Most of Saturday was spent at my nephews karate tournament at Gunderson High. It was my first time attending a karate tournament and I have to admit, it was a little nerve racking. While growing up, my parents would always tell me they hated watching me play sports because they were always nervous. Well, I got a taste of how they felt watching my nephew, Tobey and my godsons, AJ and Brian at this tournament. It’s definitely worse as a spectator. Maybe its because as a participant, you have control in the outcome. As a spectator, you’re helpless and can only watch. My nervousness was all for not as Tobey took first in his division and AJ and Brian took second and third in theirs. Congrats guys!

I spent most of today traveling back and forth from Berkley to SJ and then from SJ to Fremont to first celebrate my parents 41st Anniversary and then the Baptism of my cousins daughter, Charmaine. One word describes how I feel right now—STUFFED! I ate so much today that I probably won’t eat for the next couple of days.

Today, with the weather being so nice, I headed out to the Wild Animal Park. It’s been awhile since I last photographed anything so what better way to spend my afternoon at one of my favorite places with my camera.

This also gave me the opportunity to use the 70-200mm lens again. I’m absolutely loving the images coming out of this lens.

Indoor volleyball is regarded as one of the toughest sports to photograph due to the combination of (typically bad) lighting and speed at which the game is played. ISO’s of 1600-3200 and shutter speeds of 500 and greater are usually required to “stop” the action. Fast lenses of f2.8 and below are a must. My poor Canon 50D was pushed to the limit and quite honestly it shows in the quality of the photos. Because I had to shoot at ISO3200, there was quite a bit of noise in all the pictures I took. I’m starting to realize if I want to continue shooting sports and indoor volleyball, I’ll have to start saving for better equipment.

Anyways, here’s a few of my favorites from the tourney this weekend.

The US National Men’s Volleyball Team played their second Red/Blue scrimmage in as many weeks as preparation for the World Championships later this month in Italy. The Red Team were victorious winning 3-1 over the Blue squad. Most of the players that suited up today are part of the 19 player preliminary roster that will be trimmed down to 14, including two liberos, with 12 being chosen for each match. The team leaves for Italy in the following week and will be playing in the Pool with Mexico, Venezuela and Argentina. Best of luck guys. GO TEAM USA!

The following are some shots from the scrimmage today held at Golden West College in Huntington Beach, CA.

A couple of weeks ago, a coworker and I headed over to Oceanside to take some snapshots of the Pier during sunset. I realized I hadn’t been back since moving to Carlsbad last October, which is weird considering it’s just a short 10 minute drive from where I live. Anyways, it was my coworkers first time taking photos there so I was happy to show him key locations to be at as the sun was setting.

Here are a few of my favorites that I took. Enjoy!

Beautiful weather, great scenery, and 25,000+ people showing their support for a great cause – what more can you ask for? Below are some of the images I captured throughout the day. You can check out the full set here. Enjoy!

The start of the walk.

The memorial wall.

There was entertainment throughout the walk.

I love the interesting people I met.

It’s not AIDSWalk without the outrageous people. The guy on the right did the walk in heels!

And since this was at Golden Gate Park, there were alot of unique buildings, plant life and beautiful scenery.

Last Saturday, I participated in Scott Kelby’s 2nd Annual Worldwide Photo Walk in San Jose. It was a historic event as 32,000+ photographers attended 900+ similar walks around the world. In some of the larger cities and locations, there were multiple walks scheduled throughout the day. San Jose was one of those cities.

Our group was led by Frederick Van Johnson – Photographer, Writer, Instructor and Host of This Week in Photography Podcast (TWiP). Based on some of the gear fellow photographers were sporting, I’d say we had a good mixture of professionals and hobbyists.

The walk began and ended at Gordon Biersch, a well known brewery in the heart of downtown San Jose. From there, we were left to explore the wonders of downtown San Jose. There were so many things to shoot from modern buildings, art museums, parks, shops, clubs and even a cathedral. Throughout the walk, I got a chance to observe and speak to other photographers. It was a great opportunity for me to see first hand how other photographers shoot and compose shots. The pictures I’ve seen from the group have been fantastic. You can checkout some of the photos in the San Jose Flickr Group. Also checkout this short highlight video put together by Ni Ki Cruz Photography.

Personally, I had a blast even though I couldn’t attend the meet up afterwards at Gordon Biersch. Below are some of the photos I captured during the walk. You can checkout the full set here. Enjoy!

What a great weekend for shooting and being outdoors. I was back in San Jose this weekend to attend a couple events. The first was on Saturday for Scott Kelby’s 2nd Annual Worldwide Photo Walk in downtown San Jose. The second event was AIDSWalk San Francisco 2009 on Sunday held at Golden Gate Park. I’ll be blogging and posting more pictures from both events soon.

For now, I wanted to share my favorite picture from Saturday. This is one of my entries for Scott Kelby’s Photo Walk contest where he will select a Grand Prize winner and 10 Honorable Mention photos from thousands of participants all of the world who participated in this historic event.

While doing the Journey Into Africa Tour a couple of weeks ago at W.A.P, we had a brief encounter with this little guy on the trail. He was actually “outside the fences” so I’m not really sure he was part of the attraction. Nonetheless, he gave us a great photo opportunity.