Akula Kreative

I’m always amazed how well iPhones capture color in photos. These photos have been cropped, but are otherwise untouched. Not bad for a phone, eh?

I bought—well, asked for—this single bloom (called a queen protea) at the farmers market for the sole purpose of taking pictures of it.

This thing is almost more animal than plant! Amazing, right?!!

Happy Monday.

In case you were wondering where we went last week…
Here are a few highlights from our quick 3-day road trip from San Diego to Monterey:

As a belated birthday present, I booked Andrew a Personal Guided Tour of the Monterey Bay Aquarium:

Left: Monterey Bay Habitat from above // Right: restaurant-quality fish food

Two interesting facts:

1. The waiting list to clean the glass in the Habitat tank is 2 years!
2. The Aquarium is debt-free (thanks to David Packard) and has more than 1500 volunteers. Crazy!

// the sign explains this one //

Apparently, many of the corals that are confiscated at Customs end up here!

// sardines //

// Monterey Bay Aquarium is the first to exhibit this beautiful crown jellyfish //

// the most photographed exhibit: the sea nettles //

// my new favorite: the bumper jellies! //

// an anemone //

The new Jellies Experience at the Aquarium is amazing and we highly recommend it!
Thanks to Linda and Diane for our wonderful tour!

// Point Lobos //

These cows are always a highlight of this trip.
I don’t care if the ranch hand gives me dirty looks for taking pictures…I LOOOVE them!

It seems that our plan to focus on fewer design services this year has been foiled once again!

Meet: Karbon Speed, a start-up based in Dallas that will soon be offering high-speed triathlon bike wheels direct to the consumer.

Karbon Speed: “We need help editing a logo design. Can you get this back to us in 1-2 days?”
Akula Kreative: “Ummm. Ok.”
Karbon Speed: “Awesome.”

Fast forward 1 week.

Karbon Speed: “Now we need a few product photos. Do you do that?”
Akula Kreative: “Not really. We’re not professional photograph—”
Karbon Speed: “But we reeeeeally need them. Tomorrow.”

What can we say. We’re suckers for desperate requests by clients. The photos we took are not perfect by any means, but under the circumstances we’re somewhat proud of ourselves. With a few lamps, a roll of white paper, a camera, Photoshop, and a little creativity, we found a solution that fit Karbon Speed’s needs.

We’ll announce the official launch of their company this summer, so stay tuned!

I promised myself I would have more focus this year, but my mini wall succulent is too cute not to share.
The original succulents died a while ago (due to accidental drowning)…so I added some new clippings from the yard today. Little plants make such a big difference in your work space – I highly recommend them.

We found this mini-wall-hanging-ceramic-pot (not sure what else to call it) at one of my favorite places in
San Diego: Cedros Gardens.

Happy Easter, folks! Have an eggs-ellent weekend.

Happy Valentine’s Day from Akula Kreative! Nani (our pit bull mix) was a good sport this morning and let me take some photos, so here is one to share…

Download Hi-Res Valentine’s Day Dog Photo (3.5″ by 5″)

This is free for personal use only. Enjoy!

Here’s a small sampling of photos taken on our trip to Bora Bora in October of 2011.

The shades of blue were just incredible…

In the photo above you can really see the separation of ocean and lagoon.

I’ll end with an abstract shot of the shoreline – my fave!

Since I’m not a professional photographer, I decided to include photos on the blog only. Here are a couple to start!

These are lilies from my birthday bouquet a couple of years ago. I was walking by the kitchen when I noticed how nice the light was coming through the window so I grabbed my camera and took some detail shots. I love how abstract they look close up!