It turns out that both Carol from Nikon and I had late flights on Thursday so we headed out to find one last image to take home from Hawaii. We ended up at the Kilauea Lighthouse to find high winds, big waves, a little rain, you know Hawaiian weather. Working the waves I captured an image that I thought was an appropriate Aloha from Hawaii.

Image captured with D3X in HSC, AF-S 70-300mm VR on Lexar Digital Media

A trip to Hawaii is not complete without a visit to the rainforest so, off we headed for Ho’opi’i Falls once again slipping and sliding our way down the trail through the forest to the stream and falls below.

At DLWS we always like to save the best for last and boy did Moose and Sharon give it their all to come up with a grand finale. We had a fire dancer meet us at the beach and perform for the group giving everyone a chance to photograph him.

We used flash combined with the light from his fire for some images where Joe, as usual, worked his magic with light.

And, I did a couple of shots with him illuminated with just fire.

And so, another great DLWS event comes to a close. We had our participants slideshow and said goodbye to our new friends. I’m already counting the days to our Outer Banks event.

Images cpatured with Nikon D3X, PC-E 24mm (forest), AF-S 24-70mm, AF-S 70-200mm (portrait of fire dancer) on Lexar Digital Media

…or, the magic continues as our DLWS adventure took us to Ha’ena State Park for our morning shoot and the weather was amazing. We had dramatic clouds, big, pounding waves and photo opportunities everywhere we turned.

While photographing along the beach a Monk seal hauled out of the water to take a rest on the beach and, I kid you not, a rainbow appeared in the sky behind it.

As if our morning’s good fortune was not enough, we headed to Waimea Canyon for our afternoon shoot. There had been showers to downright heavy rain throughout the day while we were in the classroom but, the photo gods smiled on us once again as the skies parted and, yeap, a rainbow appeared over the Canyon. We’re not talking a fleeting moment where you had to grad the shot before it disappeared. The rainbow stayed over the canyon for a very long time giving everyone the opportunity to make several compositions with it in the photographs.

Images Captured with Nikon D3X, AF-S 14-24mm, AF-S 24-70mm, AF-S 70-300mm VR on Lexar Digital Media

We kicked DLWS off Sunday night by meeting a great group of enthusiastic photographers eager to learn and have an excellent time photographing in Hawaii. Moose, Kevin, Joe and I all gave our presentations and I have to say that the energy of the group was contagious driving us to give it our best.

Monday morning came with an overcast sky and a light mist falling on us…perfect weather for our first location shoot at Opaeka Falls.

After an afternoon spent in the classroom teaching digital darkroom workflow an finishing images we headed back out for our evening shoot. Once again the photo gods were smiling giving us the weather we needed for our evening shoot at Spouting Horn. With the sun out and the tide coming in, Spouting Horn gave us quite a show. I went for a different perspective and was rewarded with a rainbow as one of the participants set her camera down for a minute to simply sit and enjoy the moment.

As the sun began to set in the west, the clouds lit up with a hint of color and the crashing waves gave us a beautiful ending to day one.

Tomorrow is another day and I can’t wait to see what our locations and the photo gods have in store for us.

Images captured with Nikon D3X, AF-S 70-300mm VR (first, second and fourth images), AF-S 14-24mm on Lexar Digital Media

We spent the day scouting out the best locations for DLWS and did we ever find some gems…

We are excited to share what we have found with our DLWS participants and you too through our blogs. Stay tuned for some great adventures.
Images captured with Nikon D3X, AF-S 24-70mm on Lexar Digital Media