Maria was lit by 2 Speedlites, one inside my Photoflex Octodome and the other inside The background is lit by a 3rd Speedlite.
I have always admired photographers who specialized in glamour.
They may be men but they are very in tuned to how makeup works on the variety of skin tones, hair color and facial features of the women they photograph.
Coordinating all that and wardrobe alone is enough to make my head spin.
Having a makeup artists on hand is definitely a god sent.
I recently connected with makeup artist and hair stylist Anna Cameron recently so we when we got together, we collaborated to photograph aspiring model Maria Nuñez.
Professional belly dancer Hadia Habibi needed some pictures with her Al Nar Bellydance Ensemble.
Group photos tend to be documentary in nature i.e their primary purpose is to record who was present at some place and time.
For that reason, I take a quick group photo with my point-and-shoot camera as an attendance record whenever I’m teaching. It cures the most camera shy instantly.
The very first thing I did when I entered the grounds was head to the Skytower Ride.
This tower gave an unobstructed view of Sea World.
Although the ride didn’t give us a lot of time at the top, 3 minutes up and 3 minutes down.,it was sufficient to give me an idea of what to expect.
It gave me a good perspective of where everything was and more importantly where the sun was relative to the various places I planned to shoot.
The picture on the left was taken from Skytower Ride.
I saw I had a severely backlit situation if I stayed at eye level from the stands.
I was glad I packed my 70-300 zoom.
Blue Horizons Stadium
The sun was behind the stage as you can see from this picture.
At the Blue Horizons stadium where we watched the 25-minute show of aerial acrobats, bottle nosed dolphins and a pilot whale, you probably want to steer clear of the first 12 rows, their splash zone.
Those are the rows for the hard core folks who want to get the entire ‘feel’ and flavor of the show by getting soaked to the bone.
I’m not saying I wouldn’t sit down there but if I ever did so, I would be sure to have some serious water protective gear for my equipment.
A mountain lion takes a drink in its enclosure. This picture was taken through a thick glass. I was so close, I could almost hear her purr.
We all have dreams of going on a safari in Africa.
But how many of us have the deep pockets or the time to do this?
So a trip to your local zoo to photograph the animals may have to do for now. Here’s what you’ll need:
a long telephoto lens (300mm and longer)
a monopod
a cart for your gear
If you don’t have a long telephoto lens, you can rent one from Borrow Lenses or if you happen to live in the Los Angeles area, you can head to Samys Camera.
Getting close is often your biggest problem. This image of a big horn sheep was taken with a 300 mm lens on a Canon 40D which has a cropped sensor, so the effective focal length was 480 mm (300 x 1.6) yet he appears small and hard to differentiate from his surroundings.
I like Borrow Lenses because you don’t even have to leave your home.
They ship it to you.
And when it’s time to return it, you drop it off at Fedex.
