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Four months ago, I went to Indonesia to photograph some of the most spectacular volcanoes on the planet. Indonesia has over 150 volcanoes and 127 of those were active (in 2012). My plan was to visit only five on the island of Java; they were Ana Krakatau, Merapi, Bromo, Semeru and Kawah-Ijen. In this first part, I will focus on the first couple days and the visit of Anak Krakatau and the temple of Borobudur. Indonesia is composed of 17,500 islands, the biggest islands are Sumatra, Celebes and Java. The island the most known  is probably Bali. In this trip we spent 14 days on Java and only 3 on Bali. Indonesian volcanoes erupt regularly (as Mount Kelud did a couple of days ago). I had no experience climbing active volcanoes so I went with a travel agency that...

A couple weeks ago, I was invited to take part of a collective photo shoot in an equestrian farm in Sonoma Valley. It was the first photo shoot of a group called: The collective model. The idea behind the collective is to have a group of talented models, make-up artists and photographers who get together to help each other out. Nobody gets paid (except maybe the location) and everyone benefits from the shoot. Everyone gets new images for their portfolio. For this first shoot, the location was a farm in Sonoma Valley, where we had access to horses, stables and rings. There were 5 models (Taylor, Brian, Debbie, Yuliya and Russo) and one other photographer plus myself. After a quick introduction and walk around the property, we got to work. It was a very fluid...

Hearst Castle was the home of William Randolph Hearst and is now a California State park. Hearst Castle is located near the unincorporated community of San Simeon, California in the Central Coast of California. Despite being relatively far from majors cities (San Francisco or Los Angeles are both 250 miles away), it attracts about one million visitors a year. So don’t expect to be alone when visiting the “Ranch”. We spent a couple days in Paso Robles, so one day we drove to Hearst Castle. On the way, we saw wild zebras. Zebras were imported by Mr. Hearst for his private zoo and released in the wild (at least on this large property) in 1958. For me, the most striking feature of the place was the two swimming pools: The Neptune pool (outside)...

Our trip to Burma is winding down. It was an amazing experience, this country is really a photographic wonderland. My friend QT Luong summarized it well: “Burma will spoil any of your future southeast Asia travel experiences”. In 14 days, I shoot more than 3500 images. Last night we had our group photo sharing session where I show the pictures below: Supa Pagoda in Yangon. Hot air balloons at sunrise over Bagan Capuccino in Burma Portrait of a novice monk. Young novice monks in a temple (Bagan) Burmanese umbrella Sunrise over Bagan’s temples. Golden buddah Ceremony in Mandalay Mandalay fort at sunrise Alm offering in yangon. Inke Lake fisherman Woman ferrying people across a small stream in Yangon Hide and seek monk One of the many Bagan temple...

Yudanaka Onsen is a small mountain town known in Japan for two things: its hot spring and the snow monkey park. There are many hot springs in the Yamanouchi area where Yudanaka is, including the more known Yudanaka Onsen and Shibu Onsen. The Japanese have been enjoying the water from these hot springs for centuries in bath houses. Shibu Onsen has 9 public bath houses (each with its figurine in front) and countless of private ones. The monkeys are the emblem of the area. Monkeys are drawn everywhere: on signs, on hotel logos, even on the manholes for the hot spring water pipes. We were looking for a Japanese style hotel called ryokan for our stay. The best roykan in town is the Kokuya, the hotel is literally on the hot spring source (5 meters away) and offer eggs...

I’m currently in Japan and we are starting 2014 ahead of almost everybody else. As we entered the new year, I wish that 2014 will bring you health, and of course photographical inspiration. I cannot do anything for your health but I can definitely try to inspire you: I have started this year by visiting Japan and the famous snow monkeys near Nagano (Jigokudani Yaen-Koen). Snow is falling, it’s all white and cold but really nice. Japan took a bit of time for me to enjoy but now I love this country. It was an adventure for us to drive on our own to the snow monkeys park (driving on the left, with road signs in a different alphabet, I really do not recommend it unless you are an experience left-side driver and you know some basic Japanese). We are...