Working with what you are given when it comes to travel photography

I love to travel and all of the places I have been to. Most of those have been on vacation—most of the time, it's on a cruise when I am on vacation. When you cruise and arrive at the islands and take a tour, it's not in the so call best light. Take, for example, the island of TORTOLA in the Caribbeans.

The Island of Tortola

My wife and I signed up for an excursion to one of their popular beaches. We are in a van and heading to the beach, looking out the window. Taking what was given me, I was able to pull off some pictures that I felt summed up the island.

The Beach

While not in ideal conditions, I took pictures that I liked. I always want to take something that is not a snapshot. Maybe someday, we may go back and spend time on this island and get those pictures that we all love. Sunrise and Sunset. Until then, I will enjoy the vacation and what I love. Photography.

Rain in the tropics

The Birds

About 6 months ago, I purchased the Canon R-5. I love it. I have been doing people primarily, and now I had a chance to do the animal eye detection on this camera. It did not let me down.

The Dominican Republic

When I travel and walkabout, I use the Aperture Priority setting at F5.6 with an ISO of 200-400. I use this because most of the time, when I am walking, it is daytime, and I will get the speed I need. I had fun with these birds. I call it birds in love. After all, its SPRING :)

Head Shots

Head shots are so much fun. For me, I use a two light setup that I can do just about anywhere. When II mean anywhere I mean anywhere. I have and shared doing in a parking lot. Doing them in a hallway and many other area’s. This was not the case with the pictures above. This was luxury, got to do in a conference room.

What made this interesting is that we had about 1 hour to do about 42 people. No problem, everyone was on time and all we needed to do is wait for the moment and then take the picture. For this group I took about 4-5 and picked the best 3 in my view.

I do post in Lightroom and very little Photoshop at times. Photoshop to remove any marks on the face that are not suppose to be there.

This was a great group and now onto the next group different company. 142 Headshots and see group shots.

Good Morning Cincinnati, Ohio

Good morning Cincinnati! Last week I needed to go to 3 large cities in three days. Usually, I always carry my Canon equipment with me, but I have been playing more and more with my iPhone, and this is the case again. While I say this, if I am on a professional job, I can do more and better with my Canon equipment.( at least at this time)

Cincinnati,Ohio

As much time I practice my photography, I also do this in my post processing. I have been recently going thru some classes with Ricord learning true compositing. I say true because I want to make it seem like it was there. Some call this not natural photography. I call it art and, yes, photography. Just about every picture is corrected one way or another that you see on the web, in magazines, and so on. The cameras do have their limitation.

I looked at this photo from my hotel room. Out came my iPhone, and I made about four shots and looked at which one was best as far as focus. The original sky was nothing to write home about, so you got it; the sky was replaced with a sky I wanted and made it feel like a sunrise. But, most importantly, for me, a picture I like.

Product Photography

There is so much out there to get documented for someone needing a picture. This could be the high stress of a wedding, maybe a landscape or travel, and the list can go on. One advantage of product photography is that you get a chance to think and then take the picture

Product Photography

When your present employer finds out that you are a product photographer, you got it; they ask if you could take some pictures. So that is what I did above for an upcoming show.

My setup was using white paper on a roll for the background and then placing the rolls about 8 feet away from the back of the roll. This time, instead of flash, I used 4 continuous lights. The significant advantage of constant light is that I can see where the light is and make adjustments if necessary. The other benefit of this project was color. The color had to match. With my background in the printing industry, I do a process that we call ICC profile. What is that? Make it simple it's a process to make sure everything is calibrated from camera to post-processing to print. I use X-Rite Color check for this process.

Why 4 lights? I used two of them to light the back of the paper to make it white. With no light, it would have been dark gray. Two to light the back even. The other two, I used one for the backlight of the roll and the other to light the front.

After taking the pictures of the single rolls, it was time to put them together. The advantage of the single is that it gives the client multiple ideas and uses how they want. In this case, they are using both single rolls and various rolls. I know because I am working with them on an advertising project.