Jeffcable

Canon gear on sale now - Up to $700 off!

Wed, 31 May 2023 21:12:05 +0200

I just got word about new Canon rebates with some really great deals. One that jumps out immediately is the Canon R6 camera which was selling for $2299 is now available for $1599! They also have the same rebate on the Canon R6 kit with the RF24-105mm f/4 lens, which sold for $3399 and is now available for $2699.

Check out all the deals by clinking on the image above or HERE.

Happy shopping everyone!

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa Costa Rica and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Memorial Day Photos: San Francisco National Cemetery

Tue, 30 May 2023 03:46:38 +0200

Today is Memorial Day and I thought it would be appropriate to pay my respect to those who have made it possible for us to have our freedom. I looked back and found some of my older images from the National Cemetery in San Francisco (from a blog post I did ten years ago) and also have added some new photos that I took yesterday.

The first two photos were taken back in 2013. It was the first time that I visited the cemetery after the volunteers has placed flags in front of all 32,000 tombstones.

For this image, I used a fish-eye lens to capture the flags at the entry of the cemetery.

On my previous visit I was there on Memorial Day and had a chance to photograph some of the military who were in attendance.

Yesterday the cemetery was mostly empty. Since I had just finished shooting an event, I had many of my cameras and lenses to choose from. I decided to use my Canon R3 with the Canon RF 70-200mm lens. I got down low to capture the flags and show the repeating pattern of the endless headstones.

I also looked for graves that had been visited. I shot from a standing position...

...and also got down low to highlight the tribute.

I did not just take photos. I also walked around and fixed some of the flowers and flags that had fallen over and took time to read many of the names of the fallen.

As I walked around, I was looking for repeating patterns in the background. I took this photo at f/3.5 to have the first stone in perfect focus, but let all the stones in the background go out of focus. This photo highlights the name and information.

For this photo, I waited for the wind to blow the flag in the foreground, and focused on that. I took this photo at f/5 to have both the flag and the stone in focus.

There are some military who are buried with flat headstones at grass level (like you can see in the first photo). I got down low to the grass to highlight only the repeating pattern of the flags.

After spending an hour or so in the cemetery, I was about to leave when I saw these geese walking through the grounds. I saw these two that were walking towards the flags and waited to take photos until they got close. It almost looks like they are paying their respects.

I got back in my car and was driving out when I saw this goose walking. I lowered my passenger window and framed my shot, and just as I did, it took off. I like that this is a different view within these hallowed grounds, with a little bit of life amongst the fallen.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Japan Photo Tour - Part 2 - Kyoto, Osaka and more

Tue, 16 May 2023 14:39:40 +0200

As you saw in the last blog post, we started our Japan photo tour in Tokyo and then made our way to Nikko, We had overcast weather for most of the first part of our trip. Unfortunately, we visited Mt Fuji, but the weather was so bad that we never got a glimpse of the majestic site. But the overcast skies and rain drops did not keep us from visiting some great sites and getting really nice photos.

Instead of taking wide shots, I showed our guests how isolating subjects up close would make for better images in this weather. This photo was taken with the Canon R6 MK II and the RF 24-105mm lens, under the cover of an overhang (to keep us out of the rain). With the low and flat light, I took this opportunity to slow the shutter speed to 1/15th sec to get some motion in the water coming from the dragon's mouth. I framed this shot to include the dragon (as my main subject), but also include the cherry blossoms and pagoda in the background.

Our next stop was Kyoto, and it was the first time that we had no rain in the forecast. We arrived in Kyoto in the evening and had a nice dinner. As we were walking back from the restaurant, I saw that the Kyoto Tower was lit up in these great colors. I suggested that we do night shots, using the tower as our subject and the wet, reflective streets in the foreground. We walked to a nearby temple and used that as our shooting location. I really loved this location and was hoping to shoot this same image at blue hour the following night. My plans were made, but the tower was lit in white, devoid of this great color. It turns out that the first night was a special lighting to honor breast cancer awareness.

Kyoto is known for all the amazing temples, and we really enjoyed photographing these. On this morning we visited the Golden Pavilion. I was really happy to see the nice clouds in the sky and great reflections in the water. Really nice shooting conditions! I used the Canon R6 MK II, RF 24-105mm lens with a Tiffen circular polarizing filter to accentuate the contrast in the clouds and the reflection.

We spent hours walking the grounds of the Golden Pavilion, enjoying the nice weather and capturing the beauty of Japan.

The next day we went to an area just outside of Osaka, which had endless cherry blossom trees. As we walked around the trees, it was hard to stop photographing their colors.

At one point we started shooting up into the sky. I saw the sun coming through the blossoms and used this as an opportunity to teach the starburst effect (using a low aperture and placing the sun in the right spot). Fun stuff!

I saw these young ladies dressed in traditional clothing and had to get their photo. They had just purchased some sweet treats and happily showed them to me.

I had heard about this next stop and was excited to photograph the tall bamboo trees and the Toril Gates and the Fushimi Inaru Shrine.

Due to the cherry blossoms being in full bloom, the area was packed with visitors, tourists and locals included. These walkways were VERY crowded but I really wanted a clean shot without people the frame. As I walked up the pathway, I thought that this was not going to be possible. But then I noticed that even though there were two open rows of these gates, people were only going up the right side. People assumed that the opposite side was for people exiting the area, but that was not the case. Once I figured this out, I went back down and walked up the left side to get this clean shot.

More cherry blossoms...

We saw this woman posing for photos, and many of us chose to shoot our own images of her from different angles. I decided to use this tree as a "frame" above her.

One of our last stops was to the Himeji Castle, which was built in the 1300s. Once again, we had great weather. Our group split up, allowing everyone to walk the property to find their own favorite photo locations. I saw this hedge with vibrant red leaves and thought that it would make for a perfect foreground to the castle. For this photo, I got down low to the leaves...

...and i this photo, I raised the camera a little higher to show more of the trees and a little less of the red leaves. This really shows how shooting at a slightly different height can change the composition of your image.

Our last night in Japan was spent in Osaka, where we went to visit the Glico running man. This is one of the most well known landmarks in Osaka and has been popular for the last 80 years. While waiting for the sunlight to diminish and the billboards to light up, we all broke out our phones to capture video and time-lapses from this location. I saw one of our guests (Dave) standing still amongst the fast moving crowd and had to capture this. I slowed the shutter speed of the camera to 1/6 sec and held it as steady as I could above my head.

I did not really understand why this was a tourist attraction, but took the photo anyways. There were literally thousands of people taking photos of this billboard.

In order to capture this billboard differently than everyone else there, I slowed the shutter down and twisted the camera to get this spinning effect. It is different and I like the uniqueness of the shot.

And I forgot to post this cool time-lapse video from the Shibuya Crossing in Tokyo on the last blog post. This is the busiest intersection in the world.

Click HERE or on the image above to see the time-lapse.

Overall it was an amazing chance for all of us to experience the beauty of Japan and I really look forward to getting back there next year. Hopefully I will get a chance to see Mt. Fuji next time around!

If you would like to go with us, please click HERE to get more information.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Japan Photo Tour: The people, the cherry blossoms and more

Thu, 04 May 2023 17:09:36 +0200

After numerous years of delays due to the pandemic, we were finally able to take our guests to Japan last month! Even though I have been to Japan numerous times, it was the first time going with M&M Photo Tours, leading a photo tour to this amazing country. We timed the trip to try and catch the cherry blossoms in full bloom, and the timing was spot on. More to come on that in a little bit later in this blog post (and in another post coming soon).

It was also the first time for me to use the new Canon R6 MK II camera. For this trip, I decided to bring the Canon R6 MK II and my Canon R5. I brought 3 lenses with me: the Canon RF15-35mm, the Canon RF24-105mm, and the Canon RF70-200mm.

After landing in Tokyo, I needed to stay awake for another 4 hours in order to get time adjusted. I had yet to meet with our tour guests, so I went for a walk and tried the new camera.

By the time I got to the hotel, it was already dark, but I love taking night photos, so this was fine with me. With all the lights on the storefronts, and masses of people returning home from work I figured that motion pans would be fun. This was one of the first snaps from the Canon R6 MK II, taken at 1/5 sec.

I saw this small side street and loved the lights and busy walking traffic. Since I did not have a tripod with me on this evening, I decided to test the image stabilization (in camera and in the lens). I leaned against a wall and took this photo with a one second exposure, handheld. No problem at all!

Speaking of motion, the next morning was the first time for our group to head out for photos. As we waited for our train to arrive, I thought that this would be a perfect place for our first group shot. As a passing train entered the station, I asked everyone to stand still, so that I could get them sharp, but with motion of the train. I set the camera for a 1/20 sec for this photo.

For our first stop, we visited the Great Buddha of Kamakura. It was an overcast day and we had white cloudy skies. It was great light on the Buddha, but really boring for a background. This was a great chance to demonstrate the new "Sky replacement" feature in Photoshop to the group, when I was teaching post production a couple of days later.

This bronze statue is about 35 feet tall and dates all the way back to the 13th century. There were a lot of people shooting straight onto the statue, so I showed everyone how we could shoot from an angle, and farther away, and use the foliage as a frame.

After visiting the Great Buddha, we walked to the Haze-Dera Temple and we all had a great time roaming the grounds .

We did not see any cherry blossoms in this location, but the architecture and other foliage was beautiful.

I took a lot of photos there, but my favorite was this detail shot of these "six jizo" sculptures.

On our second day in Tokyo, we went to Ueno Park, which is the best place to see the cherry blossoms in Tokyo and it was awesome. When we first arrived, I looked around and saw these decorations and thought that they would make a perfect foreground for the blossoms. I had our guests start here and then we broke off to allow everyone a chance to grab photos of their own.

We saw a combination of white cherry blossoms and pink ones. So beautiful!

The next day we visited another temple. I found it interesting, but since we had overcast weather once again, it was not terribly photographic. But we saw this young lady who was dressed in traditional Japanese clothing and I saw an opportunity for some really nice portraits. It turned out that she was in this location to celebrate her 23rd birthday with her family. It was a win / win for us because she loved having her photo taken, and it gave me a chance to teach some portrait photography techniques to the group. I moved her to this location to get a good background and nice side-lighting. For this photo, I grabbed my Canon R5 and I went with my favorite portrait lens, the Canon RF70-200mm lens.

We went to a couple different places around the temple for more photos. I took this photo with the Canon R6 MK II and used the Canon RF15-35mm wide angle lens to show more of the scene. Because I did not have a flash with me at the time, I knew that she would be really dark in the bottom of the frame. But I also knew that this could be fixed later, so I took the photo and brightened her in Photoshop later.

After photographing the young lady, we were standing around waiting for the other guests to meet back at our spot. I heard drumming noise and turned to see these people coming into the main area of the temple. It was a bridal party walking towards their wedding ceremony, with the bride and groom in the middle. More good timing.

One evening took the train to the Shinjuku station and we visited the famous alleyway informally called "piss alley". It is nicknamed this because in the 1940s there were no bathrooms in the area so people would just go to the bathroom anywhere in this alley. This narrow alley is now home to many small places to eat. Since it was really dark, I recommended that our guests crank up their ISO to 3200 to get photos of these tiny eateries.

We visited many beautiful gardens, this one being one of my favorites. I took portraits of each of the guests and then asked one of the guests (thanks Dave!) to take a photo of me here. There was a light rain falling. If you zoom into the photo, you can see the rain drops falling everywhere.

Any time we saw people in traditional clothing, we tried to stop them for photos.

The next stop on our tour was Nikko. In this area we ventured off to the Kanmangafuchi gorge. It was a really pretty location, and in this case the overcast weather once again worked to our advantage. Due to the low light, we could slow our shutter speeds and blur the water. I set the Canon R6 MK II to ISO 100 and f/20 which gave me a shutter speed of about 3/4 sec. And just like on the first night in Japan, I was able to use the image stabilization to shoot this handheld at the slow shutter speed and get a really sharp image (with motion blur of the water).

Hiking a short distance up the trail, along the edge of the Daiyagawa River, we came across the well known Narabi Jizo statues. These statues are lined up along the wall which stretches for hundreds of feet. Again, we had perfect light for photographing the statues, with no harsh sunlight or shadows. I really loved this location for three reasons:

1. It is not as popular as other tourist destinations, so it was not crowded with people.

2. The ancient stonework and colors were really pretty.

3. I love photographing repeating patterns.

The statues all wear these red hats and scarves, since they are treated as live people and kept warm from harsh environment.

After shooting many images of the statues, I was trying to figure out a unique way to photograph them. I saw this rain covered tree limb and focused on that, letting the statues go out of focus. I showed this to the other guests and we all took turns holding the tree limb down to get the best composition.

We were just about finished photographing the Jizo statues, when a couple of our guests came down from the hillside above and told us about a beautiful old cemetery. Even though we only had 10 minutes more before we were all supposed to meet by our bus, I hurried up the hill to grab some photos. It was stressful trying to shoot in such a short period of time, but well worth it!

These last photos (of the first half of the Japan Photo Tour blog) is of the Skinkyo Bridge. This red lacquered bridge was built in 1636 and crosses the Daiya River. It is known as one of the nicest bridges in Japan. As we all stood there taking photos, all I could think of as "How can we shoot this differently than the standard photo taken by everyone else?" So I decided to teach everyone who to zoom the lens while shooting a long exposure shot.

This was my favorite image of this experiment. Some people might love it and others may not like it all, but I was happy to get something "different".

I have many more images from this trip to share with you all, and this will be coming in a "part 2" blog post in the next week or so.

We will be returning to Japan next year for another photo tour. If you are interested in going, check out the photo tours page here.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Using the Canon R6 Mark II: My initial thoughts

Thu, 20 Apr 2023 17:50:07 +0200

Most of you know that I switched to all mirrorless cameras about a year ago, mainly using the Canon R6, Canon R5 and the Canon R3 bodies. Everything has been going great with these three camera bodies, but with the release of the Canon R6 MK II, I decided to sell my Canon R6 and switch to the new body.

I have been using the Canon R6 MK II for a while now and wanted to give you my initial thoughts.

Why I wanted to upgrade

First of all, let me tell you why I switched to the new camera. I thought that it would be nice to have the following (in order of importance to me):

* Higher resolution (24.2MP vs 20.1MP)

* Even better auto focus (face and eye detection)

* A faster frame rate (40fps vs 20fps)

I also like to be using the latest and greatest cameras since Canon is always upping their game.

Much like the Canon R6, the image quality is exceptional, capturing great detail, color and clarity. So now I have the same great quality with the increased resolution. This is a good thing, although it is not a massive change going from 20MP to 24MP. In many ways, the newer camera acts and feels like the original R6, but in some ways it is very different. More to come on that later.

Below are some images I captured on the Canon R6 MK II while on our photo tour in Japan last month.

The overall ergonomics and weight of the camera stay the same, which is a good thing since I have had no issues with this on any of the Canon mirrorless cameras (other than the original Canon R with the touch bar).

I have been blown away with how good the subject and eye detection has been on the recent Canon mirrorless cameras, and heard that with the R6 MK II, it was even better. When selecting the subject to detect, there is now a menu option for "Auto" which I assumed would save me jumping between "people" and "animals", which I do fairly frequently since I use the camera for local events and photo tours. But so far I have found that choosing my subject type manually (like with the Canon R6) gives me better results. There is also an option for the eye detection which lets me choose "Auto", "Right eye" or "Left eye". I am not sure why I would ever use this, since I almost always want to focus on the eye that is closest to me, not caring which side that is. Auto does a great job and I just leave that as my default.

The faster frame rate is a nice to have, but not a real selling point for me, since I rarely use the highest frame rate of my Canon R3 (other than to capture fast action in sports). But...if I am going to capture fast action, I will still default to the R3. The typical photographer would never need 40 fps, but I guess it is nice to have that option for sports of wildlife photography. The only drawback of 40fps, is having to go through so many similar images in post production.

I know that there are many improvements when shooting video with the Canon R6 MK II, but since I am primarily a still shooter, I will leave that to the videographers.

The one change I don't like

Now let me talk about the one "feature" that I do not like on the new Canon R6 MK II. They moved the power switch to the right side of the camera. That may not sound like a big deal, but to us photographers who have gotten used to all the buttons and dials, this is a real pain. Not only did they move the power switch to the right, there is another switch (almost exactly where the power switch used to be) for selecting still image mode or video mode. I have built up many years of muscle memory, and have used the wrong switch countless times in the last month. It is really frustrating. When I am using the Canon R6 MK II in combination with the Canon R3 (where the power is on the back of the camera) it is less confusing. When using the Canon R6 MK II in combination with the Canon R5, I have to consciously remember which camera I am using, to make sure I am turning the camera off and not switching to video mode.

Was it worth the upgrade?

The big question I ask myself is: Was it really worth upgrading from the Canon R6 to the Canon R6 MK II? And the answer is a little convoluted. I really love the camera and the images look awesome, but this was true from the R6. The increased resolution is nice to have, but not a massive difference. I have yet to use the burst rate of 40fps, so that is not a factor. Lastly, the auto focus is excellent, but again, it was excellent in the original. So it comes down to the cost. I was able to sell my R6 and purchase the new R6 MK II for a net difference of about $400. I think it is worth that to be using the latest and greatest. If you are looking to upgrade from a DSLR camera or an older Canon R, either camera would be a great addition to your camera bag. I think the big difference will come down to budget. If you are willing to pay $500 more for the newest model, then the Canon R6 MK II is your camera. If you are on a tighter budget, the original Canon R6 will cost less and is still is a great choice, while they are still offered.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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The baboons and monkeys in Tanzania: Always fun to photograph

Thu, 06 Apr 2023 19:28:51 +0200

In the last blog post I talked about the flamingos in Africa. Today's post is all about the baboons and monkeys in Tanzania. We actually saw fewer baboons and monkeys than on our typical safaris in the region, but the sightings were great nonetheless. And I was able to photograph two new species I had never seen before.

These first images are of the baboons.

Whenever we take guests to Tanzania, the baby animals are a highlight. It doesn't matter what animal we are watching, the youngsters always get the most attention and the most photographs. For me personally, I love capturing the interaction between the baby baboons and the adults. There is SO much personality in the youngsters! They climb all over the adults, on the backs, hang under their bellies, and will hop a ride any chance they can get.

When we are with a large pack of baboon, I try to point out the most active youngsters so that people get nice photos of them. Part of that is waiting to get the animals in the right location and best light. In this case, we had overcast skies (neutral light) and the baboons moved into a clearing. Time to fire away!

As we were driving up the outside of the Ngorongoro Crater, we came across some baboons on the raised side of the road. It was perfect because they ended up being right at our eye level. I saw this one youngster feeding in front of us and liked the concentration and catch light in it's eyes.

Believe it or not, all the rest of these photos were taken on our last day in Tanzania. We were staying at one of my favorite places, spending the bulk of the day relaxing and keying down from almost two weeks of go, go, go. I have seen smaller monkeys in this area but this was my first time seeing the White throated monkey.

Even though I had taken tens of thousands of photos on the trip, and you think I might be shot out at this point, I could not help myself. I really wanted photos of these monkeys!

Just like with the baboons, I was mostly keying in on the youngsters. I took this photo right outside my room. I shot it vertically to show the length of the adult's tail, but also felt that it did not show enough of the monkey's faces.

This is a crop of the above image. Because I was shooting with the Canon R5 (using the Canon RF100-500mm lens) with a lot of resolution, I could crop in and still have a ton of detail. You can see a lot more of both monkey's eyes in this version. I really like this image...

As always, I am always looking for action and reaction. This monkey was grabbing it's own tail while calling out to the others.

This little one was playing with it's tail while hanging out in a tree. Really cute.

I was just about done photographing the white throated monkeys when I saw this little one looking right at me, in between the leafs of a nearby tree. It was in perfect light. Gotta get that!

Seeing the Colobus monkey was another first for me. I was totally captivated by the long white tails on these monkeys. They stayed pretty high in the trees, making it a pretty difficult shot to get.

This was one of the last photos I took on this last trip to Tanzania, and I really love it because I saw something new and different. That is the best part of going on safari. No matter how many times one goes, there is always something new to photograph.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Flamingos in Africa? Absolutely!

Sat, 25 Mar 2023 14:12:38 +0200

When people think of animals in Africa, flamingos are probably not the first thing that comes to mind. But I have made numerous visits to Tanzania and Namibia and literally seen tens of thousands of these amazing birds. On our recent photo tour to Tanzania, I saw more flamingos than I have ever seen there before. There were many parts of the lake that were turned pink by the saturation of birds along the waters edge.

I am excited to share this experience with you all.

We had our guides drive us close to the shoreline so that we could isolate certain birds. I was shooting with the Canon R5 and the RF100-500mm lens. I suggested that our guests set their cameras to ISO 400 to get a fast shutter speed (1/1600) to capture the birds as they moved. The flamingo run along the top of the water before they lift off, leaving a great trail behind them. This makes for a great photo!

We all took photos of the birds in flight. I suggested that everyone try to get images when the birds were flying low, out of the bright sky and using the stationary birds as a background.

We watched these 5 birds as they pranced along the shore right in front of us. The way that they were walking in unison reminded me of ballet dancers.

After shooting a lot of images of the flamingos, I thought it was time to challenge some of our tour guests. I suggested that they lower their ISO to 50 and roll their aperture to f/14 and try panning along with the birds. It is not easy to get the birds sharp when shooting at 500mm and 1/60 sec, but the results are really nice!

For this photo, I rolled my exposure compensation to +1 and panned along with the fast moving flamingos. This created a high-key shot (extra bright) and further blurred the background.

A couple of days later, we took a hot air balloon ride over the Serengeti. I was hoping that we would see some of the lake as we floated across the plains, and our pilot did not disappoint us. He was able to take us over the lake numerous times (riding different air currents) and at altitudes ranging from 800 feet to 5 feet. All those dots are flamingos in the lake from high above.

I was using my Tiffen Circular Polarizing filter, which really helped get nice reflection shots off the water.

As you can see, this was taken at a very low altitude.

There were 5 balloons in the air that morning, which allowed us to get nice images of the other balloons in our photos.

As our pilot lifted us to a high altitude for the last time, we looked down and saw these lines in the lake. At first we had no idea what we were seeing. Then we realized that these lines were caused by the flamingos as they moved across the water, cutting lines in the algae along the surface. I pointed the camera straight down and caught this image to share with all of you. (You can also see the shadow of our balloon mid way into the frame.)

It was just one more amazing African experience for myself and the others, and one that I will never forget!

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Photographing lions on safari in Tanzania, Africa

Thu, 16 Mar 2023 17:58:11 +0200

On our recent safari in Tanzania, we were treated to many lion sitings. It is not uncommon to see these majestic cats in the wild, but the real treat was to see them in so many different situations.

One of our first lion sitings occurred when we were in the Ngorongoro crater, but they were pretty far from us and you can not drive off-road in the crater to closer. The same day that we left the crater, we drove to my favorite area of Tanzania, an area called Ndutu. In this area, we can drive off-road. This means that if we see a lion in a tree, we can drive right to the tree to get a nice photo. Within minutes of entering Ndutu we saw this lioness resting up in a tree. Our photo tour guests were really excited to get photos of her as she moved from branch to branch.

Also in Ndutu, we watched as some of the lions stopped for a drink. The one above appears to be pregnant, or possibly just have a very full belly.

Here is another female drinking.

My goal is to get our vehicles in the best position to photograph the wildlife. We saw this one lioness walking in our direction. Our guide quickly moved so that we could get a nice photo of her with sunlight on her and the tall grass in the background.

The same lioness that you saw walking in the previous photo decided to plop down and take a rest very near our vehicle. I wanted to get a photo from a low angle, so I used the reciprocating screen of the Canon R5 (with the Canon RF100-500mm lens mounted to the camera) to lower the camera outside of the vehicle as low to the ground as I could and fire off some shots a couple of feet off the ground.

In the same pride of lions, there was this one male...

The female was not very happy with the male! I was really happy to capture the emotion in the female, but did not expect the male to jump out of the frame. Arghhhh! This would have been so much better if we saw the whole male.

If you have been on safari before, you may know that there is a whole ritual with the mating process. I told all of our guests what to expect and we all had fun capturing the interactions between the male and females. At this particular moment, I think the female startled the male.

And in this shot, I think the second female startled the first female.

They were likely fighting for dominance.

The mating process is always interesting. The entire process happens in about 20 seconds, and it is repeated about every 20 minutes, sometimes for as long as a week. The male lion almost always looks angry and the female typically looks bored. Many times after completion, the female will snap back at the male before turning over on her back. She turns onto her back to help the fertilization process (since the lioness' fallopian tubes are curved).

Towards the end of one of our days, we came across the partial remains of a wildebeest, and heard that a lioness was close by. At one point she popped our of the bushes and I grabbed this photo of her perfectly framed in the brush. I love the way that her golden body is in contrast to the dark background.

She started walking away and our guide made another mad dash for a "straight-on' position. He guessed perfectly and we had a shot of her coming right at us. As she walked towards us, she gave us this big yawn. We loved that!

The following morning we were driving along the waters edge when we spotted this large male lion who was resting by the water. I encouraged our guests to shoot an image of the lion, but to take it wide enough to show all the zebra on high alert in the background. This shows the way that the animals coexist in the wild. (Almost everyone on our trip was using a Canon R5 or Canon R6 with the Canon RF100-500mm lens. This lens is great because, with the same lens, you can shoot tight or wide). They either owned the gear or borrowed it from my contacts at Canon CPS (for free I should add).

Towards the end of our trip, we were driving in the Serengeti when our guide saw these two male brothers hiding under a small tree. We waited for about 20 minutes to see if they would move.

Waiting while on safari is a very good thing. Not only do things change in an instant, but it also gives us a good chance to capture portraits like this one.

Both of the brothers got up and started walking towards the copis (rock outcroppings). Figuring that they were heading towards the rocks, we moved our vehicle to follow their path. I loved this scene, with the big male lion surrounded by the endless tall grass of the Serengeti.

Once the large male made it to the rock area, he turned around to check out our vehicles. I love this shot with the curve of the tail and the interesting background.

Just before walking behind the rocks and mostly out of sight, he turned and looked right at us. Many people ask me if I am ever scared while on safari and the answer is always "no". These big cats, although incredibly powerful and dangerous, do not see us as food. They are accustomed to the safari vehicles and usually use the shade of the vehicle to cool down. Would I get out of the vehicle? No way! But we always feel safe and love getting great photos of these big cats.

By the way, I just added a bunch of new photo tours to my web site. These include future trips to Africa, Greece, Indochina, Costa Rica... You can find those here.

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Photo retouching - making a good photo much better!

Sat, 04 Mar 2023 21:57:53 +0200

My last blog post was written and posted from London, during a long layover on my way to Africa. We just completed the amazing photo tour in Tanzania and now I am writing this blog post while on another layover, this time in Ethiopia.

After shooting more than 300GB of images in the last 12 days, I have started working on the culling (using Photo Mechanic) and retouching (using Adobe Photoshop). As I was working on this process, I thought that I would show you my finished image and the original, to give you an idea of what I do to complete an image. Regardless with what camera you use, or even the photo retouching software you use, these tips should be helpful to you. At least I hope so!

Let's jump right in.

On one of our slower days on safari, we decided to work on the art of capturing birds in flight. We continually chased the Lilac-breasted rollers, waiting for them to take off, and hoping to grab some nice photos. This shot was taken at 1/5000 sec using the Canon R5 camera with the Canon RF100-500mm lens. The subject tracking is SO GOOD, that it really helped me and our photo tour guests capture some killer images. But, if you see the original below, the image needed cropping, and some adjustments to the white balance, tiny, color saturation and contrast. What a difference this makes!

At one point, one of our vehicles got a flat tire. While our guides were changing the tire, we were surrounded by the local Masai people. This was an awesome time to do portraits of them. I love this photo of a local Masai boy, but there was a rock at the bottom of the frame. Using Photoshop's clone tool, I was able to remove the distraction of the rock and make a better portrait.

One of the things that we look for when photographing the large cats in Africa is the yawns and good facial expressions. The lioness looks ferocious in this photo, but it is simply a yawn. I knew as soon as I took it, that it would make a nice photo, but I needed to crop in and makes subtle changes to the exposure, shadows and highlights to really finish it off. You can see how the tighter crop and other adjustments really brings the photo to life.

This photo was one of the most difficult of the trip. We were parked off to the side of a kill, photographing the vultures as they continually flew down to feed. After taking countless images of the birds in flight, I figured it was time to try something different (and teach our guests some new tricks). I changed my camera settings (from ISO 1000, f/7.1) to ISO 100 with an aperture of f/11. This now gave me a shutter speed of 1/200 sec. I followed the vultures with my lens as they flew down and motion panned them. I captured this photo and loved the motion in the wings with the face being tack sharp. Using the resolution of the Canon R5 camera, I was able to crop in on the photo to highlight the details of the head and the motion everywhere else, with plenty of resolution to spare. Comparing the retouched image to the original, you will see that I also made adjustments to the exposure to brighten the bird and background.

I took this photo this morning, before packing up and heading to the airport. This monkey was just outside my room and screaming for a photo. I was captured by the orange eyes, but needed to make minor adjustments to bring out the eyes. I used Photoshop to select the subject and then increased the exposure and made adjustments to the shadows slider to lessen the dark shadows. These changes were less obvious but still needed to complete the shot.

This last shot is one of my favorites from the trip. We were done photographing the wildlife for the day, and heading back to our tent lodge for the night. We saw some color in the sky and I asked my guide to drive to a spot with a good acacia tree in the foreground. At that point the setting sun was behind the clouds and we thought we would just get a little color in the background, but no actual sunset. One of photo tour guests who was in the car with me, said "I think the sun is starting to show." And sure enough, the sun made a full appearance in the perfect spot. We took many photos as the sun appeared and then dropped below the horizon, and I honestly did not think they would yield much. But after seeing the original and then playing with it in Photoshop, it blew me away. I increased the exposure a bit (since I was shooting at -1.7 exposure comp to protect the highlights), brought up the shadows to show the colors in the sky and show some of the animals at the bottom of the frame (even though they are hard to see here). I darkened the highlights to accentuate the colors in the sun, and added saturation to try and match what we saw when taking the photo. Once again, minor tweaks that make a big difference!

I hope that these examples will help you with your photo retouching, and take your good photos to great!

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
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If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

On my way to Tanzania again!

Mon, 20 Feb 2023 19:02:26 +0200

I am writing this blog from Heathrow airport in London, about halfway to our final destination in Africa. As many of you know, Tanzania is one of my favorite places in the world, and definitely an amazing place to photograph wildlife. As I sit here in the airport lounge, a little bleary-eyed from lack of sleep, I started looking back at some of my favorite images from my previous trips to Tanzania. I thought I would share some of those with you now.

The following images are in chronological order.

We came across these two elephants grazing amongst the acacia trees, and it was an overcast morning. The muted light really helped to make this such a cool photo.

On my first visit to the hippo pool in the Serengeti, there was a lot of running water and a lot of activity amongst these large animals. It is always fun to wait for the big opening of their mouths and then getting shots like this.

This is one of the most difficult photos I have taken in Tanzania. This motion pan was taken at 1/30th sec, with me hand holding a Canon 200-400mm lens.

Photographing elephants is always incredible, but catching them with their youngsters is even better!

This group of elephants with nice big tusks, came right towards our vehicle. The bright blue sky in the background worked well for this scenic photo.

I have seen lions hanging out in trees before, but this was the first time I saw more than 12 lions in one tree. It was an epic moment!

Did I mention how much I like the baby elephants? :)

We see a lot of baboons on our safaris. This one was hanging out next to the parking area where we stopped before entering the Ngorongoro crater. It wasn't until I was reviewing my mages that evening that I noticed the perfect symmetry of this baboon.

In that same location, we witnessed this beautiful moment between mother and baby.

On this particular day, we came across a herd of elephant crossing the plains of the Serengeti. These two youngsters stopped and were sparring for quite a long time. I love the interaction between them.

I remember this moment so well. It was the end of the day and we had a little bit of sunlight left. We looked for some big cats to capture and did not find any, so we decided to stop and photograph these young baboons playing the trees.

This photo was taken on the way to the air strip, before we took off to our next location. We always leave early in case we spot something good, and that day we definitely did. There were at least 3 generations of lion together in this spot.

Photographing the spotted cats is on the top of my list at every safari. On this afternoon we followed this leopard for at lest an hour. It stopped on this rock and took a rest. I had our guide move the vehicle so we would have a great background far in the distance. Just after we moved, it looked up into the light rain and yawned. We all fired off a ton of photos at this moment.

During the Great Migration, millions of wildebeest cross the Mara river. It is not uncommon for the crocodiles to try and score some lunch during the crossings. This giant croc lunged for the wildebeests but missed catching any of them. At this point they started jumping over the crocodile to get out of harms way. We were all shooting and cheering at the same time. It was such an awesome moment!

Before the lions grow up to be the kings of the jungle, they start looking like this. Honestly, there is nothing cuter than cubs in the wild.

This photo was taken on our last safari. We had been out photographing all day and were heading back to our camp as the sun was setting. I asked our guide to wait in this spot to get the acacia tree silhouetted in front of the setting sun. I then saw that one of our other vehicles was heading towards the tree and prepared everyone in my vehicle to capture this scene.

Also from our last safari, this lioness had been feeding on a zebra carcass, when she got up and started walking towards us. The late afternoon sun was right into her eyes and made this shot that much better.

It will take us a day to get to Tanzania, but on Wednesday we will start the hunt for the next favorite images. For this trip I am bringing the following gear:

* Canon R5 camera

* Canon R6 camera

* Canon 200-400mm lens (with RF-EF adaptor)

* Canon RF100-500mm lens

* Canon RF24-105mm lens

* Lots of ProGrade Digital memory cards

* Apple 16" MacBook Pro

* Crucial 4TB x8 SSDs

I look forward to capturing more images and sharing those with you soon!

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Goodbye Drobo, Hello QNAP - My new data storage solution!

Tue, 07 Feb 2023 18:29:28 +0200

As you can imagine, the process of transferring all of my data from one hard drive system to another is a daunting task, and not one I looked forward to. But...about 6 months ago I got a letter in the mail stating that Drobo was going bankrupt, just as my trusted Drobo 8D was crashing every 6 hours or so. This drive has EVERY digital photo I have taken since 1990. I was also using two of the Drobo 810n NAS drives to remotely backup my data more than a hundred miles from my house. These stopped working correctly as well.

It was panic time!

I tried reaching out to my contacts at Drobo, and they did whatever they could to try and fix the issues, but the writing was on the wall. I needed to investigate new NAS solutions and do it quickly!

I was doing a workflow presentation for B&H, and as part of that I mentioned my dilemma. I said that if anyone out there knew of a good replacement solution to let me know. I received numerous emails from listeners and one of them mentioned QNAP. I really did not know know much about QNAP, but looked at their website and saw the solutions they offered.

I reached out to their support people and peppered them with questions.

I wanted to know about:

* The speed of their devices

* Remote synchronization abilities

* Remote access from anywhere in the world

* Over the air synch of data from my phone

* Management utilities and options

The answers I got were really encouraging. They had really great hardware, remote synchronization options and a lot more. I then reached out to their corporate marketing people to learn more.

As it turned out, they are located in Southern California, and I was scheduled to be down near their offices last December. A meeting was set up and I met them to get even more information, and to see their products in more detail. This time I was totally blown away. I brought a long list of features that I required and another list of features I had long wanted from Drobo. QNAP was able to deliver on all of them!

Fast forward a couple of months and I am now moving ALL of my data to the QNAP TVS-h874 NAS drive, which is populated with 8 of the Seagate IronWolf 20TB hard drives. Yep, this will give me more than 100TB of storage, even set up in Raid 6 (which means all my data is safe even if two drives fail at the same time).

I have been moving the data (literally millions of images) from my old Drobo 8D to the QNAP drive over the last 5 days, and I am almost done. I hope to have everything on the QNAP by the end of tomorrow. Then my plan is to replicate everything from the TVS-h874 NAS drive to the TS-832PX NAS drive (which has 8 of the 16TB Seagate IronWolf drives in it). This second box is the one that will be placed offsite. I want to get all the data on the second drive here locally so that I am not trying to remotely synchronize all this data over the Internet. Once I get everything copied to the second drive, then I will set it up for nightly synchronization from my location to the location in far from here.

I have yet to set up everything, but I wanted to let all of your Drobo users out there, that there is a great alternate solution. Not only does it do what Drobo did, it also happens to be way more powerful, have a ton more features, and a substantially better user interface.

This is what the web-based user interface looks like. I have yet to dive into all of these options yet, but I will report back once I am fully up and running.

I have tried accessing files on the TVS-hx74 NAS drive while traveling and it is amazing how much faster and easier it is than using the Drobo. What used to take 10 minutes can now be done in 1 minute. I love that!

Stay tuned for more information on my data transition. I am sure there is a lot more information to come.

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

The amazing birds of Costa Rica: How to photograph them!

Fri, 27 Jan 2023 01:11:50 +0200

In the last couple of months I have made a couple of trips down to Costa Rica. One was my normal photo tour with a group of 12 people and the other was a private trip for a client. On both occasions, I made visits to the rain forest and the cloud forest. During these trips we captured photos of monkeys, sloths, frogs and lots of birds. I thought I would write a blog post specifically on the birds this week, showing you some images and giving you tips on photographing these fast moving animals.

Let's start with the hummingbirds.

Photographing hummingbirds is a challenge! They move so fast that, many times when you finally get the focus to lock in on them, they are gone. Using the Canon mirrorless cameras definitely makes things easier, since the subject detection often locks in faster than I could do with a single focus point. But even with that, it is still a frustrating experience, especially for a novice shooter. For these photos I was using the Canon R5 camera with the Canon RF100-500mm lens.

One way to capture hummingbirds is to pick a flower where they are frequenting, prefocus on that flower and wait for the hummingbird to come back for more nectar. I had my shutter speed at 1/400 sec to show the movement in the wings.

Of course, it is easier to photograph these little birds when they are not in flight. They do tend to return to a favorite perch in between flights.

What is most amazing is how much the color varies on their bodies with a slight turn of their heads or bodies. I would wait for the colors to be brightest and then fire off a bunch of shots.

It is difficult to predict when the hummingbirds will leave the perch, since they give almost no indication of their movement, but it is cool to capture them as they fly off. For this shot, I tried to predict when the bird would fly off and hit the shutter button. When photographing birds, it is definitely handy to shoot in burst mode (preferably at least 5 frames per second).

I will vary the speed of my shutter to capture the wings more "frozen" and to show blur. In this photo, I had the shutter speed at 1/1000 sec.

I love capturing the hummingbirds with their tongues sticking out. This is not something I see when I am shooting (because it happens so fast), but since I am shooting in burst mode, I will ultimately find some of these images when I am culling through them on my computer.

There are a lot of little things happening that most of do not notice with these little birds. In this shot you will notice that the hummingbird is fluffing out the blue feathers by its face. So pretty!

At one point, the rain started coming down and I thought it would be cool to slow the shutter speed of the camera to show the motion of the rain. I set my shutter speed to 1/400 sec, followed this hummer and caught it hovering right in front of me. I was hoping to get some rain drops being displaced by the wings of the bird.

For this shot, I slowed the shutter speed to 1/200 sec to try and get longer streaks with the rain drops.

More colors, this time in the rain.

Finally, after a lot of photos, I captured the water drops bouncing off of a hummingbird. This time off of its head, and I love that! (This was taken at 1/400 sec).

Now for some of the other amazing birds in the region...

I have been to Costa Rica so many times and never get tired of photographing the Scarlet Macaw.

The colors on these birds is just mind boggling.

They fly around and make very loud screeching sounds, which I take as a challenge to find them and photograph them.

It is hard to capture the Macaw in flight, especially with a good background. This shot shows the bird with a blue sky behind it...

...and here with some of the foliage in the background.

From the same location I caught this Macaw flying right at me. If you are planning on photographing birds in flight, you want to get a shutter speed at a minimum of 1/2000 sec (and ideally at 1/3000 sec). This photo was taken with the Canon R3 at ISO 3200 to get a shutter speed of 1/2000 sec.

This is a photo of the Chestnut-mandibled Toucan, which are pretty common in the rain forest where I lead my photo tours. They are often high in the trees looking for nuts, but we do see them down low. I always teach my guests to move their position to get the best background behind the bird. My goal is to get the bird without any hot spots "bright white" in the background as they create a distraction from the subject.

I was lucky enough to catch this Mealy Parrot as it flew above us. This was actually captured with a shutter speed of 1/6400 of a second, since I had a little more ambient light to work with.

In the last couple of trips we have been lucky enough to capture great images of the Fiery-billed Aracari at a local feeder.

Thank goodness for Dennis (my guide) who can spot just about anything in any place. He saw this Lineated Woodpecker high in the tree above us. I had my guests move to get the best background possible and get a shot like this.

Here is a Common Hawk who decided to fly away within seconds of us getting out of the vehicle to photograph him. How rude! :)

On the recent private trip, we visited a new place. It was a home which had bird feeders surrounding the entire back deck. This made for a perfect place to photograph some really interesting bird species, like this Blue Crowned Motmot.

Look at the amazing patterns on this Speckled Tanager.

I saw these two Palm Tanagers squawking at each other and fired off a bunch of images, looking for one like this, where they both had their mouths open at the same time. Again, this is where having your camera in burst mode is advantageous.

Lastly, I am excited to share images of the ever elusive Resplendent Quetzal.

In both of the last two trips to Costa Rica, I visited a location where these Quetzal are frequently seen. It is high in the cloud forest, at an altitude of more than 11,000 feet. Trust me, it is A LOT colder than the rain forest. On both visits, we were lucky enough to get some nice photos.

This photo is from the first visit, where we saw a male quetzal with a medium sized tail.

This is the same male with a nut in his mouth. This is one of my favorite photos.

These last three photos were taken on the recent private trip to the cloud forest. We got up before 5am and headed to the viewing spot, hoping to catch the birds in neutral light. On this visit we saw this awesome male with two long tail feathers.

The morning light was only good for an hour or two and then the backgrounds were too bright for nice photos. We took a break for lunch (and a nap) before heading back to try again in the afternoon. This time we saw this female as she flew from one perch to another. Hoping to catch her in flight, I cranked my ISO up to 6400 on the Canon R3 (giving me a shutter speed of 1/3200 sec) and was happy to grab this shot.

...and this one too. I love the position of her wings, but just wish I could see some of the red feathers in her back end.

I have always wanted a photo of a male quetzal in flight, and this was the first time I was able to capture such an image!

I hope you enjoyed the photos, and I hope that you all have a chance to join me on my of my trips to Costa Rica. Most of the 2023 trips are sold out (or close to being sold out), but I just announced 2024 dates which are wide open at this time. You can find them on my photo tour page HERE.

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Cambodia Photo Tour: Ta Prohm Temple (location of Tomb Raider) and an amazing floating village

Tue, 10 Jan 2023 01:52:07 +0200

On this last blog post from our Indochina trip, I will show you some of my favorite images of the places and people in Cambodia.

As you saw from the last blog post, we made the bucket list visit to photograph Angkor Wat both at sunrise and during the day. But, as it turns out, there was a lot more to see in the area. On one of our days in the country we visited the ancient temple of Ta Prohm, which is an amazing site to photograph. This temple has been overtaken by the trees of the area, but luckily the people of this region have decided to let it be and not intervene. The resulting views are breathtaking.

We had overcast weather on the day that we visited Ta Prohm, which was perfect for photography. No harsh light and shadows to deal with. For this visit, I was using my Canon R6 camera with the Canon RF 15-35mm lens. I chose the wide lens knowing that we would be in tight quarters. This wide lens let me capture photos like this, showing the immense tree growth and how the roots of the tree have integrated with the stonework since the 12th and 13th century.

As much as I looked forward to seeing Angkor Wat, I actually enjoyed photographing Ta Prohm even more. There were amazing views at every turn!

Just like our visit to Angkor Wat, we did not have tons of other visitors to deal with, which made for really clean images.

I loved the different colors in the stone.

You may recognize this spot, as it is featured in the Tomb Raider movie. The place is a big maze, so it really helps to have someone who knows the area to get you to the best photo locations. Mike and our guide have been here many times and knew exactly where to go for the best photos.

As I mentioned earlier, there were photos at every turn.

I was taking the photo above this one when the sun peeked out, and came through a back doorway and lit this one stone inside this room. It reminded me of something out of a movie, where the tomb hunter gets a sign of where the next clue might be.

I saw this one tree reaching for the skies and thought that it would be fun to point the wide angle lens up to get this perspective.

I always tell our photo tour guests to have a subject in their photos. In this case, my subject was the tree in the middle of the scene, with the surrounding building as a supporting subject.

We gave everyone ample time to photograph this spot, but I could have stayed even longer. I look forward to our next visit to capture more of Ta Prohm.

I also would like to share images of the Cambodian people.

We hired this young lady to model for our guests. Mike and I picked a nice location for the background and we all had a blast capturing her in her traditional dance outfit. For this outing and the ones to follow, I switched lenses to the Canon RF 70-200mm lens. This is my favorite portrait lens because of the clarity and the ability to shoot at f/2.8 and get great separation between my subjects and background.

We made a visit to a local monastery to watch the munks in their daily rituals.

We asked these two if they would pray for us in this one location, since it was really beautiful.

I encouraged our guests to photograph them from different angles, giving a very different background and look.

As we were getting ready to leave the monastery, I saw this row of statues and I took a photo. Then I saw this young boy coming up this walkway in front of the statues and I quickly raised my camera and fired a bunch of frames as he approached. Having the boy in the frame makes for a much better photo, in my opinion.

One evening, we attended a dinner show. I did not take a ton of photos at the performance, choosing to just relax and enjoy the moment more than shoot images. But, I still had the bug to get a couple of nice photos.

These next photos are from our boat tour of a floating village in Cambodia.

We were totally captivated by the people, young and old, living in these floating homes.

This young man was being taken to the floating school.

It was fascinating to watch the pet dogs, who also lived in the floating houses, as they moved between the homes and boats. Small quarters, but they seemed happy.

We loved the colors that people were wearing.

This shows the inside of this mans' floating home.

This woman had SO much character in her face. I love everything about this photo, her face, the pose, the hammock seat...

We saw this young man watching us from his window, and had to capture that smile.

As we cruised through the floating village, we could not stop taking photos. The people and their unique lifestyles were so incredible.

I saw this young man bailing water out of his boat. Keeping my camera in a burst mode (which I always do), I took numerous frames to get that exact moment when the water was being tossed out.

This older man is WAY more flexible than I will ever be!

Here is a photo of the floating school...

...and some of the children in class.

At one point we were floating along taking photos, when we saw these two ladies up on their roof. We did not understand what they were doing up there until our guide explained that they were drying fish in the sunlight. I zoomed the Canon RF20-700mm lens all the way to 200mm and sure enough, that is what they were doing.

We made a couple of loops through the floating village in order to see all of the different water ways. As we left the village, we saw this boat coming up on us. I grabbed this shot to show the young boy resting on the bow, but also to show the floating homes in the background. This one photo seemed to tell a whole story in itself.

I hope that you enjoyed the photos and stories from this amazing trip. It was my first time going to Vietnam and Cambodia, but will definitely not be the last. Yes, there were endless photo opportunities, but more importantly, it was such a treat to see and meet the people from these remote countries.

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Cambodia Photo Tour: My first time to Angkor Wat

Wed, 28 Dec 2022 21:25:36 +0200

Holy cow, it has been almost three weeks since I have posted to the blog. I guess it is just that time of the year when everyone wants family portraits, and all those people I photographed throughout the year are ordering their digital images for holiday cards. All of that and a little time off for me too.

But alas, I am back at the computer to do something other than photo retouching.

In today's blog post, I will take you along with me to Cambodia. You get to see all the sites that we saw, but without the jet lag!

Our photo tour group departed Vietnam and arrived at the Siem Reap airport for our first steps in Cambodia. We were all excited to be so close to the ancient temple of Angkor Wat, with high expectations for the coming days.

I am not an early morning person, but Mike (the owner of M&M Photo Tours, and my partner on most of my trips) set a very early meeting time for our first full day in the country. We were going to leave the hotel at 4am and make our way in darkness to Angkor Wat for sunrise. Even though the tourist numbers were lower than normal (due to the pandemic), we wanted to make sure that we had a clear shot of the temple across the water as the sun rose. That next morning we walked through complete darkness with our flashlights in hand, got to the waters edge, set up our tripods and waited.

At approximately 5:15am we could start to see the shape of the temple, and we started taking photos. I took this photo at 5:40am, before the sun rose above the horizon. For this shot I was using the Canon R5 with the Canon RF24-105mm lens. The colors were gorgeous, the reflection just right, and the silhouette was iconic. All of us were excited to see what we had captured in our cameras. This was a photo I had dreamed of for many years!

At 6:30am, we packed up our tripods and waited for the sun to light the surroundings so that we could tour the complex.

It did not take long for the darkness to change to light, and we all scattered to photograph the largest religious monument in the world.

Being at Angkor Wat towards the end of the pandemic did allow us to get clean photos without throngs of tourists.

I was totally blown away as I walked around and saw endless details in the stone.

It was amazing to see how all of this artwork has survived since the 12th century.

With over 400 acres to survey, the photo opportunities were endless.

This photo was taken in the back of the temple. We had set a meeting time and I arrived at that location a little early so that I could get some photos from this perspective before exiting.

I had some time to walk around the back of the temple, and saw this one flowering plant growing in the grass, and decided to use that to capture a different view of Angkor Wat. I took a couple of photos using the plant as my subject and the temple as a supporting subject, and then noticed a dragonfly that was flying amongst the flowers. It kept coming back to the same flower, so I thought it would make for a nice photo opportunity.

I switched to my other camera which was the Canon R6 which has the Canon RF70-200mm lens, and zoomed all the way to 200mm. I got down low and waited for the dragonfly to stop. I shifted my position so that I would have a good background and got this shot. I loved the way that the colors of the dragonfly were in contrast to the purple flowers. This dragonfly was so predictable that I notified our other guests about this shot, and they all took turns photographing it.

A couple of days later we made another visit to Angkor Wat in the later part of the afternoon. This time our goal was to get photos of the temple with the golden hour light on the front of the buildings. As we approached the complex once again, this time entering in daylight, we saw a couple having their engagement photos taken. I asked if we could take some photos of them as well.

Their photographers were really nice to let us step in for some photos. As we were shooting, they were checking out (and very jealous of) our newer Canon mirrorless cameras.

I saw these 4 monks who were walking the property and asked them if they would let us take their photo. Once they agreed, I walked them over to the spot you see here, knowing that this would give us a nice reflection in the water. As soon as I took this photo, I knew that this would be one of my favorites from the trip.

After taking the photo of the monks, I asked this young lady if she would do the same thing for us. This is not a hired model, just a young lady who was there with friends. I love that she helped us capture another favorite photo!

This was my first trip to this amazing country and surely it will not be my last. Mike and I will surely be doing this trip again in 2024. If you are looking to join us in Asia sooner, we are heading to Japan in March and have a couple more spots available.

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If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
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Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Vietnam Photo Tour: Cao Dai Temple and the Floating Markets

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 23:24:01 +0200

Towards the end of our visit to Vietnam, we made a visit to the Cao Dai Temple. This building is very colorful and is one of the most visited tourist sites in Vietnam. It is the home of the Cao Dai which is a religion that combines Buddhism, Christianity, Taoism and Confucianism.

We arrived just before noon, in between two ceremonies. They actually have four ceremonies a day, starting from 6am all the way until midnight.

Since the ceremony had yet to start, we walked around the outside of the building to capture the unique architecture. We had to wait outside until the temple was officially opened for visitors (who are restricted to view from the inner doorways).

Once the ceremony began, we had a great view of the amazing inside of the Cao Dai Temple. I decided to use my Canon R5 and Canon RF24-105mm lens for my wide shots.

The ceremony lasts for quite a long time, giving us ample time to photograph the people and the details of the architecture. I encouraged our tour guests to not only photograph the people, but to try different photography techniques to show this in unique ways. Here I focused on the nearby column, letting the people go out of focus. I used my Canon R6 and Canon RF70-200mm lens for tighter shots like this.

I really loved the bright colors and repeating patterns inside the Temple.

All the men and women in attendance wore white, and they were segregated to separate sides of the temple. Also, their sitting positions were determined by their levels of spiritual attainment, lower levels in back and higher levels up front. The priests wore the bright colors. Each of the colors represents a different religion - yellow for Buddhist, blue for Taoist, and red for Confucian. (Thanks to Susie J - one of our guests - for researching this and allowing me to steal that info to share with you all).

I used selective focus and a narrow aperture to focus primarily on the priests in the back of the ceremony.

After the service, we all walked around the grounds to get more photos. I looked for interesting details that caught my eye.

I always look for teaching moments, and this photo is an example of that. I had some of our guests walking around with me and saw that the sun was just over the temple. I showed them how to change the aperture of the camera, move so that the sun is barely visible, and get a starburst effect like this.

Nearby the Cao Dai Temple was a huge Buddah. I saw this reflection in the water and encouraged everyone to get a shot like this. So cool!

The next day, we visited one of the floating markets and what a photography bonanza that was!

As you may have seen from my previous blog post, we loved photographing the people of Vietnam. Watching them work on the floating market was another chance to capture the people in their unique environment. For this day, I decided to use my Canon R6 and the Canon RF70-200mm lens. I did not need the high resolution of the Canon R5 (since I figured I would not need to crop much) and I figured that the reach of the 70-200mm would be perfect for this excursion.

This woman was selling meat from her boat.

This woman was transporting vegetables in front of a floating store.

The following images show the people of the floating market. I will let the photos do the talking for me...

For those wondering, this is a uniquely carved pineapple.

This is the final blog post from our Vietnam tour (even though I have so many more images from this amazing trip). The next blog will share images from our next stop, Cambodia!

I hope you get a chance to see and appreciate my view from different parts of the world. If you would like to join us on a photo tour, you can see the upcoming trips here. We do not have another trip planned to Vietnam and Cambodia yet, but let me know if you want to join us in the future, as I promise we will be doing this again soon. We do have a couple of spots available for my favorite trip - Tanzania in February!

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
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If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Vietnam Photo Tour: The hard working people

Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:02:40 +0200

One of the highlights of our photo tour to Vietnam was the photographing the people from this country. And let me tell you, these people work really hard!

After spending a couple of days on Ha Long Bay, we spent some time in the surrounding area. We came across these women working hard in their fields. You can see the green onions in the foreground and the banana trees in the background.

I was shooting with the Canon R6 with the Canon RF70-200mm lens set at ISO 160 (the cleanest ISO for these cameras) and at f/2.8 to create as much separation between my subject and the background. We watched these ladies watering this large field by hand, filling these water buckets at a nearby watering hole and then walking through the fields. They repeated this over and over. This would be strenuous for a younger person, and I was totally impressed by their strength.

This woman was harvesting the green onions, one bunch at a time.

After harvesting the scallions, she brought them to her husband and another woman who cleaned them and got them ready for sale.

I encouraged everyone to get down low so we could see their faces. For this shot, I decided to focus on the scallions instead of the face.

After photographing the people in the fields, we walked through one of the small towns. We came across this woman who was drying the rice in her courtyard. As I watched her tossing the rice in the air, I mentioned to the group that this would be a great time to slow the shutter of the camera to show the motion of the toss.

Speaking of hard working people, this is a photo I took of Nguyen (our awesome and hard working guide). I saw this curved stairway with the blue doors and thought it would make for a perfect background for portraits. I ended up taking portraits of all of our tour attendees here as well.

One of our guests, Bob P, even took a photo of me in this location.

It was fun to watch these men playing their game.

The people of Vietnam were very friendly and welcoming.

They had no problem with having their photos taken (unlike some other countries where it is discouraged).

This artisan was putting together what was to be an amazing ceramic wall mural.

Being that the country has only been open to visitors for 25 years, we were really impressed by the friendly and welcoming people. A couple of people have asked me how we were received, as Americans in Vietnam. I can tell you that there was absolutely no negative interactions. As our guide told us, the people of Vietnam look forward, not backward.

I hope you enjoyed seeing some of the people of Vietnam.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
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If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Vietnam Photo Tour: Two nights on Ha Long Bay

Thu, 17 Nov 2022 22:02:37 +0200

We were 5 days into our photo tour of Vietnam when we made our way to Ha Long Bay. This was a bucket list location for many of our guests (myself included) and it did not disappoint. We had spectacular weather and the constantly changing views were incredible.

We arrived at Has Long Bay and were taken to our "junk". Let me tell you, this boat was anything but junk. It was awesome!

This was my room on the boat, which was super comfortable. I should have taken a photo of the bathroom, because it was also really nice, and had a porthole window in the shower. The window was always propped open, which save me amazing views while showering. I love that!

As I mentioned, the weather was perfect with temperatures in the mid 80s and a beautiful breeze.

As the boat cruised along slowly through the bay, the photo opportunities of the limestone islands were endless.

I was sitting on the deck of the boat, relaxing and taking in the sites. I saw this ornate carving and thought it was make for a different view of the bay.

On our first night, we were treated to a beautiful sunset. All of us met on the upper deck and took photos. I was using my Canon R6 and the Canon RF24-105mm lens. This was a great chance for me to teach a lesson on exposure compensation and how to properly expose for the sun.

After this we had a lovely dinner on the deck of the boat.

After capturing the sunset, some of our guests were anxious to get up at 5am to capture the sunrise. I am not much of an early riser, but made sure to join them (albeit only for 20 minutes before going back to bed) to see what transpired.

The sun did not present itself like in the evening, but we loved the different layers of rock and color.

Here are some of the other boats that were docked for the evening.

The next day we cruised around for a while and then spent the afternoon on a small private beach. Honestly, I was not sure I would enjoy this, as I have a hard time sitting still for 5 hours. BUT, it turned out to be one of the best parts of the trip.

We swam in the water, took turns kayaking, ate an awesome lunch, and relaxed with this view.

I took my iPhone with me on the kayak and watched this family fishing from their boat.

Our second night treated us to yet another pretty sunset. This is definitely the right time of the year to visit Ha Long Bay. The weather is not stifling hot and the sunsets are better.

On our last day on the bay, we cruised along the different rock formations and just enjoyed the views.

We also visited a floating city.

This man was enjoying his Pho breakfast from his floating home.

I loved the colors of the fishing boats, in contrast to the rocks and greenery of the background.

This last shot was taken by one of our guests. Hans brought his new drone with him and asked me to help him with the setup. After some tweaks, we got him up and running (literally) and he captured this great view of the bay.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Vietnam Photo Tour: An early morning trip to the flower market

Sat, 05 Nov 2022 18:50:13 +0200

After our visit to Sapa (featured on the last blog post), we took an overnight train back to Hanoi. We arrived at the train station bright and early in the morning (5am) and headed directly to the flower market.

The flower market was bustling at this early hour, with all the local vendors purchasing their daily allotments.

And like most of the people in the city, the bulk of these merchant traveled on motorcycles or other small vehicles.

These people could transport a lot of flowers on a motorcycle!

The vendors were very friendly and had no problem with us taking their photos.

The colors and assortment were breathtaking.

I was using a Canon R5 with the Canon RF 70-200mm lens. This allowed me to take wide shots and come in close.

This was the first time that I have ever seen flowers boxed like this.

Everywhere we turned there was another booth bursting in colors.

Of all the booths at this market, and there were tons of them, this one was my favorite.

I was blown away by these beautiful arrangements. I asked how much one of these would cost, and was shocked that they were less than $20. I wish I could get this quality and price at home!

This woman was working endlessly to keep her booth refilled.

Amazing, right?

Even though we had spread out across this market, I had a bunch of our photo tour guests with me when photographing this booth. I taught them to shoot wide (like you saw before), but also to get in tight and shoot detail shots like this. I loved the water that was on the rose pedals, and wanted to highlight that in this photo. I took this photo at f/6.3 to make sure that there was selective focus, but not too selective.

This woman was excited to show us how she prepared her flowers. She even offered to let some of our guests give it a try.

We were watching the woman cutting her flowers when I looked up and saw this lady walking towards us with flowers in hand. I quickly reframed and shot this photo. Once again, this shows the amazing eye detection focus of the Canon R5.

It was 6:30am and the market was done for the day. We had finished shooting and we were getting ready to get back on our bus. As we stood on the side of the road, I realized that I should have tried motion panning the people as they left the market on their motorcycles. Luckily, there were still a couple of people still on their way out. I saw this man coming towards us and quickly raised the camera and panned at the exact same speed that he was traveling. Shooting at 1/25th of a second, I hoped I could nail this shot. I was very excited to get this motion pan in perfect focus and showing him with a bike full of colorful flowers. I have already made a large 24x36 print of this on my new Canon Pro-4100 printer. I am going to frame it and put it up at the house.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

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Vietnam Photo Tour: The people and rice fields of Sapa

Fri, 28 Oct 2022 16:58:15 +0200

The second stop on our Vietnam tour was a place called Sapa. Located in the Northwest region of Vietnam, this area is known for the rice terraces and high mountain terrain.

We got up early in the morning and boarded our bus for the 5 hour long ride out of Hanoi. We left the big city and headed up into the mountains. We had great weather, with big puffy clouds. At one point, I asked our guide if we could pull over to get a photo of the scenery. This photo was taken about 2 hours from our final destination. So pretty!

As we climbed higher and higher into the mountains, we started seeing the rice terraces, built into the hillsides. Once again we stopped to get photos, this time capturing the workers harvesting the rice.

At one point along our drive, I saw this pattern of mountains draped in clouds and knew that this would make a dramatic photo. I took a monochromatic shot like this in Switzerland years ago, and it is still a favorite of mine.

On our first full day in the mountains of Sapa, we walked through a village of the nomadic tribes people called the Red Dao. I was carrying a Canon R5 and a Canon R6 camera with me, with the Canon RF 24-105mm lens and Canon RF 70-700mm lens.

This was a great chance to teach the group about taking portraits, thinking about the aperture of the camera, the lighting, the background...

This woman was working in a market that we visited. I loved everything about her look, and also loved that the artwork behind her made the perfect background.

We visited many different temples on our trip, and stopped at one that was right along the Chinese border. Normally this border would be bustling with energy with people and vehicles crossing between China and Vietnam. But all import, export and other crossings have been stopped due to the pandemic. It was eery as there was absolutely nobody visible on the Chinese side. They have all been quarantined to their apartments for months!

Inside the temple, there was an elaborate prayer ceremony happening. We all watched and photographed this colorful event.

After exiting the temple, I looked up and I really like isolating the dragon on the roof against the nice blue skies we had that day.

Of all the photos that we took in Sapa, this is one of my favorites. And here is why... When we were driving to visit a market early in the morning, our bus was heading down a hill and I saw this scene with the rice terraces and one lone tree. I knew that this would be a great shot, and asked if we could stop. Our guide said that there was no good place to pull over on the way down, but that we would try to stop on our way back in the afternoon. I marked the spot in my mind, and made sure we stopped on the way back. Our guide said that in all his years guiding in this region, nobody else had seen this and asked to stop and photograph it. I love finding unique photos!

On our last day in Sapa, we had overcast weather. That worked perfectly for photographing waterfalls, so that is exactly what we did. We all grabbed our cameras and tripods and I taught the best way to capture water in motion. Most of the exposures from my Canon R5 (with the RF 24-105mm lens) were taken between half a second and 2 seconds, using a Tiffen circular polarizing filter.

I even set up my tripod to take photos of each of our photo tour guests as they came down the steps. You can see some of them coming down behind me in this photo.

As we walked through another town, we came across this woman who made fabric in the area. You can see that her left hand has turned indigo from the dies they use.

Of course, we took lots of photos of the rice fields.

Great patterns and lines.

I saw this little boy peaking out from this doorway and had to get the shot.

This last shot is yet another favorite from the trip. We were walking through another market and someone spotted this woman sitting low by some produce. She had SO much character in her face, we just had to photograph her. I took the photo really quickly, because I did not want her to pose for the shot. I wanted to get the real expression on her face. Thank goodness for the eye detection on the Canon R5 to lock in instantly. Looking at the lines on her face, it just makes me want to know more about her life.

Next up, I will share with you our early morning visit to a local flower market.

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Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________

Vietnam Photo Tour: First stop - The city of Hanoi

Tue, 25 Oct 2022 15:50:45 +0200

I just returned home from our photo tour of Vietnam and Cambodia, and let me tell you, there is so much to photograph in these locations! This was the first time for me in these countries and I am excited to share the photos with you all.

We started our tour in the city of Hanoi, waking up to rainy weather. The great news is that the rain stopped almost at the exact time that we arrived at our first stop, the Tran Quoc Pagoda.

As you can see, the rain had stopped, but there were no blue skies to be had.

The overcast skies did provide nice even light for close up photos, so I instructed the group to shoot more detail shots, isolating the buildings more than the sky.

One of the things that I like to teach is to look for unique photos in each spot that we would visit. In this case, I found this small plant that was growing in the tiles of the roof. Using selective focus, I relied on the repeating pattern of the roof to draw your eye back to the plant.

I saw this lady praying at the pagoda, and took this photo as she prepared to put incense in front of an alter.

As we exited the pagoda, I saw this area that would be perfect for a group shot. I took the photo, and then had out guide, Nguyen (3rd from the right), take another photo with me to the right and I combined the two images in Photoshop.

As we drove through the city, we came upon this famous street where the train comes incredibly close to the homes and shops on the side of the tracks. If you look closely, you can see the yellow line showing the safe distance from the train. Recently there was a man killed here, so the police block the street (allowing only residents into the area) every time a train approaches.

While we waited for a train to approach, I decided to teach some motion panning. There are millions of motorcycles in Hanoi, so I wanted to capture that and tell a story with a photo. I took this shot at 1/10th of a second and panned my Canon R5 and Canon RF 24-105mm lens at the exact same speed as the bike.

As the train approached, the police pulled a barrier across the road and everyone scrambled to get a photo of the close proximity of the oncoming locomotive. In hindsight, I realized that the best shot would have been to lay the camera down on the street and use a wireless remote to fire the camera. Oh well...maybe next time.

As we cruised around the city,. I kept with the motion panning instruction, since everyone loves it so much. Myself included.

We went to the tomb of Ho Chi Minh. We did not go inside, but we did photograph the building and it's surroundings.

Next to the Ho Chi Minh is the Royal Residence.

As I was walking back from the Royal building, I saw this woman posing for a photo and quickly grabbed this shot. I loved the way her red dress popped against the background.

As I was returning to our meeting location, some of us were lucky enough to see these soldiers preparing for a changing of the guard.

One of our attendees was photographing this young lady, so I used this another teaching opportunity, showing him how he could shoot through the flowers to make it a more interesting portrait.

That evening, before dinner, I took the group out for some night shots. I knew that, even with the cloudy weather, we were likely to still have deep blue skies during the "blue hour"in the evening.

Our hotel was located 2 blocks from this lake, which made it an easy walk to our location.

It was a really long first day in the country, but a really great one too. Our next stop was to visit the area of Sapa, to see the beautiful rolling hills and rice fields. I will post those images on the next blog entry.

__________________________________________________________________________

Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!
__________________________________________________________________________
If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
__________________________________________________________________________
Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Africa, Costa Rica, Cuba, Europe, Asia, India and more. And Canon will loan you any gear you want for FREE for any of my tours.

__________________________________________________________________________