Fantastic FNQ photo Friday

One of the nicest things about living in Cairns are the fabulous beaches. I mean, seriously, how could you not love living here.

Palm trees leaning out over golden sand, calm seas protected by a huge reef so it never gets too rough. And beautiful sunny weather all year round.

Not quite. Ironically Cairns is at its most beautiful any time but Summer. As soon as the hot weather starts to arrive Cairns starts to get funky.

The first thing that happens is that the water warms up and the jellyfish come out. Then the crocodiles start heading towards the ocean looking for new territory. They swim out of the rivers and up and down the coast looking for new rivers to live in. And then the wet seasons starts.

From November through to March it rains more than not. And we're talking torrential downpours here mixed in with the odd tropical cyclone or two.

So whenever a friend says they're coming to visit I always recommend they come outside of these times if they want to spend time swimming at the beach. Of course if you just want to photograph it while standing on the sand then come and visit whenever you like. Either that or you could just hit the rainforest. Nothing quite as authentic as a torrential downpour in the jungle.  :)

Capture One buys Expression Media and offers free downloads

For those of you who've been following my blog for a while you'll know that my workflow is heavily invested in the wonderful cataloguing software formerly known as iView Media Pro and then incarnated as Expression Media.

Well big news today is that PhaseOne has bought Expression Media from Microsoft. This sounds like wonderful news because the software seemed to be going nowhere under the Microsoft banner.

Anyway Peter Krogh on his wonderful blog the DAM show reports that PhaseOne is offering free versions of Expression Media 2 to anybody who has a version of CaptureOne or iView Media Pro. So what are you waiting for? Hop on over to Peter Krogh's blog where you can find all the details. If you're like me and anally retentive at cataloguing your images then you've gotta get this software.

Take me out to the ballgame

This time to Japan I got a chance to go to a game of the local professional baseball team - the Sapporo Nippon Ham Fighters. The Fighters had won their division the previous year and were considered one of the strongest teams around - until this season started!

They haven't had too good a year so far and this makes photography a bit of a game of cat and mouse. Why's that? Because everybody is fired up and cheering like crazy at the start of the game, but if the other team is scoring too many runs then fan morale, and photographic opportunities for happy supporters, tend to take a nose dive!

Being inside meant I had to put up my old ISO to 800 or so, which with my 70-200 f2.8 gave me a shutter speed of about 1/100 to 1/250th of a second.To avoid too much noise in your pictures the trick is to expose your histogram as far to the right as possible. That way your picture might be too bright for what you want but when you darken it down in post-processing your picture will look less noisy than if you try to brighten up a too dark picture.

I'll post some shots over the next few days to show you the range of stuff you can shoot from a sitting position in the stands. I find the trick for sporting events that you're not too familiar with is to go with die-hard fans. One of my wife's friends from her kindergarten days fit that maniac bill and I found myself surrounded by people who knew every player, every stat, and every other baseball loonie in the crowd. Meaning I often got the heads-up on things that were going to happen before they did.

I took this image of the crowd on the other side of the stadium with a telephoto lens. When I want to make a place look really crowded, or a crowd look really big, I always reach for the telephoto and try to get as far away from my subject as possible. I do this because the farther you get away the longer a lens you need to focus on people, and the longer the lens the more compression you get thus increasing that impression of a huge crowd. The trick with this image was to wait until the home side was batting, then everybody stands up and starts waving their big, pink, inflatable hands. The other trick is to shoot it early in the game because towards the end, if your team is losing, nobody stands up any more. In fact a lot of people go home meaning you miss the chance for big crowd shots.

Search for cheeseburgers and chocolate ice-cream in Ghana!

Long before I ever entertained being a professional anything I was a traveller. Just bumming my way around the world with a camera in my hands and lots of Kodachrome film in my backpack.

My first big overseas trip was 9 months travelling through Africa from North to South. Through the kasbahs of Morocco, the sands of the Sahara, the jungles of the Congo and the game parks of East and Southern Africa.

And a little black book. Full of messy writing readable only by yours truly but full of details and memories of what a wonderful time I had. An invaluable piece of (and I use the term very loosely) literature that later helped me to recognise what photos were, and remind me what life was like pre-marriage, children, mortgage and responsibility! :)

I thought I might share an adventure from that little black book. An adventure that happened in the country where this photo was taken - the West African nation of Ghana. It doesn't involve any photography or mind-blowing feats of daring - just a great night out in a far off part of the world.

My diary tells me that it was the night of April 12th 1994 in the capital city of Accra. A couple of friends and I were feeling really hungry so we wandered down to a hamburger place recommended by some local friends we'd met while staying at the 'Hotel California'. We entered a darkened little restaurant to find it absolutely deserted but figured it was just a little early. The waitress brought over our menus and they were fantastic. After weeks of local food bought in rural markets and prepared ourselves we were ready for some home -grown fare and they had burgers, lasagna, tacos. You name it, they had it. So we all ordered cheeseburgers and fries all round and the waitress cheerfully took our order.

Only after about five minutes she came back to tell us that she didn't have any bread or meat. And out of everything on the menu all she had was chicken and rice or chicken and chips! The night was still young so we headed out into it to try our luck elsewhere. And our adventures began.

We hopped into a local taxi, which already had a customer in there who just about died when 3 foreigners jumped in! The driver dropped off the local guy in the middle of nowhere in the pitch dark and we asked the driver for some eating recommendations. The conversation went a little like this. "Do you know Variety Chop Bar?" (a place I'd been to before). "Yes", assured our driver. "Can we go there?" To which our driver replied, "Yes, it sounds very good. Where is it?" So we told him to take us to a good chop bar. I kid you not this bloke drove for nearly half an hour through all these pitch black streets to God knows where. Every 5 minutes we would lean forward and ask him how far it was and the guy would say "Not very far, Is very, very good!" Well with that sort of a recommendation what can you do?

We were just pissing ourselves laughting and we finally ended up outside a place called Papaye - a McDonalds look-a-like apparently created by Woody Allen. We walked in and the place was so bright in the surrounding darkness, all red and yellow. Even the staff were in these horrible red and yellow uniforms! They had the first electric mozzie zapper I'd seen, although by the number of mozzies I saw it wasn't working too well.

We picked up our menus and a sat down in a plastic booth and a waiter came over to take our order - at last cheeseburgers and chips (fries) all round. Now the kitchen was totally open and the women cooks were standing only about two feet behind our helpful waiter but he got on his microphone and yelled the order into it, even though we could have whispered our order to the cooks and they would have heard us.

And the speaker was so muffled they couldn't understand a thing he was saying so in the end he wrote it down on a piece of paper and handed it to the very bemused looking cooks - obviously this happened a lot. We thought it was great. Our meal arrived pronto minus about half our chips because as they passed it from the kitchen to the restaurant it had to go through a curtain which knocked half the food off the plate. :) But it was yummy and a welcome change from beans and rice.

Now our search was on for some ice-cream. It started off at the Maharaja Restaurant down the road. The door was opened for us by a dwarf - the first one I'd seen in Africa - with a giant gold hat taller than he was, with white trim and a fantastic uniform. Nothing unusual there but it definitely helped the ambience of an interesting night. We sat down and the maitre d' brought us the menus, while the other ex-pats in the pink and white decorated restaurant looked at us very strangely. (Looking back on it this is probably because we were all dressed like your typical backpackers) We looked at the menu to find only coconut ice-cream. Dilemma. Do we settle for this or press on to find chocolate. Off we went.

Next it was on to Dolly's Hamburger Bar where the guy on the door assured us that they had chocolate ice-cream. Yeeha. Our joy, however, was short lived when we asked the guy inside and he opened a waist-high freezer chest to show us tonnes of vanilla ice-cream! As we walked out the door who should walk in but three more dwarfs. I was beginning to feel like I was in an episode of Twin Peaks.

Over the road we went to the Golden Lily Chinese Restaurant. We climbed up the stairs to find three closed wooden doors, one in front, one to the right and one even further to the right. It was like a labyrinth game. Which one led where? I managed to choose the right door (the middle one!) and into a fancy looking restaurant we went. We'd learnt our lesson and didn't bother sitting down - just went right up to the head waiter and asked if he had ice-cream. "Yes" "What flavours?" "Strawberry and Vanilla" By this time it was a matter of principle and we moved on.

After another couple of restaurants we were finally saved by a supermarket selling everything from Mars Bar ice-creams to Diggable Planet CD's (might have to Google that one!). So after two glorious chocolate ice-creams each, a memorable burger meal with Woody Allen, more dwarfs than I usually meet in a month and a very long and funny taxi ride we'd turned a dinner into an adventure.

Looking back on this little adventure that happened more than fifteen years ago in a country so different from my own I am reminded of how wonderful travel can be. How it can open your eyes to a different way of living. Of how you can make an adventure of the simplest of tasks. And how writing these things down is one of the most important things you can do. Next time you head out and panic about forgetting a spare battery or CF card don't forget a little black book and lots of pens so you can write down and later read all about your wonderful time away.

The changing way professional travel photographers do business

There are lots of reasons why I do what I do. Travel is in my blood, an addiction. Like many of us, I would still travel and take photographs whether I was paid for it or not. But it's not a hobby for me. It's a vocation. And the money I receive lets me support these wonderful people here - my wife and kids. It also gives me the opportunity to broaden their horizons by showing them the pictures from my adventures and taking them along with me when I can.

I'm a bit of a traditionalist when it comes to the way I photograph. I hardly ever crop, fiddle around in Photoshop or really do much at all after I've pressed the shutter. When I'm comfortable working a certain way I stick to it. I still use software that's probably considered out-of-date by many. My workflow is quite a few years old now and I upgrade my gear but only because my clients expect the better quality files that come out of the newer cameras. If my clients accepted the files they did years ago I'd probably still be shooting with my 8MP camera! (just joking - kind of)

But something I can't afford to keep the same as it was when I first started is the way I make my living. Back in 1998 I was in Bangkok, Thailand. I was half way through a year long trip just bumming around the world with my then girlfriend, now wife, and browsing through a book store. I came across a hard cover book by nature photographer John Shaw called 'The Business of Nature Photography". This heavy tome changed my life.

In it I pretty much found a road map for how to get started as a professional nature photographer - and many of the concepts translated well into the travel genre. Sure it mentioned working with DOS databases so some things were a bit outdated even then, but things have changed so much in those 12 years that many of the concepts written about, while still possible to do, won't let you earn a living.

Not long after that year finished I had my first stock photo sale, followed by my first two articles published in a national magazine. Because one of the main concepts mentioned in the book was that the easiest way to break into this field of photography is to write articles to accompany your pictures. So that was the path I trod.

In Australia it usually works in this way: the more travel articles you publish and the more of a name you get, the more you have various tourism bodies and PR companies approach you to go on famils. Famils are free trips designed to show you the best of a certain destination. So once you reach a certain level you get your travel paid for. You would write an article for a magazine or a newspaper and they would license one-time, non-exclusive rights. Meaning that you could then onsell that same article as many times as you liked to non-competing publications. And they would pay you for the words and the photos separately. By selling a single article multiple times you could cover your Cost of Doing Business (remember each day away on a famil is a day you have to make up for later) and make a reasonable living.

And then somebody changed the rules. Suddenly the big publishers wouldn't accept one-time, non-exclusive rights any more. They wanted all the rights in the known (and unknown) universe forever and a day - basically meaning that they could publish your work as many times as they like without paying you any extra. So there was no way you could sell that article again. And somebody then came up with the idea of not needing to pay for photos any more because you could get them for free from the tourism boards or for very cheap on Microstock.

And so in the space of a few very short years a lot of travel writers/photographers have found themselves in a very dire situation. Sure they may still get free travel but the money they make from selling their article packages isn't enough to support a single person let alone a family. Many are leaving the industry bemoaning the fact that the world has changed and they can't figure out why.

The thing is, there's not a damn thing we can do about it. And there's no point moaning and whinging (that's whining for you North American folks. :) ) because it won't do us any good whatsoever. There isn't a guidebook to how to make it as a travel photographer any more. We all have to figure out our own individual paths and how to sell our work without selling ourselves short. In other words it's time to be as creative and rely on our instincts in our business as much as we do with our photography.

And just because everybody else is doing something doesn't mean we all have to. The new catchcry is social media. But is anybody making any money on it? Maybe if you're selling workshops or tours then you can build a bigger client base. But if that's not your game is having a couple of thousand of followers on Twitter going to get you more paid work? I dunno. I hear stray stories now and again but they seem to be kind of like the stories you hear about one or two people making a fortune on Microstock. The exception to the rule.

Not that I'm saying that social media is a waste of time - just that you shouldn't do it just because everybody else is. This has never been a profession for lemmings. Try it, analyse the results and if it's not doing what you hoped move on. And by that I don't just mean getting you business, I mean if you're passionate about writing a blog then it shouldn't matter to much whether it's making you a fortune. Because you're helping feed your passion which is a good thing.

I'll be honest here. I don't make a red cent from my blog. I just do it because I love to write and seeing as the magazines aren't paying me anymore I might as well just write for me and if people find it interesting and rewarding then I'm happy to have them along for the ride. Every so often it leads to an email from somebody who may hire me for an assignment but for the most part I just do it for the love of waffling on.

So how do you make a living as a travel photographer nowadays? If anybody tells you they know the answer they're lying. None of us knows. We're all trying to fumble our way along in the dark hoping that somebody else comes up with the answer so we can all get back to working like we used to. Only I don't think we ever will again. Maybe the iPad will save the magazine industry - but they'll still have their same horrible contracts and the rates won't be any more than they were when I was in nappies. So it's up to all of us to look into our hearts and search our souls. To find not only what we're passionate about photographing, but to transfer that passion into our business. To think outside the box and come up with new ways to make a living at this crazy game. One things for sure, there won't be a book written about it soon and no two travel photographers will have the same career path.

Oh but if you do happen to find the golden path send me an email and let me know! :)

Focussing on the details

One of the things I tried to do more on this trip (well more than usual for me) is focus more on the details. The little things.

I find that one thing we tend to do as photographers is look for the spectacular, the out of this world, the wow factor. And in doing so we sometimes forget that it's the little things, the quiet moments, that can be much more special.

So on this trip I tried to keep my eyes open for little things that gave a little insight into how I felt about a place or an experience.

This picture is one of those moments. To get to Sapporo from Cairns you have to overnight in Narita. Usually we just stay one night and fly out first thing in the morning but this year we decided to spend a day in Narita. One so that we could take it easy after a long day flying, and two so we could take a look around the town my wife flies to every week with work.

We visited Narita-san, a giant pagoda temple with beautiful grounds filled with tranquil waterfalls and beautiful cherry blossom trees. I photographed those (and will post them in the coming days) but this little vignette caught my eye. In the eaves of an ancient temple I spotted some straw brooms, leaning casually up against the wall. To me, perhaps even more than the ancient buildings themselves, this use of traditional-style brooms (when obviously more modern examples can be bought easily) spoke to me about how a modern society can develop whilst still paying homage to the past.

This simple image told me more about the ways that the traditional ways of doing things are honoured in Japan than a hundred pictures of geisha talking on mobile phones. I found it really interesting to focus my attention more on the little details and the quiet but telling moments and I'll post a few examples over the coming weeks. No matter how long you've been doing this, or at what level, you can always find ways to stretch yourself and learn to see the world around you in new ways.

The joys of being able to photograph freely

Here in Australia we kind of take our freedom for granted. And yet those freedoms are gradually being taken away from us with the stroke of a pen. If you want to know about the hoops you have to jump through to photograph in National Parks in this country go and have a look at this fascinating article by Ross Barnett.

The situation has become so ridiculous that finally photographers are standing up and getting ready to fight. There is a big protest march organised in Sydney by Arts Freedom Australia on August 29th. You can find the Facebook page here. If you can I would urge you to come along to help show your support, or if you can't make it sign up on the Facebook page.

Which brings me to what a pleasure it is to take photographs in a country that actually respects photographers. It is such a joy to get out your camera in Japan. Maybe it's because it's a country of people who have taken photography to their hearts in such a huge way. The book stores are full of photography magazines and books on not only the technical side of things but also the spiritual side of our craft. You can find glossy photo books on every conceivable topic. Often when I'm out photographing everybody around me has gear that puts mine to shame.

When you ask somebody if you can take their photo you're not hit with the old twenty questions. Why do you want to photograph me? What are you going to do with the pictures? Where are you going to publish them? How much money are you going to make? Nope, after being shocked that somebody finds them interesting enough to photograph they're actually honoured. Respect for someone with a camera! Who would have thought it.

Where did we go wrong? Why has such a beautiful art form become symbolic of something suspicious and evil? Why are photographers with 'professional' cameras seen as such easy targets for having to have permits to go places 2 million people with a point and shoot can? Ever heard of a permit for writers? I guess I'm a bit confused as to why I'm seen as either a highly dodgy character or a ready source of income for government departments simply because I enjoy an art form that's been around for a couple of hundred years and is something that gives so much pleasure to so many people. Go figure.