Long time no post! 
It has been exactly 5 months! Seems like forever. I have been very busy. 2010 has proven to be an incredible year of change! The primary reason I have been so busy: I started at a new job!!! I have made the “big switch” from totally free lance, to M-F, 9-5. I have so much to say about that but the one word that keeps echoing through my head is: gratitude. I still do free lance/consulting but I am a “weekend warrior” in that regard.
I am working at the Honolulu Academy of Arts as a Digital Imaging Specialist. I love the new job and my new co-workers! It is a wonderful change: an incredible opportunity to learn new things and meet new people. I thank my lucky stars everyday for such an opportunity! 
Like I said, I have so much (more) to say… I will save that for another post though. I have to ease my way into blogging again — been a while so I don’t want to cramp up.
Uncle Harvey was in town again so we made sure to get out and shoot, at least once. We all wanted to see and touch the fabled Leica M9! We met up at KCC in the afternoon, just before sunset. The light wasn’t great so we just wandered around the cactus garden. Above is a link to my gallery of shots. Only a few and all black & white. That is my “new thing”: black & white. More like, back to basics. I’ve been bored with my own work in color and felt a need to relearn how to see. This will be an interesting exercise. ^_^
stk Black & White, Galleries, Nature Black & White, Cactus, Garden, KCC, Plants
Today was President’s Day holiday. The weather was beautiful! Foster Gardens was a little crowded, I usually see fewer than 5 people on the weekend. Today there must have been at least 20 people wandering around the grounds while we were there. I am glad to see people taking an interest! 
The Bromeliad section of the garden has been greatly improved! The “butterfly garden” has filled in nicely. Not much in the way of butterfly action though. There were about 4 or 5 that hung around but seldom landed. The one I was able to photograph looked like it was attacked by an Anole or Gecko — bite taken out of it’s wing. I searched the milk weeds (Crown Flower) for Monarch caterpillars but did not find any. The new green house conservatory is really cool! Lots of orchids, strange air plants, and pitcher plants. It was a good day to photograph!
stk Galleries, Macro, Nature Afternoon, Butterflies, Flowers, Foster Botanical Gardens, Geckos, Plants
I met up with cuzin: J.T. – on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday – for a photo walk around Kapiolani Community College and Waikiki. (“Sanpo kata gata” is a Japanese term for: “while taking a walk/stroll”. I know everyone uses “osanpo” or “osampo” but that is boring!) The weather was awesome and JT has been looking for some lens upgrades for her Nikon kit. I don’t need “an excuse” to toss some glass into my bag and run out the door – that was TWO! 
You can click on the photo above to view a gallery of photos from our photo walk, please do.
We swapped between three lenses that day: Nikkor 10.5mm DX Fisheye, Sigma 12-24mm DG HSM, and the Sigma 150mm DG Macro. I was shooting full frame and JT was on DX cropped sensor. Say what you like about “third party” lenses; I love those two Sigma’s! Did I mention that the Sigma 12-24 is a full frame lens? NO ONE else has anything to match – not even Nikon (at the moment). The Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 is a phenomenal lens but it is also bigger, heavier, twice as expensive, and it “sees less”: 114 degrees for the Nikon vs. 122 degrees for the Sigma. (These are aspherical super wide zooms. IE: in general, horizontal and vertical lines stay almost perfectly straight.) Although the corner light fall-off for the Sigma is much heavier. So, one could argue that the Nikkor has just as much “usable field of view”. Personally, I have grown to appreciate the in-camera vignette – saves me a step in post… hehe.
stk Galleries, Nature Afternoon, Cactus, Evening, Garden, KCC, Sanpo, Sunset, Waikiki
Back from California. Everything worked out great! I hope to be taking many more trips like this in the future. Thanks to LEICA (and Uncle Harvey) the photo gang is reevaluating our “photographic experience”. The proof is in the pudding, so they say. Chad and I did very little photography (by comparison) on this trip.
Of course, we did do some. Above is the link to an image gallery that spans the course of two days. Nestled in between Mt. Hamilton and the South San Jose foot hills is the Joseph E. Grant County Park. Nice place!
The next day we were up relatively early to visit the “City” (San Francisco). No photos but we hit Japan Town first. Saw the new pop culture museum / VIZ theater. It was nice but kind of “MEH”. The rest of the day is pretty well documented in the photos, so please click the thumbnail above to see. Stay tuned, more from California to come.
stk California, Galleries, Nature CAos, Haight and Ashbury, Hike, Joseph E. Grant, Steinhart Aquarium
I joined my buddy Ryan S. and the Shinnyoen YA for a hike up Wa`ahila. Big MAHALO to (Kristin) Adele, David, and the rest of the YA crew for organizing the event and making me feel welcome! (Thanks for inviting me Sugs!!!) I met a lot of super people, had a great time, and got some much needed exercise! I hope to see everyone again. Please click on the photo above to view a gallery of images from that day.
stk Galleries, Nature, People Hike, Shinnyoen, Wa`ahila Ridge, YA
