Website

Ears Up, Now Running WordPress

Have you heard?

krisnelsonphoto.com is now running on the WordPress platform.
(gratuitous bunny pic)

All told, it took less than a week to move over all the custom pages from the existing photonelly.com site, as well as bringing over the 180 posts from Blogger that were published via FTP.  Hadn’t really paid attention to the post count until now, as it looks like I’ve been posting more daily photos than I realized.

Another good chunk of that time was taken up by porting over the custom home page code I had on the previous site to parse out the Blogger feed data to show new photos on the blog itself. It was fun code for the geek in me to write, but the new structure I setup with WordPress is a lot cleaner.

So … What’s Different?

Well, not much right now. The blog itself has a slightly new look with the sidebar and new widgets. Oh, and PAGING!!!! Not something that I had from FTP publishing with Blogger. It’s the little things, folks.

But, it’s really only the beginning. With all my site pages and stylesheets now maintained in WordPress, it is a lot easier to add more of the new content I’ve been dreaming up. There are also good widgets, plug-ins, and maybe a theme or two that I may look into adding. I also have a ton of new links to share, and looking to feature some of the great photography blogs I’ve started to follow this year.

All-in-all, it’s going to be a lot more fun than Blogger was.

Stay Tuned

Okay, that wasn’t much of a teaser for things to come, but if you like some of my images or where I take make them, go ahead and subscribe to the feed to get updates as they’re posted. You can also find me on Twitter, too as @webnelly if you’re into that or even on Flickr if you wanted to say Aloha!

- Kris

P.S.: Nobody’s perfect, so there are bound to be a few things that I missed when migrating or are no longer working. Please let me now if you find such instances.

Ready to Make the Move

Some time late last week I up and decided I was going to take on the effort of moving this photography site and blog over to a hosted WordPress installation. It will actually by my 3rd WordPress blog (after Maui by Photo and my Ka’anapali Dreamin’ Blog) but only my second Blogger to WP migration.

I learned quite a bit from my first migration earlier this year, but fortunately this move isn’t going to be as large as the first one.

Caution: Kinks Ahead
At the end of it all, moving to WP is going to be a big plus for this site and blog. I’ve already spend a good number of hours getting the test site ready by moving all the site pages and styles over, but I still anticipate the normal move-related issues once this switch is flipped.

I’m hoping to cut everything over late tonight and start fixing the first issues this week. By the weekend I hope to have everything ironed out and the newly renewed stream of photos coming in through the feeds again.

Thanks,
– Kris

Photos Now Available at Red Bubble

I’m very excited to announce that there’s now a second place online where you can buy prints of my best photographs.

Allow me to introduce my new “bubblesite”, Kris Nelson Photography. The phrase bubblesite comes from the company that is offering this service, Red Bubble, and it is a very clean and easy to navigate site to browse through different galleries of all my best work, including Maui, Chicago, and Door County photos.

 

Not Just Maui
The first thing that’s cool about this site is that it’s not just Maui focused like my existing store, Maui Wall Candy. I mean, don’t get me wrong, Maui is and always will be my absolute favorite place to take photos, but there is another part of my portfolio that is growing faster than I can get to Maui. This new site lets me brings those shots to you as well, and hopefully right to your living room wall.

 

More Options
Not only are there more than just Maui photos, there are many different things you can do with them as well. For example, you can use these photos to make a greeting card. There are also options such as matted prints, canvas and even framed art, too. They also have options for creating posters, which I’m still exploring.

In any case, if you have a need or are looking for a great gift idea for yourself or someone else, give it a look.

 

More Photos Coming Soon
There are still less than 30 photos here, but more are on their way. I’m working putting the finishing touches on quite a number of photos so they look the very best when they’re ready to be sold. And if you have any questions or requests for some of my work you’ve seen online, please Contact Me and I’ll be very happy to help anyway I can.

 

Thanks, and happy browsing,
– Kris

New Website: Maui by Photo

Earlier this week, I launched a new website featuring my favorite photos from Maui, called Maui by Photo.

The new site is targeted at fellow fans of Maui, and local residents alike, who have fallen head over heels for the Valley Isle and want to relive their favorite Maui memories without stepping outside the comfort of their own home. Although, most of us would jump at a chance to head back to the islands if we could.

In addition to featuring some of the best locations on Maui, each post has a place for comments where readers can talk story and share their favorite memories for the location their viewing.  There are posts for some of the best beaches you’ll probably find anywhere, as well as a section for the twists, turns, sights and sounds of the road to Hana. There are other sections, too, but it’s probably easier for you to just check it out for yourself.

I’ve updated the Find Me page here at the site with more links to Maui by Photo, and if you haven’t seen that page yet, it’s getting pretty big now.  There are now 7 different places online that you can go to find various parts of my photography, a number I hadn’t realized was getting so high until now.

You can also read more about the new site via the official launch announcement yesterday on my existing Maui site. I also created my very first page on Facebook for this site, which you can find here.

I hope you like it, and if you’re a fan of Maui, I look forward to hearing some of your favorite island stories.

Thanks,
– Kris

Updates, New Home Page, and Upcoming Projects

Updates

It’s been some time since the last update here aside from the daily photos I’ve been posting. It was a great two weeks in Maui this year, which is really no surprise. As anticipated, I took a large amount of photos, again no surprise, and I’m still in the process of going through and editing/publishing the very best. No surprises there either.

Even without going through all the photos yet, I can already say from a photography perspective, it was a very successful trip. I tried out a few new techniques and expanded my horizons quite a bit further over the previous years, especially with a renewed focus on composition. It gets even better, though, as I’m hoping to determine this week if we’ll be able to return to Maui in September for the first annual Maui Photo Festival and Workshops. More details on that soon.

Sticking with this most recent trip, I hope to have more of my latest photos published out on Flickr in the next week or so, as well as over on my profile at Hawaii Photography. As I finish them, I’ll have updates on the blog here as well.

New Home Page

About two weekends ago, I went ahead and redesigned the home page of the site here to feature the daily photo that I’ve been posting on the blog. While it’s not complete (nothing ever is, really) I think it’s a pretty nice addition to the site and a good way for me to feature a larger range of photos here online. There’s more to it than just throwing up a new photo everyday, and I’ve been meaning to write up some of the behind-the-scenes details behind it on my web development blog. Hopefully I’ll get to that soon as well.

In the meantime, feel free to browse through some of the past photos and let me know your thoughts on how you think it could be improved.

Upcoming Projects

After every trip to Maui, I end up with a giant pair of blinders on from a photographer standpoint. You can’t really blame me because Maui is such an amazing place to shoot, and no matter where you go, there’s something beautiful and intriguing to capture with your camera. While I don’t live there (yet), there are still many other things closer to home that I enjoy shooting, and get to practice with more often.

I thought I’d take a moment to mention two of the larger projects I have upcoming in the next month, aside from a few other smaller things I’m also working with.

Upcoming Project – Blackhawks vs. Sharks, March 25th

Last year, my wife and I were given tickets to the Blackhawks-Sharks matchup at the United Center. While the Hawks ended up losing, the seats were amazing and I was able to get up close thanks to my telephoto lens. This year, when I had to the opportunity to purchase similar seats to the same game, I jumped on it.

Hockey is one of my favorite sports to shoot as a photographer, mainly because I’ve played the game all my life and it is probably the most exciting sport to watch live (yes, there’s obvious bias in that statement). The action is so fast paced and physical, there are tons of great photo ops just waiting to be captured. With these seats, I hope to come home with a handful of shots to share here, and seeing how much I’ve learned and practiced in the last year, I’m really excited about this one.

Upcoming Project – Door County

My wife and I are also planning another trip up to Door County, Wisconsin next month. With Maui being my absolute favorite place to shoot, Door County comes in as a strong second. It will be our third trip up north as Cindy and I continue our visits to different parts of the peninsula at different times of the year. Previous visits included our first trip in September and most recently in December.

December was a great time to shoot even though it was below freezing the entire time, and I was out there at least one day when the wind chills were below zero. Although our trip next month in April will be just a tad bit early for all the spring blossoms and colors to be in full bloom, it still stands to be a good trip for us to do a little more exploring through the state parks and a few lighthouses that were just impossible to do in the winter. Seeing that visits to Door County is much closer and easier to budget than trips to Maui, this is likely the first of a handful trips to the “Door” this year.

Be sure to stay tuned for updates from both projects in the coming weeks, as well as continued daily photos here at the blog.

Thanks,
- Kris