Utica Reservoir

Utica Reservoir Fine Art Photography

by Sherri on August 23, 2012

We just returned from the very popular and beautiful Utica Reservoir with new images. I know a lot of you who visit this blog also visit Utica. Perhaps you don't take photos when you are there, or maybe you are not happy with the photos you captured. These photos were created especially with YOU in mind! They are available as Fine Art Photography Prints & Greeting Cards. To order, simply click on the link below each photo. Utica Sunrise Utica Sunrise 2 Paddling Paradise Thank you for visiting! Sherri & Jeff

10 Reasons Why I Love PhotoShelter!

by Sherri on July 13, 2010

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Couple kayaking Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, Northern California.

One of the questions I get asked a lot is "What do you like about your PhotoShelter Website?" Since there is so much interest in this subject, I decided rather than answering everyone individually, that it would be a good subject for a Blog post. First of all, we don't really have a PhotoShelter Website, we have our Website integraded with PhotoShelter. That's how WE do it, but stand alone Websites can also be built in a matter of minutes, with one of several templates they provide. PhotoShelter offers so many awesome features, but here are a few of my favorites. I'll be adding to this list in future posts. Best Bang For Your Buck! If you are looking for a service for storing images, selling prints, licensing images to name just a few, I believe PhotoShelter is "The Best Bang for Your Buck." They offer several plans ranging from FREE to $49.99. We currently have the Standard Plan, which costs us $29.99 per month and serves all of our current needs. Sell Products & License Images We upload our images to our Photo Archive, which is where all of our online images are stored. Images can be ordered as prints, or licensed for personal use, directly from our photo archive. We don't offer automated Rights Managed images through PhotoShelter. For Rights-Managed licensing, clients contact us directly for a stock photo quote. After a fee has been determined, we invoice the client. After we receive payment, we set up a Private PhotoShelter Gallery for the client, where they can download their images. Great SEO (Search Engine Optimization) PhotoShelter has been working hard to improve their SEO and it and it's finally paying off. During the last few months, we have been seeing an increased amount of traffic to our Website and we have to give credit to PhotoShelter for some of it! Easy To Create Galleries I love how easy it is to create galleries, copy the same images to other galleries and rearrange the images within a gallery however you want. For instance, you can find this image of Auburn, California in our Auburn Gallery. Auburn is located in the California Gold Country, so we copied it into that gallery as well. We even took it one step further for this image. Since it is a landscape image it also went into our Landscape Gallery. Slide Shows Slide shows can be created from any gallery with a click of a button. You can group together a selection of images in a gallery, click the slide show button and use it like a portfolio. Here is a slide show I just put together for this post. If you hover over the top of the image, you will see the photo caption. It's pretty cool! Free Photography Reports PhotoShelter provides an incredible amount of marketing tools for the photographer. Their free photography reports (PDF) on blogging, social media, google analytics, Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and what photo buyer's want in photography websites are very informative. Blog PhotoShelter also distributes great information via their Blog "A Picture's Worth." There you can find a ton of really helpful articles including these: "Top 10 Ways To Piss Off A Photographer" "Top 10 Ways To Make A Photographer Fall In Love With You" "Top 13 Ways To Piss Off A Photo Editor" Grover was also kind enough to include a mention about my post on "Shooting the Amgen Tour of California" in their weekly Friday Shout-Outs!" Thanks again Grover! Free Training If what you have read thus far isn't enough to convince you to join, maybe this will. PhotoShelter also offers a variety of FREE Webinars and I can tell you from personal experience, they are worth the investment in time. They even welcome suggestions for future Webinars. Post To Social Networks The ability to post a gallery of images directly to Facebook, Flickr, SportsShooter and Twitter is a really nice feature. Here is a gallery of images I posted directly from PhotoShelter to Facebook. Coupons Everyone is jumping on the "coupon bandwagon" these days including PhotoShelter. They make it really easy to offer discounts on prints and products to your customers. I thought it was so cool, I decided to give it a "test drive." Check out my "Fans Only 4th of July Coupon Sale", to see how I incorporated coupons into my marketing plan. I will be using them on a regular basis! I hope this has shed at least a little bit of light on PhotoShelter. Your comments and questions are certainly welcomed and appreciated as always, so fire away! Thanks for stopping by and be sure to visit again sometime! Cheers, Sherri

New Outdoor Lifestyle Image

by Sherri on March 29, 2010

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Kim Brown and her new dog friend, Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

We are in the midst of developing a new collection of Travel and Outdoor Lifestyle images. Here is one of the images that will be added to our Outdoor Lifestyles Gallery soon. Check out this article "6 Tips for Capturing Great Outdoor Lifestyle Photos" to see how I go about creating images such as the one above. If you have any questions or comments about this image, please feel free to add them in the comments section below. Thank you for visiting! ~Sherri

Blackberry Cobbler Anyone?

by Sherri on October 9, 2009

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Vicki West cooking Dutch Oven Blackberry Cobbler, Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, CA

Move over summer. Fall is here. This wraps up my summer series at Utica Reservoir. Our wonderful friend and Professional Chef, Vicki, came all the way out from Colorado to help celebrate my Birthday. What a gal! She hauled 3 Dutch Ovens with her and all the makings for Beef Brisket and Blackberry Cobbler (minus the Blackberries - we picked those in our neighborhood) for my Birthday dinner Saturday night. Vicki spent much of the day prepping and cooking. Jeff gladly assisted her during the cooking process. He wants to get into Dutch Oven Cookery too. It was quite amazing to watch and photograph. But, the best part of it all was eating it! If anyone wants the recipes for the Beef Brisket and/or the Blackberry Cobbler, just leave a comment below. I'm sure I can get them for you, when she returns home to Colorado. She is currently working at a ranch in Wyoming and should be returning home soon!

Room with a View

by Sherri on October 7, 2009

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View of Utica Reservoir in Alpine County, CA at sunrise, from inside our tent.

Fall has arrived. That said, I will be wrapping up my summer series on Utica Reservoir soon. Then, my focus will be on Fall images. This photo was shot from inside our tent at 5:30 in the morning. I didn't feel like messing with the tripod, so I shot this at ISO 3200. My camera (Nikon D300) does very well at the higher ISO's. I can also reduce the digital noise using Adobe Photoshop Lightroom. Even so, I couldn't reduce the noise enough for my liking. So, what did I do? I took this image into Photoshop CS3 and applied "Cutout," one of my favorite artistic filters. It did exactly what I hoped it would. It covered up all the noise and rendered an image that was pleasing to the eye. I hope you like it! Thank you for visiting. If you would like to leave a comment, simply click on the "comments" link (add your message in the box) at the bottom of this post. Visit our Stock Photo Website for links to photo galleries.

Top 10 Lightroom Tweets of the Week

by Sherri on October 2, 2009

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Goose at sunset, Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

WOW - you have to see this one. I hope I don't bore you by posting another Goose image, but I have one more I would like to share with you. This one was taken a little bit later than the other two, as the sky was turning a brilliant pink. This image as well as most of the images I post on this blog and on facebook will be available for purchasing as a print, or for licensing. About the photo Of course, I enhanced the color a little bit in Lightroom. But, this is pretty close to the way it looked straight out of the camera! Well, it's been 2 weeks since my last Lightroom Tweets of the Week post. Normally, I would have all of my Tweets picked out and semi ready to include here already. That is not the case today, because I have been working on a BIG Website project for the past few weeks. I guess I had better go on over to Twitter and see what else I can find! [click to continue…]

Questions? Jusk Ask!

by Sherri on September 14, 2009

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Jeff Hartnett and Kim Brown kayaking on Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

This image was also captured during our camping trip to Alpine County last month. If you would like to know how this shot was captured, how it was developed in Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 2, or you would like more information on Utica Reservoir, simply leave a comment below. You can also read all of my previous posts on Utica Reservoir here. Thank you for visiting!

What’s Up at SMP?

by Sherri on September 2, 2009

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Sierra Sunrise over Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

Sierra Sunrise over Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California. This was also taken during our recent camping trip. We've been really busy working on a major Website project and I haven't had a chance to post for a few days. Today, I decided I had to post something no matter what. Here is an overview of what we are working on:
  1. We are adding a collection of new images to our on-line galleries.
  2. Some of our images are getting moved to our new archive, but they will still be available for purchasing as prints and for licensing.
  3. We are preparing to offer a few new services. I'll keep those a secret for now.
  4. We will be rescanning some of our slides.
  5. And more...
We hope to have the things mentioned above completed in 3-4 more weeks. After that, we will be concentrating on adding hundreds of new images to our galleries and archive. In the meantime, I hope to get back to posting on this blog a bit more often than I have been! Thank you for visiting. If you would like to leave a comment, simply click on the "comments" link (add your message in the box) at the bottom of this post. You can also sign up for a "free" subscription to this Blog. Just look in the upper right hand side of the Blog under "Subscribe to Sherri's Blog." Then, either click on the orange button, or enter your email address and click on "subscribe." Visit our Stock Photo Website for links to photo galleries.

Morning Paddle on Utica Reservoir

by Sherri on August 26, 2009

Morning paddle on Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

Morning paddle on Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

Jeff and I have kayaked and canoed on a lot of beautiful lakes and reservoirs in Northern California. If I had to choose the top 5 best places we have ever paddled, Utica Reservoir would definitely be one of them! 5 reasons why it is in the top 5.
  1. The water is warm, clear and has a sandy bottom.
  2. There are many islands to paddle to and camp on.
  3. The water is calm most of the time.
  4. The scenery is beautiful in every direction.
  5. It's not too big or too small. It's the perfect paddle lake!
You can read more about Utica Reservoir here. I have many more images to share from our recent trip. I will be spacing them out a bit, as we are in the middle of some very BIG Website projects. For that reason, I will also be spending less time on Twitter and Facebook, until those projects are a little further along. Thank you for visiting. If you would like to leave a comment, simply click on the "comments" link (add your message in the box) at the bottom of this post. You can also sign up for a "free" subscription to this Blog. Just look in the upper right hand side of the Blog under "Subscribe to Sherri's Blog." Then, either click on the orange button, or enter your email address and click on "subscribe." Visit our Stock Photo Website for links to photo galleries.

Top 10 Lightroom Tweets of the Week

by Sherri on August 21, 2009

Man kayaking on Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

Man kayaking on Utica Reservoir, Alpine County, California.

This photo was captured as Jeff, Kim and I were heading for the Lily Pond that Jeff had discovered earlier that day. We were starting to get a little nervous, as thunder bumpers were rolling in. The last place we wanted to be during a storm is in a boat on the lake! Fortunately, the threatening looking sky rolled out of there about as fast as it rolled in. We were happy little kayakers once again! [click to continue…]