vacation

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Whether you’re going for fun, to visit family or to break out of your everyday normal routine, we all want to create memories that will last a lifetime while traveling. Capturing images with your camera is the best way to relive those memories and share them with loved ones when you return home. So grab your mobile camera or a DSLR, these are some of my best tips to make sure you come away from your travels with images you are proud of. And you don’t even have to be a professional photographer to capture them. It may take a lot of preparation work, but in the end, it will all be worth it.

Plus photography is super fun 🙂

1. Scout Photo Locations From Your Computer

One of the best ways to start preparing for your trip is to start planning all the beautiful sights you want to see before you leave. But if it’s your first time visiting a new place, all the options and maps can get a little confusing. Scouting out various photo locations and points of interest before you leave will help reduce stress. It will allow you to not waste time on your vacation and you could hit the ground running as soon as you arrive. Plus if you’re going to a very popular tourist destination, you can be prepared by obtaining tickets and plan for events in advance and not have to worry about lines.

So here’s what I like to do before I even leave on my trip,  I like to begin my research on social media.Click here to read more

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I thought this image was interesting because it could be two different things. Either the light reflections on the ocean water or a whole bunch of fish swimming by. Obviously, it’s fish but I’m hoping it made you look a little deeper into the image to figure that out.

I was standing on top of this pier when I captured this image. I took that pier image in 2015 and to this day, it still looks the same. Either torn apart or never finished but easy to walk along the planks. Andrew and I noticed other people standing on the pier and saying something about a Baraccuda. Obviously, we jumped up from our beach chairs and I grabbed my camera to go check it out. We didn’t see a barracuda but saw all these fish swimming around the pier in what seemed like circles.

I loved how the sun was hitting them just right and made the water look so transparent. It was difficult to see exactly what I was capturing through my camera lens because the sun was so bright but I think it turned out cooler than expected.

Even though we didn’t see the barracuda, I did see a dolphin, a stingray, and possibly 2 nurse sharks just from the beach. So very cool if you ask me!

My camera settings for this image is F4 at 1/4000th sec and ISO 320 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens.

 

 

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Taken around the same time I captured this image, I had so much fun watching these fish swim by. I wasn’t able to go underwater so seeing one of these fish swim from above the water was pretty cool. One after the other, more and more started to show up and I was so excited. At one point it seemed like they just kept circling Andrew and me.

I don’t know about you, but when animals or wildlife just show up like this I get extra excited. Sometimes it’s hard to keep my composure but with them circling us, I had plenty of opportunities to capture this image. I think my favorite part about this image is seeing how thick the waterline is. I don’t know why it wouldn’t be the fish. I just think this perspective is so interesting. Plus I like all the water bubbles in line with the fish. It honestly makes me want to go back to a beach later this summer and try it again.

But honestly, they just kept circling us and we had no idea what was going on. After a while, Andrew asked if I got my shot and I said yes. Then he told me to put my camera on video mode so he could jump in the middle and I could capture them all racing away. LOL. I still haven’t looked at the video footage yet, but I’m pretty sure it will just like a big blob of nothingness. If it turns out well, promise I’ll post it. HAHA

By the way, I’m working on a blog post of all my favorite GoPro accessories and I’ll definitely be discussing how I captured this image. If you have any other questions about the GoPro, please let me know and I’ll try my best to answer your questions.

My camera settings for this image is F2.8 at 1/800th sec and ISO 100 with my GoPro Hero 5 Black.

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I know I’m extremely late to the game on this one. Like almost 6 years late, but have you seen the movie “Finding Vivian Maier”? If you haven’t, it’s on Netflix and it’s definietly a must watch especially if you’re a creative but more specifically a street photographer. Holy Cow. I was blown away by this movie.

First of all, Vivian Maier’s work was so good and to think she shot everything on film too. I feel like with film (as opposed to digital cameras) is much more planning and thinking involved. Especially since film takes a little while to shoot and reload, but also since you can’t even see what the image looks like after you’ve captured it. It’s like praying you got something good but never not knowing for sure until your roll is developed and then it is sometimes difficult to go back and recreate that exact moment. It’s actually a bit terrifying when you sit down to think about it.

And that Rolleiflex. OMG how cool was that camera. I love how the viewfinder was on top so that you could sneakily take photos without people really knowing. I feel like I can sort of do that with my Sony A7II but not to the extent that Vivan did.

But second of all, how cool is it to find a huge trunk of negatives and seeing such amazing photographs. I loved how you got to know her and her personality through her images and the stories of people she connected with. It was very interesting how she sort of recreated herself for different people. I think when I think about her images her self portraits stand out the most to me in my head. She was such a mysterious woman and to see what she actually looked like was very nice.

Anyways, you may have noticed in 2018 I really tried my best at street photography and it’s something I really enjoy but something so different for me. Vivian Maier is now a huge inspiration to that and look forward to capturing more on my travels 🙂 This image was taken in Aruba while we were sitting down for breakfast. Across the street was this man who just seemed so content with the morning. He was basically screaming for me to capture this image.

My camera settings for this image is F8 at 1/1000th sec at ISO 320 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm.

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Always looking for new framing ideas, this one was taken right after I finished eating breakfast on the Renaissance Aruba Resort and Casino’s private island. Luckily my camera goes everywhere I go while traveling. But the private island is great. It’s just a quick boat ride from our hotel and you could literally spend the whole day here. Theres a great restaurant where they serve you wayyy too much bread and on the other side of the island you can play and interact with flamingos.

Almost immediately after we got off the boat onto the private island, it started to downpour rain. We ran to shelter and figured we would wait it out by eating breakfest. Thank goodness for Caribbean weather because the rain did not last long at all. By the time we ordered our food, the rain had basically stopped. I walked closer to the edge of the restaurant to capture this view. You would never have known that it was raining just by looking at it.

And that hammock looks so inviting.

My girlfriends and I ended up spending all morning here taking a million and one pictures. Sad to see another summer go but summer 2018 was a BLAST. I’m so glad I was able to spend some time out in the sun and on the beach. I feel like it’s been a while since I had taken such a relaxing vacation where most of the day was spent not doing anything at all. So if you’re looking for a great place to visit with great weather, I’d highly recommend Aruba.

My camera settings for this image is F4.0 at 1/5000th of a second and ISO 500 with my Sony A7II and 70-200mm zoom lens handheld. Shhhh… I didn’t even bring a tripod on this trip 🙂 That’s just how relaxing it was.

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I think my new favorite camera is this GoPro Hero 5. It’s just so small and compact but you can literally take video or pictures anywhere you go. I think the best part is all the accessories you can buy with it. You know how females love accessorizing 🙂

So for this image, I just had the AmazonBasics Floating Hand Grip with extra grip attached the camera. It’s great because the camera itself is waterproof so you don’t need an extra casing for it. The handgrip was great because if you dropped it by accident, it would just float right next to you.

Let me know if you want to know what other accessories I got for the GoPro because there are just so many it can be a little overwhelming.

Anyways, I was trying to go for that underwater/over the water look and feel for this image. I don’t think the lens on the GoPro is wide enough to do it with just the camera by itself, so this was as close as I got. I still think it’s pretty cool because you see some pretty cool reflection of the flamingo’s neck. But I think my favorite part of the image is the little water explosion you can see by his head. I think it’s just such an interesting detail that could easily be passed over.

My favorite part about seeing the flamingos was watching what they could do with its neck. It can bend and curve in so many different odd shapes. It was interesting to watch. I’m pretty sure I saw a flamingo able to make two humps in their neck. So interesting! But so weird at the same time. LOL.

My camera settings for this image is F2.8 at 1/3539th of a second (woah!) and ISO 100 with my GoPro Hero5 Black.