Image (c) Rusty Jackson. Used by permission.

The first part of my exhibition at Dragonfly Gallery at Rosedale is almost over. On Monday, part of the show will be taken down to be replaced by student photos from April’s workshop led by Raul Touzon. This was my first serious, themed show in a “real” gallery and it was a great pleasure and honour to hang my pictures in such a wonderful space. Thanks to owner Nina Mihm for the opportunity!

The top image here was taken by local photographer friend Rusty Jackson who arrived with a camera and kindly took a few shots. I also had my camera there so I grabbed an image of Rusty in return but this was one of only about 4 exposures I took that evening since I was rather busy talking to guests instead. By the way, if you have not seen Rusty’s work, I would strongly recommend a trip to his site where you will find some of the best examples of travel photography you are likely to find anywhere.

To all who came to see the show over the last couple of weeks, many thanks. If you’ve not seen it yet, please drop by the gallery between now and July 8th since you will still be able to view the best images along with a collection of other outstanding pictures from the workshop.

After a last minute call on the Austin Photography Group message board a couple of days ago, a group of about a dozen photographers gathered at the Stevie Ray Vaughan statue on Lady Bird Lake for a photowalk in downtown Austin yesterday evening. We spent a very enjoyable 3 hours wandering up Congress Avenue to the Capitol then back down to the lake in time to shoot some dusk skylines.

I spent more time chatting than shooting though I did manage to take both the shots I was looking for – panoramas of the Capitol rotunda interior and the downtown skyline with reflections in the lake.

One of the best aspect of the evening for me was a chance to meet three photographers I’ve known from various online groups but never actually met in person. Evan Gearing is an Austin photographer whose HDR images are among the best around. Brian Matiash is another well known HDR photographer based in Boston but, coincidentally, was in Austin for the weekend. Brian was shooting with Jack Hollingsworth, known to most photographers who use Twitter as @photojack. It was great to meet these guys and I’m very interested to see what they post as a result of the evening.

Given the success of the jaunt, I suspect there will be more of these gatherings in future. Would anyone like to suggest possible routes?

Practically everyone who reads this blog has heard of Austin photographer Trey Ratcliff, owner of the Stuck In Customs blog and author of the much publicised new book “A World In HDR“. What you may not know, however, is that there is quite a collection of other excellent HDR photographers in Austin. Here are a few of the guys that I enjoy shooting with and whose blogs (if they have a blog) I read regularly. In case anyone gets miffed, these are listed in alphabetical order by last name. I’ve linked to both their Flickr profiles and their blogs or Flickr streams.

• Evan Gearing (EG Photography)
• Jerry Hayes (Flickr stream)
• Jim Nix (Nomadic Pursuits)
• John Rogers (Visualist Images)
• Don Schulte (Oxherding is Fun)
• Jason St. Peter (50% Chance of Rain)
• Van Sutherland (Exile Imaging)
• Pete Talke (Places 2 Explore)
• Michael Tuuk (Michael Tuuk Photography)

If you are a fellow Austin HDR enthusiast, leave a comment with your contact details below.

I have huge respect for the great work done by the photography staff of our local daily, the Austin American-Statesman. Their images are of consistently high quality and creativity. This is shown beautifully in a video posted today on the paper’s photoblog, Collective Vision. This piece shows images taken at Fort Hood following last week’s terrible shooting and is narrated by the three photojournalists assigned to cover the story. Their pictures are powerful, sensitive and very touching. Congratulations Jay Janner, Rodolfo Gonzalez and Ricardo Brazziell on another job very well done!

Hunger is a huge problem in Guatemala this year following a record drought and the international economic crisis. Please watch the video. If you are near Austin and want to help out, please consider coming along to the concert on the afternoon of November 22nd. Leave a comment if you have any questions or contact organiser Kathi Thomas.

Voting is open until Tuesday for the Scott Kelby World Wide Photo Walk 2009 People’s Choice Award. My winning picture from the Austin walk is one of those in the running so, if you like HDRs of tire sculptures, your vote would be greatly appreciated. You can find the picture 4th down on the left on this page. To vote, click the rating you think the photo deserves, from 1 to 5 stars.

Texas State Capitol Rotunda, originally uploaded by David A G Wilson.

I attended a rather interesting and fun event this part Thursday. Trey Ratcliff, of Stuck in Customs fame organised a photowalk in downtown Austin and 160 people showed up. It was a bit of a zoo – tripods everywhere – but we had a great time. I’m pretty sure the State Troopers at the Capitol thought some kind of invasion was underway!

One of the challenges Trey handed out was to take your best photo of the Capitol yet. While I’m pretty sure this isn’t my best (you can see others here and let me know if you agree), it is definitely my favourite monochrome shot of the interior of the rotunda.

One of the other great benefits of the get-together was a chance to meet several Flickr photographers who I have been in touch with online for quite a while but have never actually bumped into in person. Among the list were Alex Suarez and Brandon Watts not to mention Trey himself.

I’m trying to round out my collection of images of the Texas State Capitol so took a few more last weekend, this time including some telephoto shots of building details. This is a rather simple but, I think, effective shot of the flagstaff in front of the dome on the south side of the building. Unusually for me, this has had very little work done on it in Lightroom and none at all in Photomatix.