Author: travel67

Yanbaru Wildlife

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Spent the day up in the Yanbaru region of northern Okinawa with wildlife photographer Mark Thorpe. Found a few interesting critters including mayflies and tiger beetles, both of which required a little patience before they’d stop for a pic. We then met up with wildlife artist Ichiro Kikuta to get some advice on the best place to find the endemic Yanbaru kuina. He advised us to head out at dusk to a small river where the birds would bathe each evening. We staked out the spot, and  just as the sun dipped below the horizon, a family of Yanbaru kuina came down to bathe. Splish, splash, taking a bath.

In the Studio – Yuki

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A couple of  pics of Yuki that I tacked on to another studio shoot earlier this month. The shot above was taken with the 645Z and the 90mm lens, while the shot below was taken with the Pentax K-1 camera and the 28-105mm lens. Although the 28-105 lens has a maximum aperture of f5.6  at 105mm it is still possible to shoot portraits with a nice shallow depth of field. Makeup by Audra Presika. The theme is a mixture of  Titania the fairy queen, and Pris the replicant.

Prime Cuts – Okinawa

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  In a previous  blog post I wrote about working on the Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown- Okinawa Episode. (Season 6 Episode 3). I was mainly a location fixer organizing a few things behind the scenes. I  was also asked to help with a reenactment where they wanted to visualize the story of Minoru Kinjo. Now a well known sculptor, Kinjo-san was a young boy when the Battle of Okinawa took place. The reenactment never made it into the Okinawa episode but they were shown recently in the “Prime Cuts” special which shows scenes from the season that never made it into the main episodes. Anthony Bourdain explained about the Okinawan reenactment: The idea was to illustrate and give background to a very complicated Okinawan story, Okinawan history. Ultimately, I don’t think it was right for my show, but a noble effort. And beautiful.  The Prime Cuts episode shows Minoru Kinjo telling his story intercut with the reenactments filmed  on the beach in Yomitan. My friend Hayakawa-san, his wife, daughter and grandson acted as the Okinawan family, …

Timelapse Workshop

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We had a great timelapse workshop this weekend with Mark Thorpe. Here’s a quick video I shot of Motobu Bay. The sequence is made up of 627 frames that were shot from 7.01PM to 8.01PM  The images were then processed together in LRTimelapse. Huge thanks to Mark for teaching the class and to James and Russell for joining and learning new skills. On the second day we worked on adding movement to out shots using equipment by Syrp. We also introduced Mark to Pizza in the Sky. A few things I learned shooting my first day to night transition: I had expected to use the cameras built-in intervalometer, but the Pentax K1 locks down the settings once you start the intervalometer. As you need to make adjustments to the shutter speed during the transition, I had to trigger the shutter manually counting 5 seconds between each one. An external intervalometer will solve this in the future. Bring mosquito repellant. Timelapses are awesome. Motobu is awesome. You are going to put a lot of wear and …

Master Higa and the Minotaur

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Last week I was chatting with Mark Thorpe about his upcoming time-lapse workshop.  He mentioned that Sunday 5th of June was a new moon and possibly the best day of the year for photographing the Milky Way. Mark would be heading out to Mount Fuji, but I thought I’d head over to Zakimi Castle in Yomitan. I doodled the castle and stars on a piece of paper. Then continued to doodle adding  a minotaur into the doorway. I actually have two animal masks sitting in my office. One is a hippo and the other a bull. They hippo has been used for a few rather bizarre photo shoots. I realized that to create a minotaur all I’d need is the bull mask and a suitable torso. Luckily my mate Adam has both the right physique and was free on the Sunday night. Still doodling on my piece of paper, the image was lacking a foreground subject and could use a hero. I’d previously photographed 8th-dan karate master Masaharu Higa at Zakimi Castle and knew he …

In the Studio – Sam

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  Studio shoot with model Samantha Armistead. 3 different looks: business, beauty and street. Makeup and hair by Audra Pesicka. Shot using the Pentax 645Z and K-1. Lighting: Beauty dish camera right, Softbox camera left for fill. Two rectangular softboxes behind the model for edge lighting. Really pleased with the images, Sam has a fantastic look and was a pleasure to work with. Audra was a real professional, quickly creating 3 different looks that transitioned from one to the other. For more information on model portfolio sessions. Click here! 

Hannah Hooper Yoga

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Early Saturday morning I was out at the beach in Nakijin Village shooting some promotional images for Hannah Hooper Yoga. Hannah wanted some simple clean shots she can use as illustrations and backgrounds for her new website. I used both the 645Z and the K-1 and a Priolite HotSync Flash to add light removing the harsh shadows on Hannah. We also took a few portraits with some softer lighting. Finally we moved to a beach in Motobu that has beautiful rocky walls. A great morning out in the sun. If you’re ever looking for a yogi, check out Hannah Hooper Yoga. 🙂

Workshop Wonders

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The Off Camera Flash workshop went really well yesterday. My buddy Pete Leong and I taught the class, and we had 3 great students Adam, Anna and Liesa. We discussed the various different types of strobes and modifiers before getting out there and practicing taking some pics around Yomitan. We finished the class down at the beach. I took a pic of Yuki to demonstrate using shutter speeds below the max sync speed. A great day. The next workshops are: June 4 & 5, 2016 – Photography Fundamentals Workshop with Chris Willson June 18 & 19. 2016 – Time-lapse Workshop with Mark Thorpe

Pentax K-1 & Priolite – Capoeira

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It’s rainy season in Okinawa, but yesterday morning we had a dry spell long enough to capture Ben and Antonio practicing capoeira at Araha Beach. Gear: Pentax K-1, 28-105mm lens,  Priolite M-Pack 1000 HotSync strobe Using the Priolite HotSync system meant I was freezing the action with the shutter speed rather than the flash duration. This removes the issues you get with ambient light blur when shooting motion with strobes outdoors. ISO 400, f4.5 1/3200 sec   This was my first time shooting Capoeira so it was  tough to anticipate the action. With two subjects performing different moves at the same time it is also tricky to get  images where they are both mid air, correctly illuminated, and in focus. Back flips and kicks are so fast to the naked eye it all happens in such a blur. It’s fascinating to check out the images and see them frozen in time. In some shots they looked like skydivers free falling. I’d also like to try this on a bright sunny day where the strobe would act …