Hidden Paradise

The trip down to Mozambique went by so fast and the week we spent there went by even faster. I would highly recommend that everyone should give this paradise a try. We decided to go down, to swim with the dolphins, as it is what my mother has always wanted to do, and can now tick off her bucket list. We stayed in a beautiful little cottage, on the top of a steep hill, over looking an aqua landscape. Well almost everyday of the week, we went out to 'sea' if these big fish would want to come and play. We experienced snorkeling with Dolphins twice, but on days we could not find any, we got to adventure the sea, snorkeling in the reefs, and with turtles. It was honestly a unforgettable experience and my main thanks goes to "The Dolphin Centre" ( www.thedolphincentre.com ) as this is who we got our amazing package deal through.

Here are a few photographs I took while we were down, however after about the first two days, I was to busy being an adventurer, as appose to a tourist and didn't take as many photographs as I would have liked.

Red R&R
Date : 03 July 2013
Time : 16h37
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Fernando's Bar
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/4
Shutter Speed : 1/125 sec
IOS : 200
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash

Playing Waves
Date : 03 July 2013
Time : 15h14
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Beach
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/32
Shutter Speed : 1/100 sec
IOS : 100
Focal Length : 200mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash

Pretty Face
Date : 02 July 2013
Time : 12h11
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Fernando's Bar
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/250 sec
IOS : 200
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash
Unfortunately rotated in the wrong direction

School's Out
Date : 02 July 2013
Time : 12h14
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Main Street
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/250 sec
IOS : 200
Focal Length : 200mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash
Unfortunately rotated in the wrong direction 

Chillin'
Date : 02 July 2013
Time : 12h17
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Main street
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/250 sec
IOS : 1600
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash
Unfortunately rotated the wrong direction

Black R & White RDate : 02 July 2013
Time : 12h26
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Main Street
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/250 sec
IOS : 200
Focal Length : 200mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash

Picture Perfect
Date : 02 July 2013
Time : 15h11
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Beach
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/250 sec
IOS : 100
Focal Length : 200mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash

Bracelet Rust
Date : 02 July 2013
Time : 15h17
Location : Mozambique, Ponta Do Oura, Beach
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/11
Shutter Speed : 1/160 sec
IOS : 100
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash
Unfortunately rotated the wrong direction

 Unfortunately some of the Photographs rotated the wrong way, and I am still unsure of how to fix this. 

Road Down to Mozambique

Wow I really do fail when it comes to keeping my blog updated. I kept telling myself I will do this weekend, well that's a funny joke. :) See what happened was, when my family moved houses we lost a line to a home phone, meaning we had to get a little portable modem for WiFi. Which means we have a limited amount of WiFi to use, unfortunately I am not use to having a limited and may have used up quite a bit of WiFi within a few months. Luckily we still have a whole lot of free WiFi to use, starting from 23H00 and ending at 05H00, so I try and stay awake till just after 23H00, but always end up falling asleep, because I have a sleeping schedule like a granny. However as you can see by this post I have decided to break the house rules and just post anyway :) .
Now that that's out of the way, on to this post. :)

Around June/July 2013 my family and I went to Mozambique on holiday, it was an amazing holiday, filled with many laughs and awesome times. We stopped at a beautiful bed in breakfast/botanical gardens/Nursery on the route to Mozambique. The drive down and Mozambique itself is so jaw dropping beautiful, and full off many photo opportunities.

Glowing Green
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 16h36
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 200mm
Metering Mode: Center Weighted Average
No Flash

Pink Paradise
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 16h45
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 80 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weighted Average
No Flash
Unfortunately rotated the wrong direction 

Triangle Tree
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 15h17
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 120mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash

Zebra Leafs
Date : 30 June 2013
Time:  15h14
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 200 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash
Unfortunately rotated the wrong direction 

Twisted Twigs
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 15h45
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 125 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash

Hens Tail
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 15h20
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 70 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash

Fire Flowers
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 15h44
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 125 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash

Dusk Duck
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 16h14
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 1600
Focal Length: 200 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash

Green?
Date : 30 June 2013
Time: 15h39
Location:
Camera Model :Nikon D3200
F-Stop: f/5.6
Shutter Speed: 1/100 sec
IOS: 800
Focal Length: 200 mm
Metering Mode: Center Weight Average
No Flash

Unfortunately two of the Photographs, uploaded onto this post in the wrong rotation, and I have no clue has to how to change that. Sorry about that, but I hope you like the Photographs :) will hopefully be a lot more up to date with this blogging business this year, 2014 :).

Unfortunately for the time being myself nor no one in my family can remember the name of the town or the bed and breakfast we stopped at, but as soon as we find it or remember I will edit this post with the details :)

Animals in the pose.

                                      Capturing Animals ( Pets)

The Watching Eyes
Date : 19 June 2013
Time : 16h20
Location : Natashas (my) home
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
F-Stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/100 sec
IOS : 400
Focal Length : 200mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
 No flash

Well where to begin, when I decided to show some of the photographs I have taken of animals (or more my pets), I didn't even think about the text to put with it. For weeks now i have been meaning to do this next post, but I must say finding a text to go with the Photographs is a lot harder then you may think. So here I go just writing what I am thinking, so lets see how this goes.

The first photograph of my cat, "The Watching Eyes" I believe to be my best Photograph of an animal I have taken working on Manual. 

The Wondering Eyes
Date : 12 May 2013
Time : 09h51
Location : Natasha's (my) home
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
f-stop :f/5.6
Shutter Speed : 1/60 sec
IOS : 100
Focal length : 55mm
Metering Mode :Pattern
No Flash

Of course as anyone who has tried to capture an animal would agree, they are pretty hard to photograph, unless you are working on quite a high shutter speed as to capture the image in time, before the animal decides, okay I am done bye. That's the big difference between shooting an animal and almost anything else (such as flowers, people, objects that don't move), an animal moves when it pleases and does what it pleases, and there is a huge communication barrier between human and animal. It hasn't happened yet that a human (without the influence of food) has asked an animal to please pose brilliantly and remain still, and the animal has actually done so. It is for this exact reason that I have respect and look up to wildlife photographers, such as Andy Rouse (http://www.andyrouse.co.uk/index.php?page_id=2), Morkel Erasmus and many more. 

The Suspicious Eyes 
Date : 19 June 2013
Time : 12h39
Location : Natasha (my) home
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
f-stop : f/9
Shutter Speed : 1/125 sec
ISO : 100
Focal length :135mm
Metering Mode : Center Weighted Average
No Flash 

Another reason why I find animal photography hard is you have to work with the light, and work with the way the animal is placed, finding the perfect image before the light (which is often natural, therefore the sun) changes, or the animals decides to pull a ugly face or look away from this perfect image you have just placed. As I am sure everyone has learnt (even those that take images off their phones) is that you can't take a photograph of an animal with a flash, their eyes just light up and go red. This could only work if you have a diffuser to place over the flash just to soften it, what I mean is if you want the photograph you need to take it, not fiddle trying to get this cover over the flash, and then come back up to take the photograph and the animal has moved or vanished (seems to be the one thing all animals are brilliant at).  

The Contemplating Eyes
Date : 7 may 2013
Time : 12h14
Location : Natasha (my) home
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
f-stop : f/10
Shutter speed : 1/160 sec
ISO : 100
Focal Length : 135mm
Metering Mode : Pattern
No flash

 Although in this post I have only seemed to point out the difficulties in capturing a animal, DO NOT take it in a negative way. It is an amazing learning experience in Photography and all that goes with it. It must be absolutely awesome to be able to take such exciting, story telling photographs of wildlife, wild animals in their natural environment. Amazing. My family and I just recently went to Mozambique (next blog post) and our next door neighbor was Roger Horrocks (http://www.rogerhorrocks.com/ , http://za.linkedin.com/in/rogerhorrocks), an underwater cameraman, he was kind enough to show us some of his underwater footage for a documentary on dolphins which he is doing for the BBC, it was absolutely beautiful, one of the most beautiful thing I have yet watched. This opened my eyes to wildlife photography a lot more, which I will definitely be trying more of. 

The Admiring Eyes 
Date :12 May 2013
Time :12h06
Location : Natasha (my) home
Camera Model : Nikon D3200
f-stop : f/10
Shutter Speed : 1/60 sec
ISO :100
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Pattern
No flash

Please remember and take into account that this post is my thoughts and opinions, therefore I may find animal/wildlife photography a lot more difficult (especially as a beginner) than others, however I plan to learn more about it through my experimenting with photography. 

Whats New this year.

        About My Photography

                      Purple Raindrops                   

                  Date : 19 June 2013

                     Time : 12h15

Location : Natasha (my) home

Camera Model : Nikon D3200

         F-Stop  : f/5.6

         Shutter speed : 1/100 sec

         ISO : 400

         Focal length : 200mm

         Metering Mode: Center weighted average 

         No flash

         

Well where to begin... I am busy taking a gap year and unfortunately am unable to travel, so the year has been rather boring over the past months. However on the bright side I have really been able to get in touch with Photography. 

Gum Boot Dancers
Date : 18 February 2013
Time : 16h34
Location : Sandton Convention centre
Camera Model : Olympus E-500
F-Stop : f/5.6
Shutter Speed : 1/60 sec
ISO : 1000
Focal length : 36mm
Metering Mode : Pattern
No Flash 

Due to my boredom family friends, the Hellbergs, gave me a job for two weeks during February. The Hellbergs have their own business, Flying Pigs Branded Theater (http://www.flyingpigs.co.za/), which my sisters and I have done Kids Workshops, face painting, etc. However this job was much bigger, they were putting together a performance for South African Tourism, and I was playing the part as Assistant Stage Manager and photographer. It was an absolutely great experience and gave me so many different photographs, I worked with different lights, from hall lights to stage lights of many different colours, I worked with action, stills, close up's, long shots and many more, it was wonderful and helped me to play around with my dads camera Olympus E-500, as I hadn't got my camera yet. At the same time I was working and getting creative with my photography, I was learning a whole lot more about camera's and photography from the photo course I was attending.

Peace Rainbow
Date : 17 February 2013
Time : 07h19
Location : Natasha (my) home
Camera Model : Olympus E-500
F-Stop : f/5.6
Shutter speed : 1/60 sec
ISO : 100
Focal length : 43mm
Metering Mode : Center weighted average
No flash
Photo Course One

I was attending the Funki Fotos course, run by Andre Raubenheimer and his wife (http://www.funkifotos.co.za/ ). There are two courses, one is over three weeks, once a week, in this one we learnt the basic's of the camera, photographs and light. The second course is over a weekend, and we went more in-depth into lighting. It was an amazing course which helped me a hell of a lot to make the picture my own. As Andre said, you should not have to explain a photograph, it should tell its own story.

Vroom Vroom
Date : 16 March 2013
Time: 13h58
Location : Randburg indoor go-karting
Camera Model : Olympus E-500
F-Stop : 5.6
Shutter Speed : 1/125 sec
ISO : 400
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Pattern
External Flash
Photo Course Two

Waterfall Clouds
Date : 18 March 2013
Time : 11h36
Location : A Randburg Park
Camera Model : Olympus E-500
F-Stop : f/18
Shutter speed : 1/10 sec
ISO : 100
Focal Length : 55mm
Metering Mode : Pattern
No flash
Photo Course Two 

I have always had a great interest in Photography, I mean just the idea alone that you can capture what you see is amazing, but actually doing it that takes some skill and knowledge. I had been taking photographs since before 2013, but always on Automatic, thinking I did a great job, but actually the creator of the camera did a great job. Back then my photographs were some other inventors and not mine, but now after learning so much about camera's, photography and light, and as well as being creative and gaining experience, I can say that the photographs I take, the memories I capture, the moments I steal, are mine. They belong to me.