Chair Programs
Treasurer Membership
Editor Communications
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Joe Doherty
Susan Manley
Ed Ogawa
Joan Schipper
Joe Doherty
Velda Ruddock
Ed Ogawa
Joan Schipper
Joan Schipper
Alison Boyle
joedohertyphotography@gmail.com
SSNManley@yahoo.com
Ed5ogawa@angeles.sierraclub.org
JoanSchipper@ix.netcom.com
joedohertyphotography@gmail.com
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Ed5ogawa@angeles.sierraclub.org
JoanSchipper@ix.netcom.com
JoanSchipper@ix.netcom.com
AlisoniBoyle@icloud.com
Focal Points Magazine is a publication of the Sierra Club Camera Committee, Angeles Chapter. The Camera Committee is an activity group within the Angeles Chapter, which we support through the medium of photography. Our membership is not just from Southern California but is increasingly international.
Our goal is to show the natural beauty of our world, as well as areas of conservation concerns and social justice. We do this through sharing and promoting our photography and by helping and inspiring our members through presentations, demonstration, discussion, and outings.
We have members across the United States and overseas. For information about membership and/or to contribute to the magazine, please contact the editors or the membership chair listed above. Membership dues are $15 per year, and checks (payable to SCCC) can be mailed to: SCCC-Joan Schipper, 6100 Cashio Street, Los Angeles, CA 90035, or Venmo @CashioStreet, and be sure to include your name and contact info so Joan can reach you.
The magazine is published every other month. A call for submissions will be made one-month in advance via email, although submissions and proposals are welcome at any time. Member photographs should be resized to 3300 pixels, at a high export quality. They should also be jpg, in the sRGB color space.
Cover articles and features should be between 1000-2500 words, with 4-10 accompanying photographs. Reviews of shows, workshops, books, etc., should be between 500-1500 words.
Copyright: All photographs and writings in this magazine are owned by the photographers and writers who created them. They hold the copyrights and control all rights of reproduction and use. If you desire to license one, or to have a print made, contact the editor at joedohertyphotography@gmail.com, who will pass on your request, or see the author’s contact information in the Contributors section at the back of this issue.
https://angeles.sierraclub.org/camera_committee
https://www.instagram.com/sccameracommittee/
July/August 2023
4 The Ocean’s Cradle of Life
With carefully timed visits, we may explore tide pools that have been before us all along, yet unseen. With a deeper understanding of them, we protect and enjoy their beauty.
ByAlison
COLUMNS
Boyle14 Confluence: The Junk Raft
By Peter Bennett20 On Location: Into the (Not So) Deep
By Bob Beresh26 Trip Report: Kenyan Safari
By Paul Reinstein
32 How-To: Using Denoise
By Joe DohertyThe best part of editing this magazine is seeing all of the great work our members submit for publication. In this issue you guys outdid yourselves.
Alison Boyle has written a terrific cover article about the ecology of tide pools, their importance within the larger ecosystem, and how she approaches photographing them. It’s worth reading more than once. (Page 4)
Peter Bennett documented the construction and first days of the Junk Raft, a seaworthy vessel floating on a pile of discarded plastic bottles. It set out from Southern California bound for Hawaii, where it made landfall eight weeks later. (Page 14)
Bob Beresh is quickly adapting to his new home, a place which virtually requires that he learn to shoot underwater. He shares with us his newfound expertise about the technique, the equipment, and the thrill of his adventures. (Page 18)
I return to the How-To column with an column about how and why to use the denoise. It’s been “easy” to reduce noise, but it always came at a cost in sharpness and detail. I compare the AI denoise functions of Lightroom and Topaz, and conclude the AI is fine if it produces photos you would have taken anyway if you had an unlimited budget. (Page 22)
Paul Reinstein’s trip report of his Kenya safari is not a travelogue. He has a lot to say about why it’s important to plan your own trip, and to avoid the scrum of photographers. And he has some lovely photographs. (Page 26)
The member photos were spectacular and numerous. In the call for submissions I suggested that we might have a special section on the ocean, in keeping with the theme of the lead articles in this number. More than half of the members submitted only ocean photographs, so the idea of making it a special section went out the window. All of those images are in the Member pages.
Ten photographers submitted portfolios this issue. That’s a lot. In the past I’ve dedicated three to four pages for each one, and included all images. Over the last six months, though, I’ve been looking at other photography magazines, to see how they design their pages to showcase the work of their contributors. I concluded that it is best, given our format, to create a two-page spread for each member. Is it better? Let me know. (Page 38)
Joe Doherty Chair, Sierra Club Camera CommitteeAugust 10, 2023 @ 7pm PDT
Galapagos Islands and mainland Ecuador offer incredible opportunities for natural encounters, whether you are a photographer or not. Through the lens and stories of award-winning photographer Krisztina Scheeff embark on an up-close view of these wonderful wildlife rich places.
Krisztina will take you on a photographic journey of some of the special places on Galapagos Islands: Booby traffic jams, Galapagos Turtles, land iguanas as far as you can see, cute sea lions. Then embark to the Cloud and Rain forests of Ecuador to see all the different species of Hummingbirds and more! www.KSNaturePhotography.com
Register for the Zoom meeting at https://tinyurl.com/SCCC-KScheeff
With carefully timed visits, we may explore tide pools that have been before us all along, yet unseen. With a deeper understanding of them, we protect and enjoy their beauty.
by Alison Boyle
All text and photographs © Alison Boyle
The shores of our oceans are interfaces of land and sea where life must exist in and out of water. This is the intertidal zone where only the well adapted survive. Twice a day as earth rotates around the sun and our moon rotates around earth, the water on our planet is pulled toward these celestial bodies producing high and low tides. In areas experiencing low tides, the water is pulled away from the shore exposing rocks and reefs.
The rocks are a natural buffer of erosion as they diffuse the power of the waves. Sea water gets trapped between the rocks, in their cracks and depressions. These pools provide marine life with habitat and nutrients they need to grow, thus serving as the ocean’s nursery. Migrating birds also benefit as they forage in these pools.
From a human perspective, tide pools are a beautiful place to connect with nature. Exploring tide pools is a full sensory experience. You can feel the warmth of the
sun, the mist in the air, and gusts of wind. You will hear waves as they roll toward the shore and see plant- and animal- marine life you will find nowhere else. As you scan the rocks and pools, something catches your eye, like a flash of color or motion. Maybe it is a beautifully placed sea star in a bed of mussels, a colorful sea anemone with tentacles splayed like flower petals or a nudibranch using a branch of kelp as a path to find its next meal.
There are infinite locations to explore tide pools along our North American Pacific coast from California to Alaska. It would take a lifetime to explore them all. Each location
may be suitable for certain marine life species based on wave strength, rock type, and sunlight.
Wave action oxygenates the water and brings microscopic plankton to the shore. We see evidence of plankton when we witness their bioluminescence, as oxygen in churning waves oxidizes luciferin found in their bodies.
Where wave action is strong you find species, like sea anemones and mussels, that are well adapted to rock attachment and require a frequent supply of plankton. Low wave action, as found in bays or coves, favor more delicate species, such as sand castle worms,
who construct thin tubes of sand on the underside of shore-facing rocks.
Rock types include sandstone and claystone. It is easier for marine life to attach to sandstone because it is coarse. This is where you find the most species. It is much harder to attach to the finegrained and slippery claystone.
All rocks may release calcium, potassium, iron and phosphorus as they decompose. Marine life, like the Kellet’s whelk and the chestnut cowrie, need the calcium to produce their shells.
Sunlight varies during the day and dictates which species you will find. If the sun is strong, heating up the rock, marine life may find shade or hide under rocks to avoid dehydration. Cool overcast days will yield far greater opportunities to see life.
Industrial pollution has affected the life found in tide pools. Chemical runoff from roads and yards can wipe out all but the most resilient species.
If you’ve ever visited a tide pool below a golf course, you will notice a significant drop in marine life abundance and species diversity due to the heavy use of herbicides, pesticides and fertilizer. The tide pools of Treasure Cove in Crystal Cove State Beach, below Pelican Hill Golf Club, and Rancho Palos Verdes Beach, below Trump National Golf Club have very little life. At other Palos Verdes locations like White Point where the land above the tide pools is a nature preserve, marine life is abundant.
Trash such as golf balls, fishing line, plastics, spark plugs (used as fishing line weights) can
entangle or injure marine life. An oil or sewage spill in the ocean could kill all marine life where the pollutant drifted. Global warming will have a gradual effect on tide pools. As sea water encroaches on our shores, we will lose tide pools as erosion from overhanging cliffs swallows them. It will be interesting to see if and how they adapt to new shorelines.
Recent legislation gives hope that tide pools will be protected and recover. The Marine Life Protection Act, passed by the California Legislature in 1999, protects our marine natural heritage through Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) and respective defined usages. MPAs allow all non-extractive uses like swimming, wading, boating, diving and surfing and restrict extractive activities.
There are three types of MPAs:
1. State Marine Reserves - no fishing or kelp harvesting, except for scientific purposes and with a permit in Southern California at Point
Conception, Point Dume, Laguna Beach, Matlahuayl (La Jolla), South La Jolla, and Cabrillo National Monument.
2. State Marine Parks - no commercial extraction in Southern California at Campus Point (UCSB), Goleta Slough, Point Vicente, Bolsa Chica Basin, Laguna Beach, Batiquitos Lagoon, San Elijo Lagoon, and Famosa Slough.
3. State Marine Conservation Areasrestriction of some types of commercial and/or recreational extraction. Marine Protected Areas are listed by region and each region has unique restrictions. To see all of them visit https://wildlife.ca.gov.
There is also the California Coastal National Monument (CCNM) established in 2000 and expanded in 2014 and 2017. It is administered by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to protect more than 20,000 rocks, islands, exposed reefs and pinnacles along our coast and six onshore public land units including Trinidad Head, Waluplh-Lighthouse Ranch, Lost Coast Headlands, Point Arena-Stornetta, CotoniCoast Dairies and Piedras Blancas. The hope is that these continue to be expanded and enforced as tide pools are important places that contribute to the health of the ocean and our planet.
My interest in tide pools began in the mid1990s at Point Dume, in Malibu, at the same time that I was learning to use a camera. The excitement of discovering marine life and capturing it in a photograph was the spark that kindled my fire for both. Marine life, its beauty and behavior, and how the different
species co-exist together is a source of endless fascination for me.
I research each new creature I photograph in order to better understand its role in the tide pool ecosystem. My goal is to reveal their true essence with a camera, much like a portrait photographer aims to do with people. As with any portrait, simplicity is key, but it is especially challenging in tide pools. Highlighting the subject without distracting elements is often impossible. I look for marine life in uncluttered areas and with pleasing rock(s) and plant life to frame it or provide a pleasing background.
Tide pool photography can be very difficult because of the rocky terrain, reflections on the water, the motion of water and subject, and the small size of the subject (often about the size of a coin).
Small subjects can be captured very nicely using a macro lens. Macro lenses enable focusing at a closer distance making subjects appear life-size and filling the frame. However, the closer the lens is to the subject, the smaller the depth of field you will have. To increase depth of field I use smaller apertures like f16 and f22. While small apertures may increase diffraction, it is a compromise I must accept. Alternative methods such as focus stacking with images taken at f5.6 and f8 are rarely successful with a moving subject. If the lens is parallel with the entire face of the subject, the whole subject has a better chance of being in focus.
Location of the subject can make or break the final composition. Subjects in shallow areas of a pool tend to be more successful as there will
be more light and fewer particles between the lens and the subject. Subjects above water need to be stationary and then focus stacking may work.
Reflections can obscure subjects under water. Removing them makes the colors in the scene richer. To remove reflections on the water, I carry a collapsible sun blocker. The sun blocker is black and opaque. It casts a shadow over my subject removing reflections.
While a sun blocker removes reflections, it also requires a longer shutter speed. Shutter speed can be shortened by increasing the ISO setting on a digital camera. I try to make most images with ISO 100, and use higher ISOs only when the subject is moving. Another option for removing reflections is to
use a polarizing filter but this limits compositions to only those directions that can achieve polarization.
I use a garbage disposal grabber to remove distracting elements from the scene. I prefer this device to using my hand as a hand may disturb marine life.
To make it more comfortable to kneel on rocks, I carry a closed-cell foam cushion to sit upon or place between my knees and the rock. Knee pads work well, too.
I wear rubber boots with good traction that minimize impact on the plants and animals. With thick wool socks, the boots are snug keeping my feet warm and dry.
When packing my gear for an outing, I always consult my checklist to decrease the chances of forgetting something important. My list includes the following items; camera bag, camera, quick release, tripod with ball head, remote shutter release with tether, macro lens, circular polarizer, batteries, memory cards, dust blower, lens cleaner, collapsible sun block, foam pad and/or knee pads, garbage disposal grabber, rubber boots, cotton bandanas, hat, gloves, windbreaker, sun block, wallet, cell phone, head lamp, empty trash bag, food and water.
I do not carry a flash but a ring flash or remote flashes could be part of your kit. Flashes are another level of difficulty that I choose not to employ as they require more power, add more weight and could generate reflections.
Many lenses made today include an image stabilizer, and I have one on my lens. I choose Kellet’s whelk with operculum
not to use it because I prefer to use the tripod for stability. It may be old school but I like to have my hands free. Most of the time one hand is holding the sun blocker and the other is holding the remote shutter release. I could not hold these other items if I had the camera in my hands. The tripod allows me to be better at composing an image by giving me time to consider the entire scene and notice distracting elements.
Optional items to include may be a plastic rain cover or an underwater housing to protect the camera from water.
Research and resources
When deciding where to go, I do a lot of research first. The two books I use often are
Tidepools Southern California, by Linda E. Tway, Ph.D., and The Beachcomber’s Guide to Seashore Life of California, by J. Duane Sept.
When I’m close to home I have some favorite locations in Palos Verdes, Laguna Beach and Malibu. Locations that are farther from home need much more preplanning to make the most of my time. I search the internet to view pictures of a potential site. Multiple websites favorably mentioning the same location is a good indication that it could be a good place to visit.
Every location has pros and cons. Some require long hikes to reach them. Some have visitation restrictions – like Cabrillo National Monument. This is an excellent location in
San Diego but docents make sure you are off the monument by 4:30pm every day. The closing time shortens your time to explore and is well before sunset. Some tide pools are very difficult to walk through. Some are very popular. If the location has a large area to explore, I often need to visit the area multiple times until I learn where to find the marine life. I am also paying attention to the news for oil spills and other events that may affect the location. I usually have a backup plan.
The best time of year to visit tide pools in California is in the winter, from November through March. This is when the tides are lowest during daylight hours. I consult saltwatertides.com to find out when the tides will be at their lowest and the exact time by location.
Once that has been established, I plan to arrive two hours before the lowest tide and stay two hours afterward. I allow more time if there will be a long hike to reach the tide pools.
Restroom visits are also an important consideration. If there are no restrooms, you need to stop drinking, use a restroom in town and then go to the planned location. It may be 4-5 hours before you have access to a restroom again. It is an all-day affair when you consider the transportation time, walking time, time spent in the tide pools and the return trip.
Over the past three decades I have developed a mindset for tide pools that I apply to all my photography outings. I try not to have
expectations of what I’ll find. This frees my mind to discover what the location offers me on that day. I’m never in a hurry once I arrive. If I stop and observe an area, marine life often appears because of my stillness, or my stillness leads to a heightened awareness of the life around me.
As with wildlife photography, the odds of finding a subject increases when you move slowly, are respectful and don’t disturb the environment. Marine life is all too aware of our presence as we make our way through tide pools. They hide for protection, interrupting their natural activities.
Patience is always needed whether I’m waiting for marine life to pause or move to a more pleasing location, the wind to stop, or a surface bubble to move out of the way.
Tide pool photography can be very frustrating when things become difficult. When I am frustrated I take a quick break from photography. Sometimes it is best to find another subject. Not all marine life can be photographed. Recognizing your limitations and moving on will make the visit more enjoyable.
Tide pools are vulnerable places that need our respect and protection. I would like to see more protections applied and enforced so that marine life can thrive. They give us much wonder and awe in return. My hope is that you fall under their spell as I have. With preparation and an open mindset, a wonderful adventure awaits.
Several Christmases ago, I was taking a stroll along the beach with my young son in nearby Playa Del Rey. As had become my habit, I was looking down at the sand as much as I was looking around at the scenery. These days, it’s difficult for me not to take stock of the Styrofoam and plastic bits I see washed up on the beach along with the other ocean flotsam.
The sad truth is, once I began to understand and saw for myself how much plastic was collecting in our oceans and along our shorelines, it was hard to enjoy a
leisurely stroll on the beach the same way I used to.
I had always been somewhat aware of the fact that plastic and other toxins were going down our waterways into the ocean; I had seen it firsthand from my work on the LA River. I had photographed a number of river cleanups for Friends of the Los Angeles River (FoLAR) and watched as hundreds of volunteers yanked and excavated massive amounts of plastic bags from the thick mud and riverbed. After a heavy rain, when the river waters rise high, the tops of trees and
branches display the plastic bags they’ve managed to snag, like ragged flags blowing in the breeze. But all those bags are really just a fraction of the tonnage that finds its way down the river to empty into the sea.
It was on one of those river cleanups that I met a man named Marcus Eriksen, an exmarine turned scientist who had begun a lifelong study of ocean plastics. It was common at river cleanups to have educational displays, and Marcus was talking about the kayak he had built out of plastic bottles and had sailed down the mighty Mississippi River.
Curiosity drew me and my camera over to Marcus and his strange-looking vessel. He
enthusiastically told me about his next adventure; he intended to build an entire raft out of plastic bottles and sail it from Long Beach to Hawaii to bring attention to all the plastic accumulating in the North Pacific Gyre (a large clockwise circular pattern of ocean currents), something that was becoming known as "The Great Pacific Garbage Patch."
"How would you like to document it?" he asked me, and without having time to think about it, I said yes.
The plan was for Marcus and his conavigator, Joel Paschal, to build the raft and then sail it 2,600 miles to Hawaii. A team of volunteers, including Anna Cummins,
Marcus’ fiancé, all joined the effort to construct the raft.
Over the next six months, starting in January 2008, I would head down to Long Beach and photograph the next stage of the project. The Junk Raft, as it was being called, was going to be almost entirely built from recycled materials, so I might go down and photograph thousands of plastic bottles being stuffed into some fishing net that would be the raft’s pontoons, or the laying down of old masts to form the raft's basic platform. My favorite time was going to pick up an old Cessna airplane's fuselage from some scrapyard which was going to be used as the cockpit and living quarters for the voyage.
To this day, I am not sure if they carefully planned each stage of the construction or if it came together in some wonderfully synchronistic fashion. Either way, by June of that year, I was looking at a magnificently weird Kon-Tiki-like vessel made from 15,000 plastic bottles, an airplane, discarded fishing nets, and a solar generator.
The Junk raft had no motor, so it would need to be towed out to sea where it could catch the winds that would propel it the rest of the journey. The towboat would be the ORV Algalita, a beautiful, sleek catamaran captained by Capt. Charles Moore, the man credited for first discovering The Great Pacific Garbage Patch years ago on an earlier journey. Capt. Moore looked the part of captain as much as you
could imagine. Not that I have much seafaring cred, but it was easy to recognize the confidence he exuded, and that reassured me greatly for the journey that lay ahead.
On Sunday, June 1, we left Long Beach Harbor cheered on by dozens of supporters and onlookers. On the Algalita was Capt. Moore, Anna, myself, and a small crew. There was also a 60 Minutes crew from Australian TV that would join us for the first leg of the voyage to Catalina Island. Marcus and Joel remained on the raft which was towed about 50 feet behind us.
I have never been out on the Catalina Channel, but as the sun set, the unsettling lights of the numerous oil derricks began to brighten, and a pod of dolphins leapt
out of the water only to add a sad juxtaposition to this already strange experience.
We moored for the night at Catalina Island, let the 60 Minutes crew off, and then continued on our way the next morning. We spent the next day and a half traveling to our destination of San Nicolas Island, one of the small Channel Islands, where we planned to unhitch the raft and let the hopefully favorable winds take it the rest of the way.
The days are long at sea. On a smallish boat like the Algalita, you feel every wave, and they don’t stop coming.
I photographed what I could just to keep occupied, and when they unfurled the sail
for a test run in the late afternoon, I knew I had my money shot. My 300mm lens captured Joel standing beneath the mast as the waves undulated beneath both the raft and our ship.
I can tell you it is quite the challenge to photograph something rocking up as you are rocking down, and as you try to hold steady a long lens in fading light. But with my newly found sea legs and a barely settled stomach, I was able to get my shots.
We got to San Nicolas, but we received reports of strong gale winds heading our way, so the decision was made to keep the raft and boat together for the night and see what conditions were like in the morning. The sea started to get rough, but to keep the
raft from floating around uncontrollably, they decided to use an old sea trick and tie the raft to the kelp forest below.
As night settled in, the first mate took a rubber dinghy out to check on the raft. When he didn’t return we started to get worried. It was dark, windy, and we saw no sign of him. It was at that point that Capt. Moore uttered a phrase that I still remember sending shivers down my spine. He turned to me with a stoic but worried look and said, "At sea when things start to go bad, the situation can often deteriorate rapidly." Gulp!
Fortunately, an hour or so later, a faint light appeared on the water and grew brighter, and the first mate’s dinghy slowly made its way back to the boat. Engine trouble, but these were resourceful people, and in the pitch of night he fixed it and calmly made his way back.
Everyone was in a much brighter mood after that, and Marcus and Joel came over from the raft, and we all crowded into the ship’s small galley and ate a wonderful dinner. The plan was to return to Long Beach in the morning, leaving Joel and Marcus to head to Hawaii on the raft, but they soon discovered that some of the lids of the plastic bottles were leaking and the raft was in danger of sinking.
We would still head home, but then Capt. Moore, Anna, and some volunteers would need to make a return trip to Marcus, Joel, and the waiting raft to make the necessary repairs, which basically involved gluing the lids onto the bottles.
As we passed the Queen Mary entering the Long Beach harbor, I have to admit I was happy to be home. It was an incredible adventure, but I was looking forward to stepping on some solid ground. I wasn't there when the Junk Raft arrived in Hawaii, but the 8-week journey brought the international attention they wanted.
The photos I took were published around the world, in newspapers, magazines, and later in books and other recountings of the Junk's trip.
I went on to photograph other stories of
plastic and its impact on our waterways, and the animals and fish that live in and around it. It's a truly sad and unfortunately worsening situation. People like Marcus, Joel, Anna, Capt. Moore, and many others are working hard to research the effects on the oceans and hopefully encourage solutions to the problem.
It would be so nice at some point in the future for my son to walk down a beach near him, and all he sees at his feet are some colorful shells and seaweed, and not numerous particles of Styrofoam along the shoreline.
It was early on a Saturday morning and the water was infinite shades of aquamarine just off the beach. That week a package was delivered that had an underwater housing for my Sony a6300 camera made by the company, Salted Line. I was finally going to be able to share some of the amazing things I see while snorkeling in Barbados with friends and family back home.
This is a big deal. Living a life away from our loved ones puts more meaning on the reports we put out on social media. Whether it’s a vibrant rainbow, a drive to a new place, or just
pics of us out to dinner, these little messages in a digital bottle are our link to the States. So I thought why not share the undersea world with my camera in hand!
There are lots of ways to start your underwater photography journey. Small point-and-shoot type waterproof cameras with zoom and video do a great job. You can also get dive cases for your iPhone that are really well designed. I haven’t used one, but the reviews look solid. I chose the Salted Line a6XXX housing because I already had a Sony a6300 camera. I don’t want to say the camera was sitting around, but
it was kind of sitting around. Now it has a whole new life!
Since I was going to be putting something expensive into something slightly less expensive and then walking with it into the ocean, I figured that I needed to fight my natural behavior and actually read the manual. While this particular housing is a relatively “insert tab A into slot B” situation, there are a few things to learn about underwater gear. I found that taking my time to read and understand the instructions that were included with the equipment really helped build the confidence that I now have when going into the water with this setup.
Each manufacturer of underwater gear comes to it with a different design philosophy. They want to make sure that the camera functions can be manipulated while underwater, and that the photographer can capture their subjects with reasonable clarity and ease.
Housings from Nauticam, Aquatech, and Sea and Sea are similar to Salted Line, but each is unique, so from here on out I will be using my housing as a generalization for underwater camera housings. Please do not use this as an instruction manual for other housings. Even for my Salted Line housing, this is just a guide as to how I was able to get into the water with my camera.
On an average Saturday morning, after the workweek has slipped away and things are still quiet, Robyn and I get in the car around 6:45am and head to Carlisle Bay. She has an open water swim group that meets there, and I have what seems like the ocean to myself. Barbados has a wealth of sea life within a very short distance to shore. In Carlisle Bay particularly, there are Green Sea Turtles and Hawksbill Sea Turtles which are a major attraction for tourists. I get to see the turtles as they are foraging among the sea grass for their breakfast. Gently padding the sand as they move across the bottom, then gracefully propelling themselves toward the surface for a breath of air.
Many of you will identify with the feeling of seeing an animal in its natural habitat for the first time that you had previously only seen in pictures. For me it was amazing to see these
turtles. In addition, a whole world of life begins to reveal itself along the reef and shipwrecks. Dozens of species of fish, big and small. A Spotted Eagle Ray. Porcupinefish. Tarpon! Do you know how big a Tarpon seems when you’re in the same general vicinity? Big! So you can see why my enthusiasm for the ocean had led me to take my camera there.
A water housing can be fickle. As you can see in these images, it comes in two pieces. There is the front part where the camera sits, and then the back which seals into the front with two O-rings along the perimeter, all secured by a set of latches with spring-set safety levers. One mustn’t get excited and attempt to open the housing underwater. That would be bad.
After confirming a fresh battery and memory card are in the camera, the procedure to install
the camera into the housing is relatively straightforward.
1. Make sure your port (the name of the optically clear window at the front where the lens points) is clean inside and out.
2. Gently seat the camera into the housing where the rubber guides stabilize it so that various waterproof switches and buttons can translate their motion to control the camera controls while you are in the water.
3. Double check to make sure the Orings to which you gave a very light coat of silicone grease are still free of any sand, dirt, dust, or debris.
4. Carefully align the back of the housing with the front and press the two together.
5. Bring the locking latches on either
side of the housing up to meet their respective catch, and lock them closed.
Simple, right? Seriously, it’s not that bad. I’ve never had my housing leak and if it did, there is a moisture activated alarm on the inside. Hope to never hear that go off!
My housing lets me go a step further. After it’s all buttoned up, I have a vacuum sensor which is installed on top of the housing. I push a button and a red light begins to blink on the sensor. Then I use a hand-operated vacuum pump to create a negative pressure environment inside the housing. When the light turns green (the trap is clean) I leave it for about five minutes to see if anything is leaking. If there is a leak, the pressure will equalize and the light will turn back to red. If there are no leaks and the vacuum remains, the light stays green and you’re good to go! I make sure to do all of this the night before I head out.
As far as camera settings, since I am just getting started with underwater photography, I am keeping it simple in order to focus on the
environment and composition. I am using a modified auto program where I have the white balance set to “underwater” (this may be a creative program setting on your camera), I set exposure compensation to +1 stop, and make sure I’m shooting RAW. A lot of cameras when you switch to auto or program mode it switches back to shooting JPG.
Honestly, the rest of it is just like making photographs anywhere else. You look for opportunities to achieve an interesting composition, and wait. It’s kind of like street photography. You set up and let the subjects fill your frame, then shoot.
I’ve found that if I go chasing after the fish, turtles, rays, or whatever, I just end up swimming around and the enjoyment of the experience becomes as fleeting as the wildlife. If I am able to settle in and enjoy the calm of being in the ocean first, then start shooting, that usually yields better results and I have more fun. What has been amazing are the times when I am focused on something, then turn around and a sea turtle or a ray are literally a couple of feet from me, just checking out what this uncoordinated splashy thing with the window and tube on its face is doing in their house. At the end of the day,
having good images to share from my time in the water is great, but it’s the time spent in the ocean that does the most good.
As with anything, your equipment may be different, your method and practice will be different, your goals for image-making will be different than mine. It has been truly rewarding to take a camera into the ocean with me. I look forward to getting better photos and spending time with lots of interesting creatures of the sea as I continue to learn. I hope that some small part of this article or any underwater photos you have seen from me or any other photographer will inspire you to give it a try when the opportunity arises. It’s great fun.
We have some great articles about photographing over- and under-water in this issue of Focal Points Magazine. They are so good in fact that I wanted to go to the shore, camera and tripod in hand. I did the next best thing and looked at images, read blogs and reviews, and looked at videos. Below are a few I especially liked.
Seascapes and Coastal Photography Webinar, Out of Chicago
December 1, 2022, 1:02:43
I’m a big fan of Out of Chicago and attend their webinars and workshops when I can, so I looked there first. I stumbled on their hour-long webinar in which several of my favorite photographers “share their most inspiring coastal images and the process behind their creation.”
Simple Tips to Improve your Ocean Photography, Seawildearth
2023, 24:25
Mark Thorpe, an Emmy Award-winning wildlife cameraman, gives specific information on how he photographs the ocean. I found myself taking notes!
Underwater Photography: A Beginner’s Guide, Larry Cohen and Olga Torrey, B&H Event Space
August 8, 2020, 59:08
Larry and Olga provide an in-depth introduction to photography underwater. They go over camera options, underwater housing, lighting, camera settings among other things.
10 Surf Photography Tips to Get Yourself to the Next Level, Tom Woods
2020, 12:43
I’m not interested in taking surfing photographs but thought I’d watch a couple of video tutorials, and discovered there is much to learn beyond the subject of surfing. This was my favorite.
A great opportunity to go on a safari crossed my path last year, so my wife and I signed up and checked off a bucket list item. I didn't really do any homework, and I just trusted the person leading the trip and went with it. We went to Kenya, specifically the Masai Mara and Amboselli National Park. Just for those who haven't been, the Mara is the Kenyan half of the region that, in Tanzania, is known as the Serengeti. Same habitat. The Masai are the indigenous people in the area, known historically as great warriors, and today they are great guides.
Having never been to Africa before, we had a wonderful time, and I was able to see and photograph 152 species (119 bird species, 29 mammal species, and 4 reptiles). We saw the big 5 {lions, leopards, rhinos, cape buffalos, and elephants}, and all of the big 3 cats {add cheetahs}. I was even fortunate enough to see and get shots of a cheetah kill (which, I understand, is not for everyone).
Do more homework than I did. We went to arguably the most visited site for safaris in Africa. The Masai guides do a great job of finding the aforementioned species, but they drive roughshod over the land, leaving tracks, and seemingly harming the savannah in the process. I'd recommend finding a place less
trafficked. I don't know if that exists, but I'd at least look.
Also because there was so many people there, I saw several examples of what I would call the paparazzi effect; many jeeps converging on single animals of interest. For example, rhinos are relatively rare, and when one was spotted, about 25 jeeps raced to the scene and encircled it. It was a fairly large circle, so there was a good 200' or more between jeeps, but the animal knew it was surrounded, ran away from the first jeeps to arrive, and then as more arrived, it ran away from those, and when finally stopped, in the center, it turned haltingly to look for a way out, and about that time we left. It was pretty disturbing.
Another example was when a leopard was carrying its newborn cub to a safer den. Apparently, they give birth in a relatively open den in the savannah. Its messy, so after they clean up the cubs, they carry them to a safer den hidden in the brush. To get there, they carry the cubs one at a time, often along the roads (tire tracks). The guides, knowing that, park on the road and on either side of it, forming a semicircle, of up to 30 or 40 jeeps and wait on the approaching leopard. They're packed so tight that the leopard cannot go between them, and has to carry the cub under one of the jeeps. Also very disturbing. And it gets worse; as the cat passes the ends of the
semicircle, those jeeps speed off down the road to secure better positions for the next semicircle, which repeats until the cat disappears into the brush.
Finally, we joined a group of jeeps following along with a pair of cheetah brothers who were hunting. I'm no expert, but I'm thinking that cats hunt by being somewhat stealthy. Having 20 diesel jeeps for an escort sort of reveals the secret, and at best, I would imagine that dinner was late that night. I would tell you that this was also disturbing, but honestly, I didn't think about it in real time. After I got home and was looking at my photos, it finally dawned on me that we were interfering with their dinners.
I get it. I understand that the tourist industry is the only thing between developers or ranchers and the wildlife, and that guides and safari organizers are trying to please their clients by getting to the perfect location for the shot/view. I understand that most people going on a safari have the big 5 and the big 3 cats as their primary target species. And I understand why there is no hiking out there and the drivers have to drive over the unspoiled land (you are not allowed out of the vehicles due to a number of dangerous predators throughout the area).
But I think those behaviors are short-sighted. First, I think its up to visitors to more evenly distribute themselves across Africa; its a huge continent with many wonderful parks and reserves. Second, I think the Kenyan Govt
needs to establish rules (presumably the same for other Govts), the guides need to establish some form of etiquette and self-policing that minimizes the paparazzi effect, and tourists themselves need to lower their expectations and/or invest in longer lenses and better cameras and learn how to use them, so the guides don't need to get so close. If you shoot with a cell phone, expect to see a blurry speck.
Frankly, I don't think any of this is going to happen, but the readers of this magazine include many who do travel for wildlife photography. I'm not suggesting anyone forego a bucket list trip like ours, but I do wish I had researched it a bit more and gone somewhere further from the beaten track. Also, when the guides take you to a site with one of the big 5 or the big 3, and while your fellow travelers are looking or shooting out one side of the jeep, be sure look out the other side too; there are so many other beautiful animals out there. And don't be afraid to tell your trip leader or guides that you're interested in stopping and seeing other animals (than the big 5 or big 3). Its only if enough people do that, will the paparazzi effect begin to diminish, and the word will spread of the many other wonders in Africa.
Below, are a few images to enjoy. You're welcome to see these and many more from my 1 (and likely only) safari here. I always recommend viewing the website on the largest monitor you have to appreciate the higher resolution.
About twenty years ago a colleague at UCLA brought me a 16x20 print of one of his digital images. Pointing to an area in the otherwise smooth blue sky of his photograph, he wondered, “what is this pattern that is almost but not entirely unlike grain?” I had no clue. I ventured that it might be electronic distortion, and as a former rock-n-roll musician he understood what I meant.
It was noise. At a technical level, noise is a highly complicated phenomenon (see the Wikipedia entry on “Camera Noise”). For practical purposes, we can think of it like static. It is generated by the electronic processes that create the image file, just as grain is generated by the chemical processes that create a negative. We live with it.
Noise has become less of an issue as camera sensors, firmware, and software have become more sophisticated over the last twenty years. It is still something we need to consider when planning a shoot, however. Under low-light conditions like indoor sporting events or wildlife at dusk, it’s a good idea to have a strategy for dealing with the resulting images.
Why should we “fix” noise? And is it cheating to do so? I think there are two reasons to fix it. One is purely aesthetic. I like to have control over the amount of “grain” in my photographs. My personal preference is not much at all, but I also don’t want it perfectly smooth. It should look like a photograph and not an acrylic.
The second reason is cost. With more time, more expensive equipment, and an expert support staff I might be able to make photographs that look just fine without noise reduction. I don’t have the resources to pull that off, so I use the tools within my reach to achieve the same goal.
It isn’t cheating. None of us sees noise when we are in the field, and we are not adding smoothness to a scene by reducing noise. We are overcoming the limitations of our gear, limitations which are a moving goalpost. My latest camera has a maximum ISO of 25600. In low light it can capture wildlife and people with color fidelity and sharpness that were once were impossible. No one would say that shooting those images today is cheating just because we couldn’t have made them forty years ago. The same can be said for software that reduces the resultant noise. The images produced accurately represent what we saw.
There are multiple approaches to dealing with noise; I will address just two. One is to manually adjust the image. This results in local blurring to blend the noise together, along with a suppression of primary colors in favor of the locally dominant tone. The second, modern approach is artificial intelligence (AI). The software makes a highly educated guess about the subject of your image, and removes noise that does not support its guess. Both of these methods are available in the latest version
of Lightroom. Topaz DeNoise AI only does the second one.
In Lightroom Classic 12.3 and later, both the manual and AI methods are contained in the Detail panel of the Develop module (in previous versions only the manual method was available). The manual method is nondestructive, and has several sliders that address two kinds of noise: Luminance and Color.
Luminance Noise is the analog of film grain. It’s monochromatic, and reducing it also reduces the sharpness of the image. Color noise is a mosaic of primary colors, and reducing it does not significantly affect the underlying image quality. It’s the same image, but without color noise.
The AI method is listed simply as “Denoise….” In Lightroom it works only on
RAW files, and produces a separate DNG file. When you click the button you get a dialog with limited options for reducing noise. It’s an improvement over the manual method of noise reduction in that it retains sharpness while reducing noise, but it’s also a bit slow. For more detail there is a good tutorial here: https://digital-photography-school.com/howto-do-noise-reduction-in-lightroom/
Topaz DeNoise AI is primarily a noise reduction package, but it also includes algorithms to sharpen images. It works on RAW, TIF, JPEG, and other image files. It can be run as a stand-alone program, or if it’s installed as a plug-in with Adobe products it can be launched from within Lightroom and Photoshop. When launched, you see the image you are working on and the option of changing the way the image is displayed. I
prefer to use the 4-Gang view, so I can see different effects on the screen at once. Using this view also lets me know which methods are wrong for a given scene. The software also allows me much more variability than Lightroom’s version does.
I tried these tools out on a photograph I shot on vacation a few years ago. It’s a modern “gather round the hearth” tableau, with everyone watching a video produced by one of the children. It was an hour after sundown on the east side of a cabin in the woods, and the scene was lit by just two sources: a porch light and the iPad on which the video was displayed. My exposure was 1/20th sec @ f2.8, ISO 25600. The proud father’s face is visible in the shadow at the far end of the table.
Without any treatment of the noise the image looks as expected. It is grainy, with a mosaic of the three primary colors that make up the camera sensor. When I used the manual adjustment tools in Lightroom I was able to eliminate the color noise and somewhat reduce the graininess. Reducing graininess comes at the cost of sharpness, however, so one must strike a balance between the two.
When I applied Lightroom’s Denoise algorithm the results are more satisfactory. The color mosaic is gone, as is most of the grain. The AI apparently recognized these objects as human faces, and sharpened some of the features while retaining the overall feeling that this is a low-light photograph. When I applied Topaz DeNoise AI to the same image, the
results were unappealing. The image looks artificial, the faces plastic, like Google Earth’s 3D depiction of the landscape. For this particular photograph I prefer Lightroom AI.
For some other photos, though, I prefer Topaz DeNoise AI. When we went to Kenya I knew two things: I needed a hand-holdable telephoto zoom with a good vibration reduction system; and I was going to need denoise software when I got home. When we returned I purchased Topaz DeNoise AI (Lightroom’s AI offering wasn’t available yet), and I found it to be the perfect tool.
Why is Topaz perfect? For the same reason it was not perfect in the previous photographs. It tries to sharpen details while reducing noise. When there is no detail to sharpen (like my friend’s face) it makes things up. When there is detail, like the coat
of an animal, it enhances the detail without looking fake.
This came in very handy for the photographs we shot in Amboseli on the last day of our Kenya trip. About one-hour before sunset our guide spotted a cheetah family in the shade of a tree. As the sun dipped below the horizon the mother led her four cubs to a small hill, from which they looked around for dinner. I was shooting with a 100-400 Tamron zoom lens at 400mm, handholding it at 1/250 sec @ f8.0 with vibration control turned on. Even at 400mm the cats filled a small portion of the frame, yet I still got usable raw images.
When processed using Lightroom Denoise the image smooths out, and some of the details show better definition. Had Lightroom Denoise been available when we came back
from Kenya I might not have purchased Topaz, but it wasn’t. LR Denoise gets me 90% of the way to finished, and Topaz gets me 95% of the way. The catchlights are sharp and clean, the dark markings on their faces are distinct, and their fur is tangible. To me it feels like Topaz DeNoise AI gave me a better, longer lens to shoot with.
My approach to photography can generally be described as “get it right in the camera.” This is a holdover to film days when the choice of camera, lens, lightsource, and film determined the quality of the shot. I still follow that approach in my landscape work, but sometimes I also follow the “shoot it first, fix it later” approach. In the darkroom I used different developers to rescue my film, and different treatments to rescue my prints. Denoise is clearly part of that tradition.
When we go to the ocean it’s about doing little, listening to the waves, watching sunrise and sunsets and good seafood. And of course for me watching the light. Our two favorite locations are Cannon Beach and Bandon, both in Oregon.
Born and raised in New York City, Peter picked up his first camera and took his first darkroom class at the age of twelve.
Peter spent many years working as a travel photographer, and in 2000 started his own photo agency, Ambient Images. In 2015 he formed Citizen of the Planet, LLC, devoted exclusively to the distribution of his stories and photographs that focus on a variety of environmental subjects.
Peter’s editorial work has appeared in many publications including the New York Times, Time, Newsweek, National Geographic, Sunset Magazine, Los Angeles Magazine, and New York Magazine. His prints hang in the California State Capitol, California Science Center’s permanent Ecosystem exhibit, and many other museums, private institutions, and collector’s homes. He has also worked with a numerous local environmental organizations over the years including FoLAR (Friends of the LA River), The Sierra Club, Greenpeace, Heal the Bay, 5 Gyres Institute, Algalita Marine Research Foundation, Communities for a Better Environment, and the LA Conservation Corps.
Peter has been an instructor for over fifteen years at the Los Angeles Center of Photography, and for years led their Los Angeles River Photo Adventure tour.
Los Angeles is where cinematographer and commercial photographer Bob Beresh will always call home, but having relocated to Barbados after living in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, he is truly a global creative.
Bob served two years as US Forest Service Artist in Residence to interpret and showcase the beauty of the Angeles National Forest. He is past Chairman of the Sierra Club Camera Committee, Angeles Chapter and a member of the International Society for Aviation Photography.
His fine art has benefitted nonprofit organizations and been sold at benefit auctions including the Leica Gallery Los Angeles. His first solo exhibition debuted in Los Angeles in October 2015.
Bob’s photos have been published in numerous automotive, aviation, entertainment industry, and luxury travel magazines, as well as the book, "The Art and Making of The Dark Knight Trilogy" by Jody Duncan Jesser and Janine Pourroy. Bob's work appears on the websites of Arizona Highways,
National Geographic, and the sites of his numerous corporate clients.
Previously, Bob worked for over twenty years in the motion picture and television business. He served business roles with Paramount, Sony, and Warner Bros. prior to starting his creative services company. bentriver.co
bobbereshstudio.com
Bonnie Blake
Bonnie Blake is a fine art photographer based in Los Angeles with roots in Louisville, Kentucky and New York City. In contrast to her years collaborating as a motion picture camera operator on television, features and the TED talks, her still photography expresses her own observations about what, as Robert Adams wrote, “astonishes” her in the beauty of the natural world.
She uses a documentary approach as well as intentional camera movement to create traditional images as well as conceptual collages. Her belief that beauty can be an agent of change inspires her to express her concern about the destruction of these lands from climate change. She hopes to use her photography to propel action toward preserving these treasured places.
Her work has been exhibited at the Photo Place Gallery in Middlebury, Vermont, the Praxis Gallery in Minneapolis and the Duncan Miller Online Gallery. She was awarded honorable mention in the 2020 Creative Portrait Exhibit at the Los Angeles Center of Photography. Currently she has a photograph in the Unbound12! Exhibit at the Candela Gallery in Richmond, Virginia.
Alison Boyle
Photography has brought so many meaningful things to my life. It is fun, challenging, and most importantly, it fulfills my need to create. It is the reason I joined the Sierra Club Camera Committee (SCCC). The SCCC led me to cherished friends and my soulmate.
Creating an image where the light, the beauty of the subject and the right perspective are in perfect harmony is one of life’s greatest joys for me. Tide pools give me infinite marine life subjects and coastal locations to explore. This body of work is on a very small scale and very intimate. The beauty of the Sierra Nevada mountains leaves me filled with awe. This work is on the grandest of scale and challenges me physically when hiking to these other-worldly locations.
I am a UCLA Health retiree as of 2023. I had a fulfilling career as a licensed Clinical Laboratory Scientist spending time working in hematology, HIV research, molecular pathology, serology and virology. I’ll never stop being a scientist. Science informs my photographic subjects and continually motivates me to delve deeper.
I started out life as a Jersey girl but I was adopted just after college and consider myself a California girl now.
Instagram: @californiacominghome
Email: alisoniboyle@icloud.com
John Clement
John Clement began his career in photography in the early 70’s after graduating from Central Washington University with a double major in Geology and Geography. Since then he has earned a Masters of Photography from the Professional Photographers of America. He has received over 65 regional, national and international awards for his pictorial and commercial work. His photographs grace the walls of many businesses in the Northwest and has been published in numerous calendars and coffee table books. Clement has provided photographs for Country Music Magazine and Northwest Travel Magazine. He has supplied murals for the Seattle Seahawks Stadium and images for The Carousel of Dreams in Kennewick, WA.
Current projects include 17 – 4x8 foot glass panels featuring his landscapes in Eastern Washington for the Pasco Airport Remodel. Last year he finished a major project for the Othello Medical Clinic where almost 200 images were used to decorate the facilities. www.johnclementgallery.com
John Clement Photography (Face Book) Allied Arts Gallery in Richland, WA.
Thomas Cloutier
Thomas Cloutier has been with SCCC since 2001, and he has been contributing to Focal Points Magazine since that time.
Cloutier’s interest in photography coincides with his interest in travel and giving representation to nature landscapes. His formal education in photography comes from CSU Long Beach. At present Cloutier is a volunteer at CSU, Long Beach where he taught Water Colors and Drawing at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI), designed for Seniors over 45. He also is a docent at Kleefield Contemporary Museum CSU Long Beach. He is Liaison for the Art And Design Departments for a scholarship program for students at CSU Long Beach, Fine Arts Affiliates, FineArtsAffiliates.org.
Steven Cohen
I am a past chair of the Camera Committee. I have been photographing for 40 years and i specialize in B&W film imaging. Recently I have embraced digital imaging and I also do digital printing. My Santa Monica at Night project is in the works and a book will be available soon.
Joe Doherty
Joe Doherty grew up in Los Angeles and developed his first roll of film in 1972. He has been a visual communicator ever since.
Doherty spent his teens and twenties working in photography, most of it behind a camera as a freelance editorial shooter.
He switched careers when his son was born, earning a PhD in Political Science from UCLA. This led to an opportunity to run a research center at UCLA Law. After retiring from UCLA in 2016, Doherty did some consulting, but now he and his wife, Velda Ruddock, spend much of their time in the field, across the West, capturing the landscape.
www.joedohertyphotography.com
John Fisanotti was a photography major in his first three years of college. He has used 35mm, 2-1/4 medium format and 4x5 view cameras. He worked briefly in a commercial photo laboratory. In 1980, Fisanotti pivoted from photography and began his 32-year career in public service. Fisanotti worked for Redevelopment Agencies at four different Southern California cities.
After retiring from public service in 2012, Fisanotti continued his photographic interests. He concentrates on outdoors, landscape, travel and astronomical images (view here at http://www. johnfisanottiphotography.com). Since 2018, he expanded his repertoire to include architectural and real estate photography (view here at http://www. architecturalphotosbyfisanotti.com).
Fisanotti lives In La Crescenta and can be contacted at either: jfisanotti@sbcglobal.net or fisanottifotos@gmail.com
Beverly Houwing loves traveling and photography, which has taken her to 80 countries and every continent. Most often she visits Africa since she loves spending time in remote wilderness locations where there is lots of wildlife and unique landscapes. Her
images have been featured in numerous Africa Geographic articles, as well as in Smithsonian and the Annenberg Space for Photography exhibits. Her photographs have also been used for promoting conservation by many non-profit organizations, including National Wildlife Federation, National Parks Conservation Association, Crane Trust, National Audubon Society and Department of the Interior. Beverly is an Adobe Certified Instructor, so when she’s not out on a photography adventure she conducts training on their software programs and does freelance graphic design and production work.
Larry Miller bought his first SLR camera in 1985 to document hikes in the local mountains. In fact, his first Sierra Club Camera Committee outing was a wildflower photo shoot in the Santa Monica Mountains led by Steve Cohen in 1991. Since then the SCCC has introduced him to many other scenic destinations, including the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve, the Gorman hills, and Saddleback Butte State Park.
Miller’s own photography trips gradually expanded in scope over the years to include most of the western National Parks and National Monuments, with the Colorado Plateau becoming a personal favorite.
Photography took a backseat to Miller’s career during the 32+ years that he worked as a radar systems engineer at Hughes Aircraft/Raytheon Company.
Since retiring in 2013, he has been able to devote more time to developing his photographic skills. Experiencing and sharing the beauty of nature continues to be Miller’s primary motivation.
lemiller49@gmail.com
John Nilsson has a fond memory of his father dragging him to the Denver Museum of Natural History on a winter Sunday afternoon. His father had just purchased a Bosely 35mm camera and had decided he desperately wanted to photograph one of the dioramas of several Seal Lions in a beautiful blue half-light of the Arctic winter. The photo required a tricky long exposure and the transparency his father showed him several weeks later was spectacular and mysterious to Nilsson’s young eyes. Although the demands of Medical School made this photo one of the first and last Nilsson’s Dad shot, at five years old the son was hooked.
The arrival of the digital age brought photography back to Nilsson as a conscious endeavor - first as a
pastime enjoyed with friends who were also afflicted, and then as a practitioner of real estate and architectural photography during his 40 years as a real estate broker.
Since retiring and moving to Los Angeles, Nilsson continued his hobby as a nature and landscape photographer through active membership in the Sierra Club Angeles Chapter Camera Committee, as well as his vocation as a real estate photographer through his company Oz Images LA. The camera is now a tool for adventure! www.OzImagesLA.com
My father taught me photography at the age of 14, and I shot landscapes while backpacking until my early 20s, and then I hung it up.I even had my own dark room for a while.When digital arrived in my early 50s, it rekindled my interest.At first it was landscapes again, but after I captured a few birds, it occurred to me that I could ID the species.After about 10 species, I decided to join some bird photography walks, and after about 30 species, I wondered what it would take to get to 100.After retiring, it became my passion.My count is now around 525, and I travel locally and worldwide for wildlife photography.With degrees in biochemistry (half biology and half chemistry) and electrical engineering, I love being out in Nature and exploring photography technology.There are endless things to learn, an entirely new community, and good exercise too!Although I no longer have a presence on FB or IG, I do send out occasional emails with photos, or a link to my Flickr page to friends, and folks I've met along the trail.I hope it encourages people to value wildlife.
paulreinstein@me.com
www.flickr.com/photos/preinstein54/albums
Velda Ruddock
Creativity has always been important to Velda Ruddock. She received her first Brownie camera for her twelfth birthday and can’t remember a time she’s been without a camera close at hand.
Ruddock studied social sciences and art, and later earned a Masters degree in Information and Library Science degree from San Jose State University. All of her jobs allowed her to be creative, entrepreneurial, and innovative. For the last 22 years of her research career she was Director of Intelligence for a global advertising and marketing agency. TBWA\Chiat\Day helped clients such as Apple, Nissan, Pepsi, Gatorade, Energizer, and many more, and she was considered a leader in my field.
During their time off, she and her husband, Joe Doherty, would travel, photographing family, events and locations. However, in 2011 they traveled to the Eastern Sierra for the fall colors, and although they didn’t realize it at the time, when the sun came up over Lake Sabrina, it was the start of changing their careers. By 2016 Ruddock and Doherty had both left their “day jobs,” and started traveling – and shooting nature – big and small – extensively. Their four-wheel-drive popup camper allows them to go to areas a regular car can’t go and they were – and are – always looking for their next adventure.
www.veldaruddock.com
VeldaRuddockPhotography@gmail.com
Rebecca Wilks
Photography has always been some kind of magic for me, from the alchemy of the darkroom in my teens to the revelation of my first digital camera (a Sony Mavica, whose maximum file size was about 70KB) to the new possibilities that come from my “tall tripod” (drone.)
Many years later, the camera still leads me to unique viewpoints and a meditative way to interact with nature, people, color, and emotion. The magic remains. The natural world is my favorite subject, but I love to experiment and to do cultural and portrait photography when I travel. I volunteer with Through Each Other’s Eyes, a nonprofit which creates cultural exchanges through photography, and enjoy working with other favorite nonprofits, including my local Meals on Wheels program and Cooperative for Education, supporting literacy in Guatemala.
My work has been published in Arizona Highways Magazine, calendars, and books, as well as Budget Travel, Cowboys and Indians, and Rotarian Magazines, and even Popular Woodworking.
I'm an MD, retired from the practice of Obstetrics and Gynecology and Medical Acupuncture. I live in the mountains of central Arizona with my husband and Gypsy the Wonder Dog.
Bird of Paradise © Steven Cohen
