Does anyone else feel that way about rules? If I go to a brewery and they have one million rules? You can’t eat in this area. You can only taste the beer at the bar not at the table. You can only have two tastes. Eh it just rubs me the wrong way. If this sounds really specific it is. A few summer’s ago we went to a local brewery that we were giving another chance because it is so close to home. Just the convenience of the location alone made us want to like it. We sat outside to enjoy the beautiful summer evening. To be fair while I’m mentioning the things that aren’t my favorite I should also mention that this place has the best decor inside and out but the patio is just perfect for enjoying lovely weather.

This is actually a really funny story because we complained through our entire dinner. Everything was wrong. We were not allowed to taste beers outside. We could only order certain things from the menu outside. I could go on but I won’t bore you. What we didn’t realize until the end of dinner is that the owner and his wife were sitting with friends at the table next to us.

The experience was so frustrating that we began to cyber stalk reviews for the brewery to try to determine if it was just us being overly picky (it wasn’t just us). While looking online we stumbled across an article that the location was expanding. I like to imagine the looks on our faces in the process of being shocked about the expansion with the sub par customer service going to true disbelief when we saw the photo of the owners at the top of the article. Let’s just say it was a big fat oops moment. We have been in since and they have lightened up on the rules which is good but it is still just not our favorite place. By this point if you are still reading you understand that I’m not a fan of rules but you know what I do love though? I love a challenge. Challenges are a big fat yes for me. Any other how I met your mother fans out there? #challengeaccepted

I like to challenge myself just to help me constantly improve in different areas of life. One day recently as I casually scrolled through Facebook on my lunch like I often do. I noticed a post on a women’s hiking page that I follow where she used a hashtag #52HikeChallenge and my brain did a literal screeching halt. What is this challenge she speaks of? I had to know. A consultation with google was a must to learn. If your mind has come to a very loud stop at this point as mine did I’ll save you some time. Here is their website:

https://www.52hikechallenge.com/

Ok back to the story. May as well get straight to the point. I couldn’t quit thinking about it and I signed up. My other half and I did our first hike a couple of weeks ago. It was at a local park nearby called Hummel park that for some reason we haven’t visited in the past. It was a super cute little park with a nice walking path on a beautiful sunny not a cloud in the sky day. For hiking the light was perfect. When thinking about landscape photography very bright light in the middle of the day isn’t the best. I wanted to share a somewhat boring shot just as an example of what I mean. There is absolutely nothing wrong with taking the photo like I did but the harsh light and lack of clouds in the sky really make for a lackluster photo.

To achieve the ideal lighting it is best to get out early in the morning or late afternoon right before sunset referred to as the golden hour. If there is a scene you really want to shoot for artistic reasons it is imperative to plan ahead. That being said don’t let poor light stop you from taking your camera with you on a hike. Just try to use the light that you have to your advantage. One fun option is to focus on shadows on a sunny day like I did on the hike at Hummel.

Something else you might try is using the shadows and really making them pop by turning them into a black and white photo.

Also consider using the “fill the frame” technique and try to use the light to your advantage like I did here. The light seems to really make the leaves pop in the following images.

I want to be completely forthcoming here and also share that the camera I used in these photos was the one on my Google Pixel. Its a sentiment among many photographers the best camera is the one that you have with you. On this first hike I purposefully left my Nikon home and wanted to challenge myself to use the camera phone and to also lighten the load (the Nikon is very heavy). I like to try to bring out details in all of my photos whether using my camera or my cell phone to take photos. My favorite app for the phone is Snapseed. Just lightly touch up your photos to bring out some detail it will make a big difference in the quality of your photos.

Thank you for checking in with me while I share this exciting new adventure and some photography with you all. I hope that you will follow along as I share some fun hiking locations, information about the gear I use, technology out there that I enjoy, the story of what I hope to gain from this challenge, and with any luck I’ll be able to share some good brewery locations. If following along isn’t enough you can sign up from the 52 Hike Challenge website. There are guidelines on what they call a hike which are pretty simple. You must go outside, travel on your feet for at least a mile, you can’t count more than one hike per day, you can complete the challenge early, but you can’t complete it in less than 52 days, and finally you can do the same hike more than once. There is so much information on their page much more than what I’ve shared here but I wanted to give a general idea about my upcoming adventure. Thank you for stopping by and happy hiking. Cheers!