in the Afternoon
The more rugged the mountains, the better they look with a low angle of incidence of the light. Of course, they also look great in the middle of the day, but since the rugged peaks are in three dimensions, you get many extra angles of contrast when the sun is low.

These kind of shots help me remember the fake symbology built up in my head of the shape-of-mountains. I got a bit of this when I was learning to draw... when drawing a human face, it takes a long time to get rid of that thing that is drilled into you as a kid -- that the eye is sort of the shape of a football. If you try to do that with a good drawing, it never works. And, it's sort of the same way with mountains. In my head, I still have to stop thinking of them as a rugged 2D line. It's thousands of 2D lines, crawling this way and that, but I can usually only see one of them. But, on late afternoons like this, you can start to see hundreds of more lines.

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more, including a post about why I don't watermark, here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The Snow Monkey
I found this guy right outside of Nagano, Japan.

I've had this photo for a while, and I decided to process it today while hanging out with Jaime Ibarra from IbarraPhoto.com (nudity warning. nudity opportunity.) We spent all day and night processing photos. He's a great guy. His techniques are so unique! I was able to convince him to write an ebook for Flatbooks.com -- I can't wait to see it. We hope to get it out before Thanksgiving! :)

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > China Mysteries
This curious place was found in China...

Who can make up a good story about what is happening here? Any guesses as to what it really is while you're at it?

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > Little Girl in a Tiny French Market
There was a small market in France with all sorts of little wonderful objects. Little fanciful things rested and leaned here and there. I had a lot of fun moving around with my 50mm to grab shots as I peeked and poked about. I chose to compose this scene in just this way and focus in just this manner.

I believe the shot below tells just enough of a story, and sets up just enough of a scene to let the a wandering mind wander…

Am I just a romantic that likes to do things in this way? Am I a fuddy-duddy that finds the idea of people re-focusing my shot as they click about to be "tech for the sake of tech?" Maybe I am…

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The Wicked Show
I was in a hangout the other night with Chee Chew from Google, and, somehow, the topic of musicals came up. It turns out that he's a huge fan of musicals and he saw Wicked here in London also. I would have never taken that guy for a big fan of musicals... and I suppose there are many lurker-musical fans out there... are you one of them? It's okay... you can admit it... you're amongst friends here :)

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > Last Night in Austin

I was down on South Congress having a little secret dinner meeting about this new app we are building… and then the sun started to go down. Did I have my camera and tripod? Yes yes… of course.. if you invite me to dinner, chances are I'll be bringing them along.

I waited for the right moment before running into the middle lane to get this. It was… exciting. Perhaps a bit more exciting than I anticipated… but, I grabbed it, then stopped at a little local market to get some goodies to gnaw on while driving back home...

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > Great Wall in Evening Light

When I was at the Great Wall that evening, I kept hiking along the old wall as the sun set. I also had a zoom lens (28-300mm) with me, so I was able to get in tight on far away structures and shapes. Not too long after I took this shot, I walked along several lengths of the wall to get to these ruins. I stood there for a long time listening to music and taking photos.

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more (and see a new video) here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The Matterhorn
For most of my life, I've generally only known the Matterhorn for the ride in Disneyland! I mean, I always knew it was a real mountain... and I've seen photos of it and stuff... but seeing it there in the middle of the Alps was really cool.

I think I was lucky while here in Zermatt, Switzerland. I understand that it is often occluded by clouds, so this was a lucky day indeed!

Zermatt was a really great little town -- I'd love to go back and spend some more time there!

- Trey Ratcliff

Read the rest, and some info on the new Silver Efx Pro, here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The PhotoWalk Egg in China
We had a great PhotoWalk in China! It was really so amazing... it was nice to meet so many people while having a great sunset on The Egg. I've been to this place many times, so I felt lucky to have good weather. Upcoming, I have a behind-the-scenes video of how this photo was made as well. I'll try to get that up in the near future, but please feel free to remind me... I get overloaded sometimes!

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > The Carrier
I've been wanting to process this photo forever -- I love carriers.

This one is open to the public, but I arrived too late to get up on the deck... So I was stuck on the ground level -- but then a sweet fog rolled in to cover part of the carrier.

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > New York, Yellow Cab
Here is one of my favorite areas of New York. It's right by the famous Flatiron building -- but I obviously did not shoot in that direction here.

There's often a nice traffic flow, and it makes for a fun experiment to time out the traffic. Since I shoot from -2 to +2., I try to predict when the middle exposure will in the right spot to get the right amount of blur on that photo. My rules for this are a little different based on the time of day and a few other factors.

- Trey Ratcliff

Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.

StuckInCustoms > Painted Face in China I was walking along outside the Forbidden City trying to find a special entrance, and I saw these guys sitting on a bench. It was so interesting and amusing… I dropped down on a knee to take a quick photo while things were perfectly strange. What do you think is going on in this photo?- Trey RatcliffClick here to read the rest of this post at the Stuck in Customs blog.

Sunset from the Sky

As I was landing in Lijiang, China, I saw this sunset out the window.

I tried not to panic the other passengers as I quickly stood up and hauled my massive camera bag out of the overhead. I tried to be smooth as I ripped open the bag in a frenzied way. I tried not to be too loud as I grunted to pull out my giant camera and jam it into the window.

I was hoping this was a good indication of a nice week of photography in Lijiang — and it was! :)

- Trey Ratcliff

Click here to read the rest of this post at the Stuck in Customs blog.