2019 Red Rock Balloon Rally

December 19, 2019 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

This balloon festival became my favorite when I first experienced it in 2017. The large red rocks flanking the launch sites makes for a good photography experience. Add some observers on top of the rocks, and there’s a great sense of scale of how large the hot air balloons and the rocks are. The Red Rock Balloon Rally also has the added benefit of being one of the largest balloon rallies in the United States. The website used to state that the festival was the second largest balloon rally but, I guess it is no longer… There really is no contest here; the Red Rock Balloon Rally is the most visually stunning festival in the southwest.

September Happened

November 04, 2019 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

Two hot air balloon festivals occurred in September: The White Sands Balloon Invitational (WSBI), and the Elephant Butte Balloon Regatta (EBBR). I went with high hopes to both of them, and photographically came up short. Don’t get me wrong though, these were still fun to attend.

The 2019 Albuquerque Internation Balloon Fiesta

October 28, 2019 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

The Balloon Fiesta began on October 5th, and ended on the 13th - plus one more day for crewing. Ten grueling days of photography, balloon crewing, and work. For those who had been observing my posts on Instagram, the theme was all about fatigue. I just had to make it to the end. Being on my feet for about 14 hours a day; working a 40 hour work week at my full-time job plus more. After the events, my feet were actually hurting for another three days.

My First Hot Air Balloon Competition

June 12, 2019 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

This ballooning event was a bit different than other ones that I have participated in. There were no general public spectators, and there was no established launch field. For this event, the balloons were expected to come to designated targets (there are other missions to complete but I won’t delve into that). There were also some restrictions on the photographers but, those restrictions simply needed the photographers to ask first, then proceed. Pretty easy going.

February Happened

April 02, 2019 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

February, did you enjoy that month? I think I did. But, it could’ve been better. To keep things short, the Friends & Lovers Balloon Rally (Albuquerque, NM) had one successful day of flying. The Kanab Balloons & Tunes (Kanab, UT) was weathered out on all three days. The event in Utah was more of a bummer since I had driven many hours to get there; taken work days off which I could have saved instead; and I got fatter.

Ending a year: Walking through desolation

December 31, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

Okay, okay, this is another generic blog post about rounding out another year. Something, something, something, I’ve done well, and I look forward to next year. Then, to subvert all expectations, I will admit that I hadn’t done that well, and will confess that I greatly fallen short of my hopes and dreams.

Out into Nature: Photographing something else

November 21, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

If you have been following my Instagram account for a while, you will undoubtedly know that I mainly photograph hot air balloons. As of the last couple of weeks though, my subject has temporarily switch to nature related photos.

A Month Late: The Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta

November 19, 2018 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

Oh, boy, it has been over a month since the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, and I hadn’t made a blog post about it yet. Until now. Why the delay? I don’t really have a good excuse other than the event made me super-exhausted and I just couldn’t be bothered to do anything more with it once it ended. Keep in mind that my photography for these balloon events are not financially motivated yet (I would certainly like to be paid but that’s not happening) so I have zero obligations to really get this kind of stuff done right away. But, that’s just lazy so, I can’t really say that there was much reason for holding this off.

The White Sands Balloon Invitational

September 22, 2018 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

Last weekend I made the drive down to Alamogordo, New Mexico to participate in the White Sands Balloon Invitational (WSBI). In so far as I know, this is the only balloon festival that I’ve encountered that takes place within National Park grounds. I’ve visited White Sands Nat’l Monument once earlier this year, and I was thoroughly impressed by it. So… balloons + white sand dunes should be a winning combination. Well, it sure would be but, I just didn’t get the chance to photograph what I wanted. More on that later.

The 2018 Colorado Springs Labor Day Liftoff

September 05, 2018 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

To sum up my photography experience during this festival, it was: cloudy. Personally, I have a very difficult time photographing balloon festivals when it's cloudy. Good light is obscured, the sky gets blown out way too easily, and the balloon colors are dulled. In scenarios like this, it's always good to have a backup plan. For me, while it wasn't a photography related plan, I planned on crewing for "Vacation" piloted by Janet who I had previously met at the Elephant Butte Balloon Regatta. Had it not been me being occupied with crewing, I think my overall experience would have been poor since I wasn't getting the photos I wanted.

The Elephant Butte Balloon Regatta

August 27, 2018 by Elliot Nahm in Balloons

This past weekend was the Elephant Butte Balloon Regatta located at Elephant Butte State Park in New Mexico. I went for two of the three days as I was completely unaware of the media & sponsor day. I had an enjoyable experience overall but, I'm not sure if I would go to this particular festival again next year. I'll explain myself on that thought later.

The lenses I use during a Balloon Festival

July 18, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

Before I even begin, let me start with this: You can use whatever lens you want!

But, hey, I still look up which lenses are appropriate for portraits. Somebody out there might curious about what others use for balloon festivals, right? Maybe. For this article, I'll write about the lenses that I use while on the launch field of a balloon festival, and provide some example images. I particularly use a Tamron 15-30mm F2.8, a Nikon 24-70mm F2.8G, and a Tamron 70-200mm F2.8 VC.

Frederick in Flight

July 09, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

Alright, I'm quite late on this post! If you're just here for pictures, scroll right on down. I went to the Frederick in Flight balloon festival in Frederick, Colorado on June 22nd, and 23rd.

Telluride Balloon Festival

June 14, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

The Telluride Balloon Festival took place from June 1st to 3rd in beautiful Telluride, Colorado. I took one of the last camping spots (first come, first served), the Thursday prior, at the town park campground just for this festival.

An Interesting Printing Service: 8x10

May 14, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

As a photographer, I've been looking into having my photos printed to be sold. There's just a small issue with that idea though. I have no idea what I'm doing. There are many hurdles that I need to clear. Well, even without much of a clue of what I'm doing, here comes 8x10 to try to make things easier.

The St Patrick's Day Balloon Rallye

March 24, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

Over St. Patrick's Day weekend, I went down south to Belen, New Mexico to photograph the balloon festival. About 74 balloons participated during the morning mass ascensions.

Why the Nikon D800 should be your first Full-frame DSLR

March 05, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

The camera that I used for my stills photography has been the Nikon D800. Released back in 2012, it's now approaching six years old. The fairly recent release of the D850 last year also now sets the D800 back to be two generations old. So for a person, in 2018, shopping for their first full frame camera, why should they look at the D800? I want to highlight three major points of why the D800 should be at the top of your list.

Attempting to learn Photoshop

February 26, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

Everybody knows about Adobe's Photoshop. Any photographer that now wants Adobe's Lightroom software pretty much has to have Photoshop bundled with it. What if I were to tell you that I just opened up Photoshop for the first time just a couple of weeks ago? So, for the past two years I've been paying for Photoshop, and now I decide to use it...

Balloons and Tunes with some Lanterns

February 22, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

This past weekend, February 16-18th, I was at Kanab, Utah for the Balloons and Tunes festival. Inclement weather only allowed for one day of flying which was fairly disappointing. I didn't get the photos that I wanted from this event as I need multiple days to learn what's best. Oh, well, it happens.

Snowdown without the Snow

February 06, 2018 by Elliot Nahm

Durango's annual Snowdown festival was just last week. I attended, sort of, over the weekend for the balloon ascensions, and none of the drinking (because I'm boring). Durango is a lengthy 6.5 hour drive from Denver, and many reasonable people would make the drive on the Friday before. But, no, I had a cunning plan.