Author: travel67

HD PENTAX-D FA645 MACRO 90mmF2.8ED AW SR – Mini Review

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I was lucky enough to test out a prototype of the lens a couple of months ago. It’s big, heavy, and a lot of money. It’s also tack sharp, and with shake reduction built in, quite possibly the perfect travel lens for a 645D shooter. As I have an upcoming trip that would be ideally suited to this lens, I bought one last week, and have been using it both in and out of the studio. Here’s another image of Rie in the field of cosmos flowers. Camera settings were 1/200 f4.5 ISO400  I shot the image handheld. The bokeh in the background looks great and the sharpness of the image is excellent. When you open the image up at 100% you can see how I took the photo by looking in her eye. There’s me in the middle holding the camera. To my right is the farmer who wandered past and was press-ganged into holding a reflector. My friend, Shawn Miller, is standing just out of shot. He’s holding a Lastolite diffusion panel, the …

Diving off Kume Island, Okinawa

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I went diving off Kume Island a couple of weeks ago. The water is still quite cold in February so I was wearing a hooded 5mm wetsuit, but the visibility was excellent and there were plenty of things to see. A small whitetip reef shark (Triaenodon obesus) hiding in a cave. This was shot at 17mm, so I was only a couple of feet away. It’s quite emboldening having all the underwater camera and strobe equipment between you and your subject. Hope it recovered its night vision after being dazzled by 4 or 5 very bright flashes.

Alexis – Woman in Black

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Model – Alexis Makeup & Hair – Summer Johnson Pentax 645D with HD PENTAX-D FA645 MACRO 90mmF2.8ED AW S Lighting – Charcoal background. Octabox powered by Profoto Pro-7a as the main light. Small softbox as low fill. A medium size strip softbox on both sides adding rimlight (powered by Profoto compacts). A fifth compact aimed at the background. Strobes triggered with PocketWizards.

64GB SDXC Card Comparison with Pentax 645D – a rudimentary test.

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Do different 64GB SDXC cards perform differently when used in my Pentax 645D camera? Why is this question important? SD cards of the same memory capacity vary in price. Some claim “faster shot-to-shot performance” but does it make any difference with my particular camera. The cards: Transcend 64GB SDXC Card Price 4,769 Yen (Amazon Japan) or $46.99 (Amazon.com) SanDisk Extreme 64GB SDXC Card Price 6390 Yen (Amazon Japan) or $73.69 (Amazon.com) SanDisk Extreme Pro 64GB SDXC Card   12,819 (Amazon Japan)  or 128.95 (Amazon.com) Whether purchased in Japan or in the U.S. there is a clear difference in pricing between the three cards. Prices shown are the best available prices on the Amazon websites as of writing. (Please feel free to click on the links, and I’ll make a few cents from any purchases you make. This is a bonus, but not the purpose of the post.) The camera: I’m using my Pentax 645D camera. It has twin SD card slots. I have them set up so that the camera writes the RAW DNG file to both cards …

Kiyoshi Yogi – Uechiryu Karate & Ryukyu Kobudou

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Kiyoshi Yogi is a master of Uechiryu Karate & Ryukyu Kobudou. He was the sai world champion, the bou world champion, and the first Okinawa traditional karatedo world champion. Yogi sensei was the 17th master to be photographed as part of the Karate Masters Portrait Project. We stared on March 11th 2012 so we’ve being underway for a year. Over the past 12 months it has become clear just how important the project is. There has been praise and encouragement from all over the world, although the best feedback is usually the beaming smiles from the masters as we hand over the prints for their dojos. Hopefully over the next year we’ll photograph even more of these Okinawan icons. I’ll continue to take the portraits, James will continue to organize the shoots, and the karate masters will continue to share their knowledge with the world.

Business Portrait – Hisano Pankiewicz

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Hisano Pankiewicz makes traditional Okinawan sweets. It’s been the family business for over a century. They have a small store in Naha called Jahana Kippan, which can also be found online at OkinawaSweets.com Her husband James is the owner of The Dojo Bar in Naha. Hisano needed a new portrait that can be used when promoting the company and introducing herself as a young Japanese businesswoman. We decided to keep the look of the shot simple and natural. Hisano was delighted with the image, and a happy client means a happy photographer. Hisano also gave me some coconut covered tougatsuke, as a thank you. Very happy photographer.