Week 26/52 127 Years



to not see
to not hear


It's quite fascinating that the best ideas for images usually come when I'm at the polar opposite of the top of the world. Originally, I wanted a straight-on portrait photo-manipulated to have a pair of hands covering my eyes and another pair of hands covering my ears. After a couple tries it didn't seem to be working so I improvised. I think the final image better emphasizes the emotional part of it without being accidentally creepy.

Week 25/52 Feathery Solitude

Cruisin' 2011



I went on my first ever cruise last Friday to Ensenada, Mexico on the Carnival Paradise ship! It was a short 4 day, 3 night trip, but boy it was super fun! The ship itself is pretty awesome. There is food available 24/7, so many activities to do, shows to watch, things to look at. It was a light-lover's dream! :D

On the first day, Steven and I left our bags in the room and took a short walk around, trying to familiarize ourselves with the place. After 4 days I think I'd still get lost. Day 1!


Looking out from the ship, it was absolutely beautiful. I brought along a circular polarizer, which really brought the clouds out, and shooting with it was awesome. The only peeve I have with it is that there was some heavy vignetting going on in the corners, but that's probably because I stacked filters.. so most of these photos are cropped to try to hide those vignettes!


When the ship finally took off at around 5PM, Steven and I decided to go to the front of the ship to look at the ocean. It was soooo windy! You can see in the last picture how crazy my hair was!


Every night, dinner was served for us at the Destiny Dining Room. You can eat as much as you want! We were seated at a table with two other couple groups, which we quickly befriended since we had so much in common. I think Carnival really did some thoughtful table-seating choices! We were all around ages 21-23, it was mostly our first time on a cruise, and one couple, Jennifer and Josh, were actually UCSB class of 2011 alumni, what a coinkidink! Our server Joel was very really nice. I never brought my DSLR out to dinner though. On a couple nights I did bring my iPhone along, so below includes some crappy iPhone photos. :P


Here are some interior shots of the ship. The atrium is absolutely beautiful - so many colors and so many lights! The Normandie theater is also amazing and huge; we watched several shows there, learned how to 70s dance up on that stage, played BINGO, and watched married couples duke it out on the "Game of Love."


There was always late night coffee and hot chocolate available.


A couple iPhone pictures of random things, including us on the windy deck again, a souvenir coconut monkey drink holder thingy, and some pretty beverages.


At Ensenada, Mexico! Had some authentic fish tacos there as well.


A really nifty part of the cruise was the complimentary room service. On the second day, we had breakfast delivered to us, and whenever we were hungry, we just called up room service and had them deliver us food!


A window with a view of the ocean in our room was pretty neat. On the second day, I woke up oddly early and couldn't go back to sleep, so I sat on the window sill, took pictures, and painted my nails. It was really, really amazing. :) On the last picture, we spotted two people on a boat, and they waved back at us. :P




A much needed vacation from my third year of college!

A short trip to UCLA

I've never been to the UCLA campus, so yesterday my friend Patrick led me on small tour around the place. It's so lovely and the buildings have such amazing architecture!

20th Annual Reel Loud Film Festival 2011 Opening Short



Here is the opening short I shot for the Reel Loud festival this year (that already passed). I feel like I'm always trying to explain what Reel Loud is and I'm sure I can never describe how awesome it is and all the work that goes into not only the films shown but also the entire show itself. My lazy butt is going to copy and paste my friend Ryan Turner's youtube video description. Hah!

[[
      Ryan Turner was brought on to create this short film for UCSB's annual silent film festival. The festival requires students to shoot on 16mm and have a live music accompaniment to go along with them. Thus, we shot this short in that style.
     This short follows the hosts: Sahar and Nadia, as they attempt to gather help from the various faculty at UC Santa Barbara for the festival only to find out that the faculty are working on a show of their own. The theme of this year's festival was "circus".
     This showcases just how cool professors in the film and media studies department are. Be jealous..

Written by: Kyle Thompson
Directed by: Ryan Turner
Cinematography by: Annie Hall
Addition direction from: Addison Smith
Starring: Nadia Ismail and Sahar Vahedi, Joe Palladino, Jennifer Holt, Charles Wolfe, Anna Brusutti, Dan Reynolds, Maria Corrigan, Edward Branigan, and Jackie Apodaca
Music by: Leo Kaliski
]]

Week 24/52 The Traveler



"One always begins to forgive a place as soon as it's left behind" - Charles Dickens


This little place was very close to my house where I've shot a couple 365s. It was nice coming back here and doing another selfie. Also, I didn't know the orchid I was lugging around was a real plant, haha. Knocked off a flower from the stem, woops!

Week 23/52 A-OK!


22/52

Just finished my last final, which means:
I'm done with my 3rd year of college
It's summer!
I'm officially a college senior!
(and although I only have a week break since I'm taking summer school and have an internship) I have a feeling awesome things are going to be happening :)

I'm also thinking about maybe making my own website, it's about time!

Monterey Bay Aquarium

I went to Monterey Bay Aquarium with my friend about a month ago, but I've been putting off editing these pictures until now. Enjoy! :)

My friend and I both use Nikon, so we swapped lenses constantly - the 50mm, 35mm, and the 10.5mm fisheye.



And of course, I love shooting people photographing things.

Week 22/52 Time of Year



It is paper writing, final-taking season again!
So excuse the mirror selfie. I tried to make it look a bit more... presentable.