Etihad Towers 360
March 3rd, 2012
Serendipity. Sometimes it hits you.
The day I took this shot, I was waiting for a few friends outside their new apartment in the stunning new Etihad Towers buildings in Abu Dhabi. While they showed up, I decided to try ou my new 8mm Sigma fisheye lens.
This is the result. One of the first shots I took with the fisheye.
Needless to say, I’m loving this lens.
More to come soon!
Tags: 8mm, abu dhabi, arab, emirates, etihad, etihad towers, fisheye, landscape, lens, photo, photography, pic, picture, sigma, towers, UAE, united, urban
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World Future Energy Summit Exhibition
January 15th, 2012Hey everyone!
2012 is starting with a bang!
Come check out my work at the World Future Energy Summit which will be held at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Center (ADNEC) in Abu Dhabi from 16-19 January.
The exhibition is hosted by Enviromena, one of the main suppliers of solar technology to Masdar, in association with Green Abu Dhabi, the arts initiative which aims to promote environmental awareness through art.
As in the last time I participated in a Green Abu Dhabi event, 30% of the proceeds from the exhibition will go to charity, including towards the Green Abu Dhabi Fund’s Mangrove Project, an initiative to help save the mangroves around Abu Dhabi.
The show will feature work by myself, Suhail Jashanmal and George Lewis.
Click the link to download the evite: Enviromena_Evite
Come check us out and support the cause if you can!
Tags: 2012, abu dhabi, art, arts show, artwork, charitable, charity, enviromena, environment, green abu dhabi, mangroves, masdar, photography, sustainability, UAE, work, world future energy summit, ziad salloum
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Baby Benny & Dad
June 30th, 2011Friends of mine, a couple, were not long ago blessed with the birth of the most adorable little boy. Now, the father is an accomplished photographer himself and so it was proving a little difficult to find him in front of a lens.
So eventually they asked me to make some portraits of their little family. And it was one of the most fun shoots I’d had in a long time.
Here are a few pictures:
All shots taken with a Nikkor 50mm f/1.4 prime lens, and lit (not always directly) with two studio lights, one of which was firing through my trusty Lastolite Hi Lite background and the other through a Lastolite Ezybox softbox.
More coming soon!
Tags: baby, background, boy, ezybox, family, friends, hilite, lastolite, photo shoot, photoshoot, portrait, shoot, softbox
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Laqlouq Snow Walk
June 15th, 2011Summer seems to have come upon us quite heavily here in Abu Dhabi. Got me thinking about the cooler times, such as earlier this year in Lebanon, where I had the chance to go on a snow walk for the first time.
The weather was starting to warm up earlier than expected and the mountain snow was turning a little slushy around noon, making skiing an unattractive proposition.
We went to a place known as Laqlouq, in Lebanon. We got there early in the afternoon, parked the car by the side of the road, put on the snowshoes and took off up the slope.
Below are a few pictures from that wonderful day.
The snows were already beginning to melt. And to melt quite fast. Just a few short weeks before, the entire mountain side was covered with snow, but the rocks were starting to reach out to the skies again…
As were some of the thorny wild flowers…
We were aiming to get to the cross at the top of the mountain. Unfortunately, just meters from the top, I dropped my glasses! Had to watch them ski their way down the steeper slope of the mountainside.
We headed down after them, and I ended up falling and sliding down a good distance myself. Got snow all over my lens… Halfway down we met two dogs, German shepherds, who eneded up following and playing with us all the way back to the car.
The light was fading fast as we headed back down to Beirut. The clouds hung low over the mountains, bringing fog as the air cooled and making for a spectacular sunset.
More coming soon!
Tags: cloud, dog, fog, german shepherd, glasses, laqlouq, lebanon, mountain, rock, ski, snow, snow shoe, snow walk, snowshoe, summer, sunset, walk, wild flower, winter
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The Cowherds
June 10th, 2011Hyderabad is a fantastic and interesting place.
We were lucky enough to have a great driver who doubled as a tour guide on my trip there. As we were driving on a highway, I spotted the ruin of a mosque rising up from the small buildings to the right of us.
I asked the driver to stop, and we entered the narrow streets and headed towards it. And there it was, around the bend. Absolutely beautiful. Overgrown with green. Small plants and flowers growing out of cracks. Hundreds of years old, by the looks of it. Neglected. Crumbling. Seeming forgotten despite the bustle of life around it.
The mosque turned out to be inaccessible. Walled off from all sides. The driver, a man in his sixties, told us that he used to come often to that neighbourhood as a child. But as sectarian troubles began to increase between Hindus and Muslims, gradually the Muslims left the neighbourhood.
Round the back of the mosque, we came across a herd of cows and goats, tied up and docile.
Turned out the Hindu family nearby were raising them. Also turned out that the family elder was our driver’s wrestling instructor when he was a child. They hadn’t seen each other in some fifty years. It was an extraordinary moment.
We got to spend a little time with the family, and eventually I was allowed to take pictures.
The elder:
The son:
Father & son:
I feel privileged to have gotten a glimpse at a different side of life in India. One not many people get to see.
More coming soon!
Tags: cow, cowherd, elder, father, goat, hindu, hyderabad, india, instructor, mentor, mosque, old man, portrait, ruin, son, teacher, wrestling
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Qasr Sunset
June 5th, 2011Sunset over the beautiful Qasr Al Sarab resort deep in the desert of Liwa, home of the rolling, flowing hundred-meter dunes and situated in the Southern UAE at the of the Rub’ al Khali (Empty Quarter).
I spent the weekend there earlier this year to attend a wedding.
It’s an absolutely fantastic place. The setting is one of those few places which are larger than life, reminiscent of the old Hollywood master epics from the sixties. Like something you could have found in Lawrence of Arabia, or Cleopatra, or something…
More coming soon!
Tags: arab, cleopatra, desert, Dune, emirate, empty quarter, epic, hollywood, lawrence of arabia, liwa, movie, qasr al sarab, Rub' al Khali, sixties, sunset, UAE, united, united arab emirates, wedding
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The Balaa Sinkhole
May 26th, 2011A short while back I had the chance to visit another of the many natural wonders that Lebanon has to offer: the sinkhole known by various names including the Balaa Sinkhole (Ballou Balaa in Arabic), Baatara Sinkhole, and Three Bridges Chasm (Gouffre des Trois Ponts in French), or even the Batara Gorge Waterfall.
What is it? It is a natural sinkhole plunging 255 metres into the mountainside. It features three natural bridges, rising one above the other over a height of one hundred metres and overhanging the enormous mouth of the chasm. I was lucky enough to visit it during the snow melt, when a 100-metre waterfall drops behind the three bridges and into the sinkhole.
It was first discovered in 1952 and explored in 1962. You can find out more here and here.
That’s a couple down there on the middle bridge:
The snaking path of the river before it drops into the chasm below:
Some mini waterfalls, a little way up the river from the sinkhole:
The long drop:
A view of the three bridges:
Two perspectives from the middle bridge:
Below is a long-exposure shot I took as I was heading out. To give you an idea of the size of the chasm, those little red, white and blue dots to the right of the middle bridge are 3 people.
More coming soon!
Tags: baatara, balaa, balaa pothole, balaa sink hole, balou balaa, balou3 balaa, batroun, Beirut, cave, Gouffre des Trois Ponts, lebanon, mountain, nahr al joz, sinkhole, sport activities, tannourine, Three Bridges Chasm, waterfall
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One Year Later
May 20th, 2011I know it’s been a bit light of late, but well… Today marks the second of two very special first anniversaries this week.
On the 20th of May 2010, along with a small group of friends, I hit Fisterra (or Finisterre). My Camino was over. My 900km trek – spanning 36 days of walking and totaling some 39 days – had come to a close.
On the 16th of May 2010, my 33rd day of walking, I entered Santiago de Compostella.
So this week I’ve been remembering so many of my wonderful experiences on the Camino and thinking of the family I made along the way. Not that a day has gone by without my thinking of the people who made it so magical.
Above, our Camino Family. Or a small part of it, at any rate.
There are many ways to enter Santiago. You can enter it on horseback, shortly after dawn:
You can enter it by bike, like these three matching ladies and their matching bikes here:
Or you could enter it on foot, which is what I did.
However you enter the city, you will be overcome with emotion. You will stop, in awe or shock or both, in the square in front of the cathedral. Perhaps you will stand in silence. Perhaps you will cry, because you can’t believe it’s over and because it is.
However after those first few moments pass, and you start meeting up with people you’ve met on the Camino, they will make way for joy.
On the 18th of May I departed Santiago and began my Camino to Finisterre. I was lucky. I walked with friends. That first night, I came across this entry written by a friend in a diary at an albergue in the town of Negreira. Brought tears to my eyes.
In the distance to the left is Cape Finisterre. The End of the World:
Our little family of pilgrims made their way to our agreed meeting point at the cliffs at the end of the cape, where we prepared for sunset.
After the sun had set, we set fire to the wooden dummy, dressed up as a pilgrim in clothes abandoned by pilgrims. We each tossed something into the fire. A symbol of our lack of attachment to material things, or of a promise to abandon a habit… As many reasons as there were people.
We have all since scattered to the four corners of the globe. And though I am quite bad at staying in touch, I have not forgotten. I miss you all.
Tonight I will be thankful, and I will celebrate.
More coming soon!
Tags: atlantic ocean, bicycle, bike, camino, camino de santiago, chemin, chemin de st jacques, compostella, family, finisterre, fisterra, horse, horseback, ocean, pilgrimage, pilgrims, saint james' way, santiago, sea, st. james, sunset, way of Saint James
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Abu Dhabi Week
April 19th, 2011Not strictly photography-related this post, but I thought I’d share.
This week I was lucky enough to be featured in the Your Abu Dhabi section of Abu Dhabi Week magazine. 
Check it out here!
More coming soon!
Tags: abu dhabi, abu dhabi week, feature, magazine, UAE, your abu dhabi
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Time Flies
April 14th, 2011
Time flies. It really does. Today marks one year since I took my first steps on the Camino de Santiago from St. Jean de Pied de Port in Southern France.
Memories of this extraordinary time have been flooding back at me of late. This is probably due to three things.
The first is that two dear friends are leaving this very day to start their own pilgrimages on the Camino. One of them is going for the second time.
The second is that I recently had the opportunity to watch The Way, an absolutely beautiful and moving independent movie by father-son duo Martin Sheen and Emilio Estevez, which follows an American father who travels to St. Jean to recover the body of his son who died on the Camino and decides to walk it in memory of his son.
The third, last but not least, is a small package which arrived in the mail just a few days ago. A prototype of a DVD project begun by Alexander Ruediger, a friend I made on the Camino and who turns out to be something of a celebrity in his native Austria.
I’m overjoyed to have had the chance to collaborate with him on the production of this beautiful DVD which offers impressions of the sights and sounds of the Camino de Santiago. I contributed a number of pictures to the project. I can tell you, I was so excited to see my pictures featured both on the cover of and on a DVD!
The DVD will be launching soon. You can find out more on www.camino-chillout.com. Unfortunately, my German is about as bad as my Chinese, so I can’t understand much of what’s featured on the website… Hehe.
More coming soon!
Tags: alexander rudiger, alexander ruediger, austria, camino, camino chillout, camino de santiago, camino frances, Chemin de Saint Jacques, chemin de st jacques, dvd, emilio estevez, france, impressions, jakobsweig, martin sheen, movie, saint james, saint james' way, saint jean de, spain, st. jean de pied de port, way
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