Southern cliffs lit up and reflected in the black sand beach of Pololu Valley as water streaks through the shoreline rocks.
© Christopher Johnson
Now Available Backlit on the BigNakedWall.com. Check it out.
There is nothing like standing near the lava as it slowly folds and hardens, slowly making it’s way to the ocean. This was our first trip to the lava and by far my favorite. After this visit, we could only view the ocean flow on our returning trips. All surface flows had solidified and left the lava to flow through the tubes.
I was mesmerized by the sounds as it folded and created new shapes. Like broken glass popping in the heat of the fire. Mostly the lava flowed extremely slow with the occasional quick breakouts. I was able to setup within feet of the flow, but it was hot. I would lean in for a couple of shots and be forced to backup quickly due to the heat. I wanted to capture the design and contrast of the hot lava along side the solid lava, so I was searching for patterns like the image being shown.
With a telephoto lens I was able to crop in close without melting off my face.
Enjoy!
© Christopher Johnson
Every time I go to photograph underwater I realize how difficult it is. Everything is moving constantly, the light is always changing and not as bright, and whatever you swim towards swims away. Not to mention how hard it is to see the camera screen because of the reflection of the sun creating a mirror over the screen. Most of the time I find myself aiming in the direction of what I want to photograph and most of the time I either miss or crop the object in half. Then there are the times I get lucky.
I was swimming around looking for turtles, but couldn’t find one. Instead I though to capture some patterns and sun rays when this turtle swam under me as if to say hello. The spot I was wasn’t very deep. I could stand up and have my head out of the water, so it was that much more exciting to have that close of a visitor. I followed her around for a little bit and then as sudden as she arrived, she was gone.
The photograph I came away with is one where she came up for air a was slowly beginning to dive back down to feed. I love how the shell is reflected in the underside of the waves as they pass by.
© Christopher Johnson
www.fromhereonin.com
Purchase a print by visiting my RedBubble page.
A couple of weeks after the collapse of the shelf the lava now flows directly into the ocean like a raging river. The smoke hid the view of the lava, but with the shifting winds we would get a glimpse every now and then. We weren’t able to get as close as before, but it was still a sight to see.
© Christopher Johnson
Purchase a print by visiting my RedBubble page
I was looking for a new way to photograph the Hawaiian coastline. This time I decided to tilt the camera down to show the foreground and imply the sunset through the warmth of the seaweed as well as the reflected glow of the sun in the water. With a slow shutter the motion of the water streaks and swirls as it mingles with the seaweed on its way back into the large holes in the coastline.
View a different photograph of mine from this same location…Â http://www.fromhereonin.com/keahole-sunset-3/
© Christopher Johnson
Having heard the lava was very active due to a piece of the crater wall collapsing into the lava lake, I was extremely excited to visit the Jaggar museum that night. I headed out after work with my family and arrived at the Volcano hours later with the unfortunate drizzle of rain. I wasn’t expecting much, in fact I wasn’t expecting I was going to see anything due to heavy fog or rain clouds. On a previous trip I knew we were getting close because the sky had an amazing bright orange glow, however, this trip wasn’t as apparent. My hopes were fading.
We arrived at the Jaggar museum lookout along with many others. Gathering up our gear took a while, but eventually we set out to the view point. With the glow of the lava and the orange night step lights leading our way to the lookout, we were all amazed at the amazing sight of the active lava lake. Never before have I been able to see the lava lake from the Jaggar museum. Usually just a glow of light as smoke billowed away. There were cracks of bright yellow and orange moving around. Forming new connections with other cracks while closing others. The most mystical sight was the sputtering lava against the crater wall.
Photographing the lava was difficult. I needed a higher iso in order to stop the motion of the lava, but not too high as to pixelate the image beyond usability. In order to capture the lava up close I needed the full range of my telephoto lens at 300mm. This all doesn’t seem difficult, but adding wind and rain to the equation made this difficult. Any small movement of the lens would move the image drastically, which generated a blurry image. I had to wait for relief in the wind, but then the rain would speckle the lens. It was a little bit of a dance to get the shots.
For the image above I shot two focal ranges. The trees were several feet in front of me, while the lava was hundreds of feet away. Maybe thousands. It took a lot of blending and luminosity masks in Photoshop to merge the images to one.
Aloha!
© Christopher Johnson
Purchase this piece by visiting my RedBubble page.
This is the second time that I visited this location along the Kaliliili coastline of Maui. The long stretch of coastline that runs along the ocean side highway on the way to Lahaina there is a small section of old fallen Kiawe trees that stretch out into the ocean. The black sand of the beach slightly covers the lower branches and they reach out into the air making it look like they are independent of the fallen tree.
I originally setup further away from the tree to get more of the tree into the photograph, however, the tree flattened out the flow of the scene. Instead I began to work on several different perspectives as well as different trees close by, but I wasn’t feeling that creative spark. As a last minute composition I decided to move extremely close to the tree I started with in order to express the organic detail as it moved into the ocean. At this point the sunset was at a close and I was graced with an orange glow of light along the trunk of the tree.
After capturing this shot I continued to shoot the ocean with long exposures and experiment with other compositions, but this was the favorite.
© Christopher Johnson
Purchase a print by visiting my RedBubble page.
The stalks of tall bamboo lean up toward the beautiful canopy of the Bamboo forest on the island of Maui. A hike that I did on the previous visit to Maui and was determined to go back. The drive to Hana isn’t for the faint of heart. It takes an entire day to drive, even if you didn’t stop. This time we went the back way, the ‘Do Not Go This Way In A Rental Vehicle’ way, but it was fine. Way faster if you just go to the Haleakala National Park where the 7 Sacred Pools are. The only crazy part was towards the end when navigating around the steep cliffs on a single lane road. The guard rails had been rusted apart from the insane surf. I was just hoping no one was coming the other direction. I am pretty sure we would have just looked at each other until someone reluctantly decided to reverse to a nearest pull out. Luckily no one came.
The hike was the same as I remembered. The only difference was that we couldn’t walk all the way to waterfall due to the heavy rains we had this Summer. I love the bamboo. There is nothing like it. The hike is fairly long and uneventful and you almost want to turn back, thinking it won’t change. Then you cross a bridge and enter into the first part of the forest and your breath is taken from you. All you want to do from that point is venture deeper into it and engross your entire self into the forest. When the wind blows there is a quiet and soothing knocking from the hollow stalks that almost stops you in your tracks. Although the wind isn’t what I wanted for photographing the bamboo because of movement, I thoroughly enjoyed and welcomed it.
The remaining trip back to Lahaina was fun. We ended up going back on the ‘Road To Hana’, which took forever, but was beautiful. It was amazing to see the damage from the Hurricane Darby that I heard so much about on the news. Funny that months later I was having dinner with a mother and daughter that lived in Hana. The mother told me a story of how she came to a van full of tourists that nearly went over the cliff on one of the windy turns. The van had been pinned by a tree and was luckily not going anywhere. While waiting for the tow truck the mother asked the tourists if they wanted their pictures taken while in the van, which they excitedly said ‘yes’. After the picture they all left the van to discover how close they were to falling over the cliff. The funny thing was the tourist driving had a “I Survived The Road To Hana” shirt on.
© Christopher Johnson
Purchase a print by visiting my RedBubble page.
I revisited the spot of the previous post “Night Lights” to further explore the night stars and milky way as a backdrop of the beautiful under-lit palm tree. This time I shot with a wider lens in order to capture more of the night sky.
© Christopher Johnson
Purchase a print by visiting my RedBubble page.
This night just happened. The moon wasn’t due to rise until 2am and the humidity was low, all while the wind wasn’t really blowing hard. A perfect opportunity to attempt a concept that I was thinking of for a while now… palm trees in front of a starry night. I didn’t have the energy to drive to a preferred location, so instead I walked to a location close by, which happens to be near a hotel. I thought the lights from the hotel might kill the night sky with light pollution, but I decided to give it a shot first. If I am successful my next attempt would be at the location I had in mind, which would by a long bike ride in the dark.
I was pleasantly surprised with the shot; even with the red of the nearby lights. The under lighted palm trees really helped bring a lot more color into the shot.
Prints are available for purchase on my FineArtAmerica store
A hike over the old lava flow… and soon to be new lava flow, but don’t tell the fern. A brilliant reminder that life will always find a way.
This image was taken near the new lava flow at Kamokuna in the Volcano National Park… fairly close to the lava flow. I deviated from the gravel road a bit to find this fern growing through the crack in the lava. The vibrant green leaves contrasting against the deep tones of the lava is a great contrast to life growing out of a harsh environment. I was captivated by the way the lava crumbled under my feet and sounded like glass breaking as I ventured to this spot. The wind was blowing and waving the small leaves of the fern making it difficult to shoot. My patience was definitely tested as I waited to the breeze to die down long enough to still the shot. Much more that I wasn’t even to my final destination.  Watching this new life was a bit calming as I began to realize how crazy it is that this fern is growing nearly five miles away from any other plant. I thought to myself how strange and foreign this environment is that is being created by the Hawaiian volcano.
© Christopher Johnson
This magnificent waterfall has been photographed a million times and mostly the same way. I wanted to photograph it with a different approach. Framing the waterfall with all of its surroundings in order to accent the subtleties of the area was my goal. The ferns in the foreground, small waterfalls along the left side of the falls, the moss along the walls, and the way the water catches smooth rocks along the cliff walls as it falls were all the details I set out to capture that are normally lost in a wide angle view.
© Christopher Johnson
On my way down to the shoreline of Kailua Kona to view the sunset I was taken back by the beauty of the palm trees silhouetted against the vibrant Hawaiian sunset.
© Christopher Johnson
Sunlight streams through the large opening of a sea arch off of Noio Point along the Kailua Kona coastline.
See the aerial version I shot with a DJI Spark drone, ‘Sea Arch Aerial‘.
© Christopher Johnson
Available backlit from Big Naked Wall. Check out the website and see the cool things they are doing for artwork with their interchangeable prints on backlit frames.
I was surprised with some beautiful flowers from my wife, so of course I set up to photograph them. What I love about macro is the new world that is seen within such a close up view of the subject. I didn’t notice all the amazing yellows in the center of the flower without the help of the camera. Then I began noticing all the tiny water drops that speckled the flower.
Enjoy!
© Christopher Johnson
Available backlit from Big Naked Wall. Check out the website and see the cool things they are doing for artwork with their interchangeable prints on backlit frames.