Superstar by MilesMorganPhotography

I’m not sure why I am posting another dark image that *SHOULD BE VIEWED ON BLACK*. Probably because it matches my cold, dark heart.

The title of this image is inspired by my buddy David “DBreezy” Thompson. Not only is he a superstar, but right now the song “Superstar” by the Carpenters is stuck in my head. You know the one…. “LOOOOOONNLINEESSS, IS SUCH A SAD AFFFAAAIIIIIIRRRRRRRRRR”. (And now it’s stuck in YOUR head. You’re welcome). I’m supposed to be out there with Breezy shooting up the fall colors right now, but sometimes real life gets in the way. Since I look forward to my trips with my friends more than just about anything on earth, this is a lonely week for me. Brings me back to the time I made this image.

I had a long Las Vegas layover, and before leaving on my all-nighter, Breezy kindly took me out and showed me this wondrous spot in what is essentially his back yard. We waited through the insane heat of the evening and into the ridiculous heat of night for the stars to appear.

I wandered off for awhile to explore the surroundings leaving Breezy to catch up with some work issues on his phone. When I came back he was just sitting there staring intently at the thing, completely absorbed. I couldn’t make out what he was saying, but it was a rather loud conversation with a lot of “F%^&” and “NAW, THAT S&*$# AIN’T WORKIN SON”, and “I WILL STRAIGHT KNOCK YOU THE F%^$ OUT”‘s. I didn’t want to interrupt what was obviously an unpleasant conversation, so I crept quietly up the side of the hill so as not to disturb him. Completely involved in the conversation, Breezy was oblivious to my presence, and I noticed him rocking side to side and kind of jerking around during his rant. “Damned”, I thought, “I’m sure as hell glad I’m not on the other end of THAT conversation!!” As he had his phone out in front of him and not up to his ear, I didn’t want to be rude and overhear what the punching bag on the other end of the line was saying as I was sure he was on speaker phone. No fear of that, however, as it was clearly a very one-sided conversation. I mean REALLY one-sided. Like, I was there for 5 minutes and didn’t hear ONE WORD out of the phone. Finally, my curiosity got the best of me and I looked over his shoulder at his phone to see who he was talking to and discovered there was no call.

He was playing Super Mario Kart

Lastly, there is nothing worse than being late when flying an all-nighter. You just want to take off, get there, and go to bed. On this evening, however, I would like to thank the Delay God’s for making my flight 2 hours late because it allowed us to stay long enough to get the milky way to line up in the image. If you were on my flight, I apologize for A) our tardy departure, and B) looking and smelling like a drowned sweaty rat when I arrived at work.

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Rattle My Cage by MilesMorganPhotography

I’m the last photographer in the Pacific Northwest to visit Palouse Falls. I’m not even sure why I hadn’t been there. I just never got around to it. So I was actually quite content to shoot here while on a recent trip with bosom buddies Ryan “Swifty” Dyar and David “Breezy”Thompson. We were supposed to be elsewhere, but the weather wasn’t cooperating, so we did a complete reversal and followed what we determined would be the most promising atmospherics in the western half of the US. On the first night, I elected to stay up top at the standard overlook since I didn’t have a “classic shot” from here while RyDyGuy and Breezy dropped down into the canyon to an area Ryan had been scouting for years. After getting lovely “Chip light” – to be explained in a future post – I figured the next morning I would drop down below with Ryan and see if I could find something more fresh.

Up and at em well before dawn, we trudged up the trail through the baked out grasses towards the rocky path that descends into the canyon. I had been warned the day before about the snakes slithering everywhere in this area. Ryan was talking loudly: a technique that works well in keeping bears from getting up close and personal. I didn’t have the heart to tell him I didn’t think the snakes would give a crap about his lecture on Acid Reflux and it’s effect on the 2016 Presidential Election. I tucked in nice and close behind Ryan and off we went.

As the trail transitioned from grass to an extremely narrow loose shale strip overlooking a rather unpleasant looking drop, the margin for error in our footing dropped significantly.

Mid sentence Ryan choked on his words, and froze dead solid in his tracks. If you know anything about physics, you’ll remember that Newton once casually mentioned that “an object in motion tends to stay in motion”. In other words, Ryan had a 220# slab of beef mount his backside. Someone needs to invent human brake lights. I vaguely heard “SNAKE” during the moment of impact, which finally consummated my relationship with Ryan after all these years. Being a pilot, I’m supposed to be quite cool under pressure, so naturally I freaked.

“WHERE!??!!! SH$%?!! HOLD ME!! SUCK THE POISON OUT!!!!!”

Time stood still. The morning was dead calm and funeral home quiet, so I steeled myself for the shrill rattle which I knew was going to signal the fact that I was about to become lunch for the first time in my life. Probably payback for all the Turkey sandwiches I’ve eaten. But nothing came. It stayed dead calm and funeral home quiet. I spastically scanned the ground in front of us with my headlamp, looking for the coiled terror of the satanic snake, which I envisioned being the size and shape of a Bentley. Nothing. Had it camouflaged itself into the rocky path so well that I simply couldn’t see it?

Ryan: “Oh snap. It’s just a rock. My bad”

Cool story, Bro.

I was LOST on the direction of the processing on this image, so HUGE thanks to my RyRy for taking the time to get me pointed down the correct path. OR, if you hate the processing, it’s his fault.

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Captain Magma by bruceomori

Captain Miles Morgan, call sign “Magma” 😉

EXCELLENT pilot, AWESOME photographer, and even BETTER friend and human being. Miles, my BIG bruddah (yes, he’s VERY BIG), is getting the shot at the Kupapa‘u ocean entry in Kalapana, island of Hawai‘i. Very memorable outing with a couple other bruddahs of mine, Ryan Dyar and Tom Kuali‘i. Nothing like shooting lava with great friends whom I consider to be three of the best photographers around. 🙂

Tom and I specialize in lava tours and workshops for the discerning photographer. Clients include some of the top photographers and business executives from across the globe. Prices, availability, and references are available upon request.

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Taken In Vein by RyanDyar

I recently spent some time traveling through the deserts of the northwest up here with my good friends Miles Morgan and David Thompson. I swear, there is more ball busting than actual shooting on these trips we take, but it would be hard to find two better dudes to travel with.



We arrived to our makeshift campsite in mid day after doing some off-roading to the top of a huge bluff overlooking the vast expanse of the Painted Hills area far below. We’d only slept a couple hours the night before, so a democratic vote decided it was nap time. Now, it was hot out there… and humid. The kind of humidity that is repulsive and causes you to sweat like a maniac. Good rest was hard to achieve, as sleeping while you’re that hot is a tall task. I managed to doze off for about an hour before Miles decided it was wake up time… and let us know by opening his Jeep doors and blasting his favorite Mariah Carey jam on the stereo as loud as any night club I’ve ever been to. After rubbing the sleep (and sweat and dust) out of our eyes, we all slowly walked back out into the warm afternoon sun to chat about the plans for the evening. We stood there looking down on the somewhat gnarly route we took to get our trucks up this bluff, feeling especially manly. Breaking the silence, Miles loudly proclaimed with a mouth full of blueberries “This is freaking RUGGED!” David and I couldn’t help but to burst into laughter. We found this to be the funniest statement ever coming from a man standing mostly naked in his pink underwear while Mariah Carey rang out of the speakers. I cried laughing, but didn’t rib him too hard as both David and I were in our underwear as well. It was scorching outside that day, don’t judge us. At least David and I weren’t wearing pink boxers though. 



As usual, Miles and David both came away with WAY better images than I did. Seriously, you’ll want to keep an eye out for their shots from the trip. Sick stuff. This image here was one of the two photos I got from the excursion. Nothing amazing overall, just a bit of a different take on a telephoto shot of the amazing lines and patterns of the Painted Hills. 



Anyways, I’m about ready to release a new post-processing instructional video. It’s packed with some unique techniques and theories about processing you may not find anywhere else. People seem to really be enjoying the videos and have had nothing but great things to say, so I *think* they are helping people… it’s been awesome to see the many before/after shots people have been emailing me. Be sure to check the videos out if you are into that sort of thing. It’s all on my website, as well as more photos, photo tour info, processing instruction via Skype like everyone else is doing, etc, etc.

2015 Tour Schedule
Lofoten Autumn Aurora – With Arild Heitmann
Northern Lights Finale – With Arild Heitmann
Processing Tutorial Videos
Processing Instruction via Skype

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