On Travel Photography

Of late, I’ve been traveling a lot to Caribbean destinations and needless to say, photography is the reason for all this trekking. So, for that reason, I always consider the availability of photographic resources that I might be able to take advantage of in each location, or the lack thereof. This helps me to determine what to bring and what not to bring with me. This is quite a critical moment in my planning scheme. Traveling light is a premium to me but having what I need for any situation, is also of equal importance and damned if you take too much and don’t use it or too little and end up needing what you left behind.

To prepare myself for each trip, I get on the web or visit the bookstore. I generally, research as much as I can about the place I am visiting and study a map to see places that might be of interest to me, ‘must sees,’ etc. Then I plan an itinerary for each day and try to hit as many sites as possible on each day, starting as early as daybreak, to catch the sunrise and see places as they wake up to daylight. Even before the eve of my trip, I start to plan my equipment load; I usually agonize over what to take and what not to take. It can really be a headache to take too much and a bust if you take too little. I cannot say this enough. So, it is essential that you have a good idea of what sorts of images you are looking to make.  You can take something and not use it and then decide to leave it next trip, only to find that you made a mistake by omitting that piece of equipment, so it is absolutely important to know what types of images you will likely be concentrating on the most and pack accordingly.

I find that a good bag is one of the most critical pieces of my gear. A good bag should be well padded and just the right size for your traveling style. It must be able to fit your cameras, lens and accessories, with room for your notepad and even pocket releases. Model releases are essential, if you intend to market your images for commercial usages. So, I make it a point to make my releases the same way I do my letterheads, and upload a blank copy online that I can retrieve remotely. That way, I can make sure that I have both a pocket release and the more complicated form of the release available at the same time. So, it is also important for me to determine if the location I am traveling to will have an internet café or a printer that might be able to help me retrieve the forms.

My gear usually includes: two digital bodies (Fujifilm S3pro, Nikon D2Xs). Four lenses: 18-50mm f2.8 Nikon mount Sigma; 80-200mm f2.8 nikkor; 35-70mm f2.8 macro nikkor; and 70-300mm f 1:4-5.6 nikkor; Nikon speedlight SB800 with SC-29 cord to take the flash off the body and still retain ttl capabilities; a Lumiquest Promax softbox for softening the light. I also take along an assortment of 2gb, 4gb and 8gb CF cards and cases to carry four in each set, usually three sets of four, rechargeable batteries (usually about 12 rechargeables and 2 extra batteries for the D2Xs) and a rapid charger. I never go anywhere without my mini maglite, fine point pens and sharpies, which just about rounds out my gear for carry on baggage. Oh, I almost forgot my 17” Powerbook, which I find to be a bit cumbersome to carry, unless my trip will be an extended trip over two weeks or so and I need to edit and upload images or work with a client on location.

My most recent trip to St. Maarten/Martin was fun but because on previous trips I have had unfulfilled intentions and ideas about shooting models on the beach, in resorts and in other situations, I thought very hard about taking studio lights and travel stands for that style of shooting. In the end, I gave in to my whims and ended up regretting it, because I lugged along a case that just barely fitted in the overhead cabin, loaded with 1 JTL 300 watts second strobe head with three batteries, two Sunpack 120J’s with 2 batteries, softbox ring for medium softbox, a pair of Pocket Wizard Plus 2 slave triggers, three empty sandbags with extra medium sized Ziploc bags, to hold the sand. The stands, small, silver umbrella, flexfill silver/white sided reflector and softbox, were small enough to fit into my suitcase — my one piece of send on luggage, which made weight, with all this in it.

Clothing is usually held at a bare minimum, since I end up wearing the same thing over and over again. The extras, I figured, might do well as a makeshift wardrobe for any would-be-male model. In the end, this extra carry-on took the place of my laptop, which I was glad not to carry. Instead, I ran out to B & H at the last minute, to replace it with the Epson P-5000 multimedia device, which I found extremely useful on this trip. The thing is so compact and fast that I may never take my laptop again on trips, not unless it is critical. The speed of my downloads were impressive, five cards downloaded faster than it would have taken one to download on my computer and I cannot say enough how much I am loving this new toy.

I found so many things interesting about St.Maarten/Martin on this trip: the mixture of cultures and peoples, the topography of the land and the fact that you can travel across the island in one day and access Anguilla, Saba and St. Barts quite easily. The place is relatively inexpensive, due to the fact that there is no tax, but they sure made up for it with doubling and tripling the prices of everything. I am only happy that making pictures comes at so low a cost, because If I had to pay, it would sure render me broke as fast as I got there.

I find that this time, my pictures mainly featured a very touristy vision of the island, so I consider this my reconnaissance trip. There were pictures of resorts and many scenic images of the varied landscapes and beaches of both the Dutch and French sides of the island. I did not use the lighting equipment that I lugged along and in the future, will opt to only take such equipment with me, if I made definite plans to do sessions with models ahead of time. I count this as a good lesson learned, once and for all.

On another trip, I might want to do a more intimate portrait of the place, to show what life is really like on the island. But at least, this time, I was able to tour and get a sense for how difficult or easy it might be to do that next time and what my approach may be. I made ties with some locals with whom I am staying connected and I got a great history lesson from a local real estate guide, which divulged the sort of information that would be good to write in any article about the place.

So, overall, I am quite satisfied with what I was able to find as I traveled around lovely St. Maarten/Martin. I definitely look forward to returning to this exciting Caribbean destination soon.