Recent trip to Petra Jordan

Here is a sneak preview of some images from my recent trip to Petra Jordan. More to come shortly as soon as I have time to upload them.

These are all from the walk down towards the entrance gate so we have not yet arrived at the Entrance when I took these images.

If you don't want to walk you can hire a horse that will take you down and up again.

This piece of rock I thought looked very much like a scull.

Busy times due to rain storm

Wow, I have just experienced my first rain flood in Egypt. We woke up 06.00 to that is was raining into our house through every A/C unit. Before I understood what was really going on and able to react and put buckets everywhere where needed and move furniture so that the water could freely poor down into the buckets... Once that was all done we were quite excited that it was raining and very awake. I took my camera and the car keys and went out to see if there might be any interesting images waiting outside!
Its not very often that we have that much rain in the same time so you have to take the opportunities when they come.

After only a few hours if even that the sun was out shining again. Then at 16.30 the wind picked up and it started to rain again but this time it came in horizontally so it rained straight in through all our windows on the house. Not a nice experience. The power kept on going on and off as well all day. We had no internet connection or mobile phone network working so we all did feel slightly isolated from the outside world.
But not to worry everything is all back to normal now at the resort the rain have dried up and the sun is shining again and it looks like nothing ever happened.

Portrait Photo Shoot, Egypt

I have been traveling a bit lately, one of my travels took me to explore Petra in Jordan. It was amazing and definitively worth a visit if you have not been yet. I will show you some images from that trip a bit later not today. 
I have also taken quite a few event photographs of golf presentations but none that are very interesting to publish here so I will spare you that.

Today I will show you a few images from my portrait shoot I did yesterday with a family. We did an afternoon photo shoot at the resort which means that it is more calm and tranquil around us than if we had done it a bit earlier also the light has a very pleasing effect for portraits in the afternoon. The calmness of course suited us very well since a child's attention is very easily distracted if there are a lot of things going on around them. We had a few on lookers at times but we managed great even with that.
Even though we were outside and there was plenty of available light at least in the beginning of our shoot the sun did drop behind the Sinai Mountains quite quickly in the end. But as I was saying we had plenty of natural light but I still used a flash to get those nice catch lights in the eyes. I had the flash positioned straight up and used only the little white plastic card to direct the light towards the person I was photographing. When you are photographing outdoors make sure that you position your subject on the edge of the shade if possible also make sure that you do not get any dappled light in their faces, from tree leaves etc. Dapples in the face or hair can easily ruin any portrait so try to stay away from it unless you are trying to do something creative and work it in. But in general for portraits stay away from dapples in your objects faces the images will turn out a lot better and you will be able to sell your client more prints which is probably what you are after -Sales!

Filing system, Sensor Loupe & Champagne on the Beach in Egypt.

I have this week started a new filing system with my images that I hope will prove to be a good and long lasting system. Cross your fingers please! For a photographer the number one thing is to have a good filing system where you easily can search and find your images quickly your income can depend on it. Since if you can’t deliver quickly I bet there is another photographer out there that can. So you can loose potential income if you do not have a good one. Now I am of course assuming that you already can take great photographs ;-)

Creative people in general are not people with order around them with paperwork etc. chaos seam to be more the norm and that is why it is so important with a good filing system and a Back UP System! Where maybe the latter is maybe the most important part in the soft copy era we live in.

Which reminds me I have to buy more external storage space! I'll have to put it on my purchase list together with some Dust Aid. I only have one strip left and they are so very good. So will have to stock up while I can. I do not know if they sell them here at all in Egypt so have to get some when I travel in a few weeks.

 I am also thinking of maybe getting a Visible Dust Loupe any of you that are using one and can tell me if you like it? Think it might be the thing I need to be able to see the dust specs easier on the sensor so that I easier can take them off. I just did a quick google search and found another brand Ohnar Loupe that also does the same thing it is slightly cheaper though. Wonder if it is just as good?

"Isn't it strange? We spend 

hundreds, maybe thousands, on a camera lens to achieve the ultimate sarpness. Then, when it comes to assessing the results, we're quite likely to use a £10 loupe with a plastic lens. The loupe is probably the most overlooked accessory in the photographer's armoury.
A loupe is a lens. You wouldn't expect much from a camera lens with just one or two elements, nor should you expect much from a similarly constructed loupe.
Achieving decent resolving power requires several elements or groups of elements, just as it does in a camera lens. And this costs money." http://www.kauserinternational.com/4xzoomloupereview.htm

I read this in a magazine and I believe its very true. I know I was thinking the same thing wow a loupe is expensive when I found out the prices of them..

Champagne Brunch on the beach!

This image is from yesterdays morning photo shoot. I was up early again taking pictures the sun was right off to my right side giving the champagne glasses a nice sparkle in them. I had to keep on swirling the glasses though to keep the Champagne bubbling  LOL. After the shoot I was lucky enough to get to drink what was in the glasses!!! Unfortunately it was only 7 Up with extra lemon so it was actually quite sweet and probably full of sand in them, it was quite windy even it doesn't look it on the images.

Sinai Mountain Range

This morning I put on my trekking boots and headed for the Sinai Mountains.

The start of the trek was quite steep then it eased out for a while and for the last bit it was a bit scary steep again going up went ok partly maybe to my new walking style that I adapted. I had my photo gear in a backpack so I was therefore slightly back-heavy so for the really steep parts I started walking more like an Orangutan (nothing against them) with my hands forward almost touching the ground so that I would not involuntarily fall backwards but forwards in case I was about to fall at all. I was more scared though walking down the steep hill with the slippery rocks, my new Orangutan walk was not of any help then more the opposite it would have made my trip down a lot quicker that is for sure and I am not sure in what shape I would arrive to the bottom at.

The Sinai Mountain Range does not consist of solid rock it consists in part of red granite and volcanic rock, so very porous. Which can make the walk a bit slippery in places so you always need to be careful of where you put our feet.

On my way up I of course stopped several times to take photographs. My goal with the trek was to get some nice images of the Taba Heights Golf Course from a high vantage point and not for the exercise itself that I got for free. The day was very nice for such a trek because the sun was hidden a bit behind a thin layer of clouds so it made the walk more bearable and not too hot and also helped with the images of course since harsh sun light very rarely help an image. I have attached a few of the images I took from this morning.

Beduin Camp.

I walked all the way up to the top!

Hyatt Regency Taba Heights.

Diving images

I went diving with a friend of mine last week and I took some underwater images while I was down there and I must take my hat of to all underwater photographers because it is not as easy as it looks to take a photograph underwater. As photographers you are taught to hold your breath at the time of pressing your shutter to eliminate camera shake and that does not help you underwater then exhale is a better option for you. Because when you hold your breath underwater you will slowly start to float up and then you get away from your camera vantage point that you had decided was best for the shot. So needless to say I will keep taking my photographs above water where I can move elements in and out of the  scene  be it things or people. Try telling a fish to stay still!

I have posted a few of my efforts here for you to view just for fun. But I can assure you underwater photography is nothing I will try to pursue anytime soon. I need to get a few more dives in me…