Hello and welcome to my last blog entry of 2016. It's a been a great year for both my professional real estate photography and personal projects like car shows and outings with the Allerton Photo Club. And thanks to the HDR real estate photos I've already put over 25,000 exposures on my "new" Nikon D750 I just bought last new years eve. Yikes! At this rate I'll need another camera body by the end of the year. 

Anyway, I'd like to share with you some of my favorite photos from the past year. All are available for sale within my galleries on a variety of mediums to suit any tastes. And while you're navigating around the site hopefully you'll appreciate the new menus which are much easier to use. Thanks to all who have helped me grow as a photographer this year and I look forward to more exiting things in 2017. 

This first one was taken during a night photo shoot at the Allerton Mansion. I love both the symmetry and dark, gothic feel in black and white.

This next one was taken out on the farm roads in Champaign County. The sun was setting to the right but thanks to the clouds the whole sky lit up in fantastic pastels. I'm just a sucker for old, run down farm buildings.

Ahhh....good ole car shows. I was raised around cars and studied as a mechanic in trade high school so I guess you could say they're in my blood. The annual show at Parkland College in Champaign, IL was rained out but even then I managed this really nice capture. 

Did I mention I like cars? I just can't resist the tail end of the new Challengers. Just a very nicely done car. 

During the heat of summer I traveled back to Allerton Mansion and photographed the koi pond with lillies in full bloom. Also worked on a blur effect around the edges which I think adds to the beauty of the scene. It's hard not to like Allerton. 

Even when on vacation I've always got the camera handy just in case. Here I visited the ore dock in Marquette, MI in September. Oh, and by the way, it's cold up there even in December. I think it was close to freezing before the sun rose. Made me appreciate the sun all that much more and probably inspired this photo.

Springfield, the capital of Illinois, plays host each year to a huge car show where they close down a dozen square blocks downtown and it's wall to wall cars. My favorite car shows are always in a vintage city location. And a nice sunset doesn't hurt. 

I made a concerted effort this fall to get out into the Champaign countryside and get some harvest pictures. It's always such a beautiful time of year with golden colors and brilliant sunsets. This images was taken almost at dusk. I stumbled into a large multi-combine harvest of soybeans and the dust they generated looked like a low lying fog across the fields and roads. Very cool effect!

And lastly this year is a light painting and long exposure outing with the Allerton Photo Club focusing on the Foo Dog Garden and House of the Golden Buddhas. This photo did require a decent amount of post processing. The lights used to illuminate the structure were daylight LED and came off too blue, while the sodium street lamp off in the background created a warm element that was pleasing. I dropped the blue saturation for the whole image and then used a mask to bring back the original sky with it's brilliant stars. I'm very pleased with the result and it's a great cap to the end of the year. 

Many thanks to all who follow along on Facebook or the blog, as sporadic as my updates may be. I'm always around should you have any questions or want to consult on an image. 

Wishing you and yours happy holidays and a great new year!

-Mike