If you want to see how I made this photo, you can visit the HDR Tutorial. It may show you some new tricks!
India is a beautiful and magical place. I wish I could say my journey to get to this exact vantage point was the just as beautiful and magical, but it was not.
I really wanted a unique vantage point, and I was reticent to try to set up inside the complex with the teaming crowds. So, I talked my driver into taking me to the backside of the Taj Mahal because I had seen a river back there on Google Maps. We started circumnavigating the place and we came to the old trestle bridge. It was quite a long stretch to get across the river. The bridge was just barely standing, and everything about the dilapidated structure was sketchy. We were the only car on it, and it was hard to get around all the ox-carts, donkeys, and bicycles.
Looking out the window at the rusting girders, I asked our driver, “When was this built?”
He wobbled his head and said, “Eighty-three.”
Well, I thought for a moment. That doesn’t sound so old.
Then he turned back to me, “Eighteen Eighty-three.”
Read more here at the Stuck in Customs blog.
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If you want to see how I made this (and how you can too!), visit my HDR Tutorial. I hope it gives you some new tricks!
After the crowds of Angkor Wat, it was nice to go find a remote temple in the jungle and be alone. This temple laid under the jungle, completely undiscovered for centuries.
The hallway and mysterious chambers seemed to go on forever.
from www.stuckincustoms.com
BTW, if you go to Angkor Wat and you want a good tour guide, contact "Eath Soratanak". You can call him "Tak". He can be reached at ratanak_eath@yahoo.com or at (855) 92 725 552. He speaks English almost as well as Sir Anthony Hopkins and has an accent somewhere between Arnold Schwarzenegger and Larry Flynt.
from my daily photo blog at www.stuckincustoms.com
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If you want to see how I made this (and how you can too!), visit my HDR Tutorial. I hope it gives you some new tricks!
I made it to the heart of Ta Prohm, an undisturbed Bayon ruin out the outskirts of Angkor Wat. It was late in the day and there was a break in the afternoon summer showers.
To me, the best thing about these temples and ruins is that you can go anywhere, high or low, safe or not. There are hundreds of tiny nooks, old broken stone doors, lost hallways, and mysterious carvings peeking out of the overgrowth. There are no tort-related legal signs barring you from going anywhere... explorer beware. Besides, if you got injured, the jungle and insects would eat you alive before the night was over.
As soon as I walked into Ta Prohm, the thunder started rumbling around and dappled clouds rolled in. The thunder was extra eerie and chest-thumping inside all the mossy and vegetated old tombs. The rain started and stopped several times, so I would take refuge in crumbling crypts and hallways until the rain let up. I took some wrong turns, but I eventually ended up here with a break in the storm. I popped out with the 10 mm get this shot.
The temple was built in 1181 AD and was the home to 18 high priests, 615 dancers, and 12,500 people. I don't know why the dancer stats are so important, but there you go.
from my daily photo blog at www.stuckincustoms.com
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If you want to see how I made this (and how you can too!), visit my HDR Tutorial. I hope it gives you some new tricks!
I arrived into Thailand this weekend and have been in content-creation mode non stop. I did take a chance back at the hotel to process this one picture I thought y'all would enjoy.
(and yes that sun picture is real... it was burning through the bottom while still streaming light over the top).
This picture is of Wat Arun, a famous Buddhist temple in Thailand. I took it from a really cool little Italian restaurant across the way that is attached to a boutique hotel named "Arun Residence". I will stay at this place next time - be sure to get the balcony room at the top if you come... it's just over $100 a night.
from my daily photo blog at www.stuckincustoms.com
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I was barefoot like the rest of them.
The day must have been around 95 degrees and as stuffy as can be, but the cool marble seemed to keep me from being drenched in sweat. After a long walk, I had finally made it to the inner core of the Taj Mahal, around the main tomb structure where pilgrims from all over the country had gravitated. The faithful coiled in long lines and snaked their way around the complex, waiting patiently to reflect at the megamausoleum and communing with the god of their choice. How could a billion people be wrong?
When I travel, I actually always enjoy talking to Indians (or whoever) about their religion. Here is a little thing I do... I'm not sure it's totally ethical since I say the same thing over and over, but I enjoy seeing people's reaction as a probe a panoply of personalities. Inevitably, when I'm in a taxi or man-powered trike-mobile, there is some sort of deity that is jiggling about on the dashboard or handlebars. It can be anyone from Shiva to Brahma to Vishnu to Krishna to Ganesha and beyond.
So, I always ask, "Who is the god to whom you pay reverence?"
They respond quickly and directly, usually naming one from of the top ten from the pantheon of possibilities.
I respond back, in all seriousness, "Oh! He is a very powerful god!"
To this, they always turn to me and nod gravely.
My guide there was from no from one of the traditional Hindu sects -- he was a Jain. The Jain don't recognize the divine origins of the Vedas (made popular in the US from Oppenheimer's re-quote after testing the Bomb), nor do they believe in any one supreme deity. They instead revere Tirthankaras who have raised themselves to divine perfection. So anyway, if you ever try out the little trick above, don't bother with a Jain because they will just give you a funny look and a wobble of inconsequential solitude.
So if any of you get the chance to go, I recommend it. The people are all nice as can be and very eager to engage in conversation about just about everything. Or, of you've already been, then you know what I mean!
By the way, this comes from my new Lucis Pro Tutorial.
from the blog at www.stuckincustoms.com
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