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Two-Humped Camel

Shot this two-humped camel at the San Diego Zoo. I panned the zoo in my zoo review over at my other blog. While gaining access to many animals for photographs is a chore at the zoo, there are some animals that can wonder right in front of your camera. One such animal is the two-humped camel, or the Bactrian camels of Mongolia.

These camels grow to a height of 8 feet and weigh well over 1000 pounds. Unlike Arabian camels (one humpers), the Bactrian wonders wild through the Gobi Desert in Northwestern China. They've been around forever--since 2500 BC.

So what's inside those two flabby humps. Well, you got it--fat, not water like one would think.

I've got a great pic of the other kind of camel--the Dromedaries-- the one you find in the Arab world. This one-humped camel is domesticated and can carry heavy loads long distances across the desert.

You just gotta love camels!

desert photos

Another Review for 50 Greatest Photo Opportunities in San Francisco

Matthew Bamberg, "The 50 Greatest Photo Opportunities in San Francisco," Course Technology and Cengage Learning, 2009. Can. $34.95/U.S. $29.99



Review by David D. Perlmutter, Ph.D. (School of Journalism & Mass Communications, University of Kansas)

I admit it--I have become a "snapista."

Long ago, I gave up treating family vacations and tourist travel as opportunities for innovative and interesting photography. Although I am a documentary visual ethnographer, I found that such vistas as the Grand Canyon, the Eiffel Tower, and the Golden Gate Bridge had become so familiar and their environments so darn crowded that I was either too lazy or too unengaged to try to stalk out some angle, moment, or scene that was different from those in the thousands of other tourists' snapshots. My solution was either to take the traditional "National Lampoon Vacation" photos of my family with the iconic locale in the background or to purchase slides at a local souvenir shop.

Matthew Bamberg's new book, "The 50 Greatest Photo Opportunities in San Francisco," from Course Technology and Cengage Learning, has made me rethink my sloth and indifference. Simply put, it is a terrific idea for rejuvenating photography from its present-day digital ghetto, where the average tourists simply shoot everything in sight and delete later or maybe asks their teenage daughter to Photoshop the remainders.

But for people who actually want to produce different (and better) photographs from the same scenes, "50 Greatest" is a gift from the gods of "writing with light." The entries are clearly laid out, organized in chapters by type of photo opportunity, such as Architecture (Bay Bridge, Chinatown, AT&T Park), City Life (Fisherman's Wharf, Haight-Ashbury, Embarcadero), Events (the farmer's market, the Gay Pride parade), parks and green spaces (Japanese tea gardens, ocean grove, Lands End) and Secret Places (Balmy Alley, the Presidio graveyard, and the Musee Mechanique).

Each subsection about a particular place or event is interspersed with compact and handy photo tips aimed at the non-pro who nevertheless wants to shoot high-quality and visually interesting pictures. So, for example, there are mini-essays on gear and lighting; other sidebar sections include bits of either local color or photographic wisdom, such as notations on the "rule of thirds," the "ins and outs of exposure compensation," and "photographing San Francisco landscapes."

Even more helpful is the coding for individual settings, with icons suggesting the "optimal photographic conditions based on the weather," such as "overcast" or "foggy." There is also a description of the place or event, a bit of history, a delineation of its boundaries or periods of occurrence, and some brief tips about "the shot."

Bamberg's writing style is clear, without showing off his professional chops to the detriment of amateur comprehension. For example, in describing getting a picture of the Coit Tower, he writes, "The front of the tower at sunset is a good time to photograph Coit Tower because the sun shines on the face and the sky is blue in back. Getting this shot is a bit tricky because there are many trees near the tower. For this reason, zoom in as close as you can to the tower so that it is cropped tightly, without any tree branches in the background. Another alternative is to frame just the top of the tower in a shot."

In this case, as in all instances of when he focuses on a building or structure, Bamberg provides a separate description for interior shooting. Especially helpful for the outsider is a description of "getting there."

In all, this is a book that will be appreciated most by the ambitious amateur, who will absorb tactics and tips more easily from its gentle suggestions and be excited at the prospect of learning through shooting one of the world's most beautiful and visually arresting cities and its environs. Even the pro, visiting San Francisco for the first time, or not well versed in some of its secret places, will get some helpful suggestions, especially on optimum weather conditions.

"The 50 Greatest Photo Opportunities in San Francisco" is an easy-to-read, colorful, helpful primer for the urban explorer who seeks to produce pictures beyond the usual frames and subjects.



DAVID D. PERLMUTTER is a professor at the William Allen White School of Journalism & Mass Communications, University of Kansas. A documentary photographer, he is the author or editor of seven books on political communication and persuasion including most recently, Picturing China in the American Press: The Visual Portrayal of Sino-American Relations in Time Magazine, 1949-1973 (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007); (ed., with John Hamilton) From Pigeons to News Portals: Foreign Reporting and the Challenge of New Technology (LSU Press, 2007), and Blogwars: The New Political Battleground (Oxford, 2008).

The Best of SF--Get My Book!

To All Digital Traveler Visitors,

If you've got an inkling to learn about photography and enjoy San Francisco, consider getting my new book,

50 Greatest Photo Opportunities in San Francisco.

It's an exciting way to see San Francisco if you can't get there right away, and if you can follow the photography trips outlined in the book.

Two Kids

Here are two kids who, when I walked by them with my Canon 5D, called out at me, insisting that I take their picture.

I agreed wholeheartedly because they were excellent subjects. They immediately positioned themselves into a fabulous pose when I held my camera up to take their picture.

They asked if I was famous and if their picture was going to be published. I told them that maybe it would be. I haven't put this picture into any of my books yet, but am planning to use it in future books.

The picture was taken on a beach in San Juan, Puerto Rico.

A Danish Freetown

Take a look at those shapes. These are a dandy-looking bunch of cut up logs in the Christiana neighborhood of Copenhagen, Denmark. Please take in all the geometry going on in the photo--it's so...so mathematical.

If you ever get to Copenhagen, this is the cool place to go. It's a hippie's dream come true. It's a land of granola and yoga, and, yes, to be sure, a stoned out hippie here and there.

Pusher Street is the area's main street, a free place where you used to be able to buy some good drugs, but all that stopped in 2004 when the government cracked down on drug vending in the area.

If you go, put on a good pair of walking shoes because the place at 85 acres is huge. The benefits of spending at least a couple of hours in Christiana in the summer are finding lots of surprises in many nooks and crannies of the green areas that surround the large lake. You'll find elaborate homemade gardens and small homes made of glass. There are even tree houses.

Musing in Vegas

Deep in the mall wilds are the Las Vegas girls--performers who dress up in ghostly costumes with faux Roman accents. They're made up to look like some non-human subject matter caked with thick foundation on their faces and hair done up like Medusa. Downright scary. Now, I could go into a diatribe about the objectification of women, but since this is a photography blog, I'll leave that one alone.

Vegas all-things-not-real land of plenty--for those with no money there are 5-minute long shows up and down the Strip and inside the some dozen malls that wind their way around huge money-sucking casinos. For those with a fistful of bumbling dollars, there is a $350 seat inside the Cher rotunda--yes the grand, black-haired lady has a colosseum that she can call her very own.

A few short years ago when my pockets bulged with money from refinancing transactions, I could catch a show or two in a quick weekend jaunt to Naughtyland, but this trip, during the time when the nation is in a downward economic spiral and money is scarce, all I got to see is women with solidly-packed mud masks in their faces and hair.

Shadows Please

I don't know about you, but I always love a good set of shadows. Many shadows consist of vertical and/or horizontal lines. Others come diagonal lines or curves. Here's how some of these lines/shapes influence your photograph:

THE VERTICAL LINE
It denotes dignity, height, strength and grandeur.
THE HORIZONTAL LINE
Denotes Repose, Calm, tranquility and peacefulness,
THE DIAGONAL LINE
This line gives the sensation of force, energy and motion like in the picture above.
THE CURVE
The curve is a shape of beauty and charm like a shadow of a woman's body.

My New Word Press Blog

Just decided to start a new blog over at Wordpress. Check it out; they have a little different set up than blogger does.

To get there go here.

Valley of Fire

About an hour northeast of Las Vegas is the Valley of Fire, a red rock wonderland. It's just off Highway 15 at Exit 75.

This is a great trip for photographers to take, especially if they want to take a break from Las Vegas' bright lights and casino action.

A word to the wise--bring your tripod. Landscape shots at smaller apertures come out much sharper if there's no camera shake.

Another handy tool to bring is a circular polarizer lens. This will get you a bluer sky and redder rocks.

Antigua West Indies Art

In the Caribbean architecture is painted bright colors. I like the colors, but don't really know if I like the blue sky with the purple architectural accessory.

Out of all the islands in the Caribbean that I've traveled to, I think Antigua is the most beautiful. The city of St. Johns is definitely one of the better cities there. Lots of people go to the Caribbean expecting something like the French Rivera. Well, there's no comparison, the French Rivera is much nicer and has much more to do.

One has to remember that most of the Caribbean Islands are third world. Some are way worse then others. The city of Castries in St. Lucia, for example, is a nightmare. There's really no where to go there and there is almost nothing to photograph.

Antigua is filled with photo ops. Antigua and Barbuda make up their own country. They are not a territory of any large nation like St. Thomas (US), Martinique (French) and St. Martin (French and Dutch) are.

Go ahead and click on the comments and tell me what you think of the color in this photograph. Do you think the sky matches the color of the building?

Shallow Depth of Field

With several inches of sharpness in this photo, the depth of field (DOF) is shallow. I took this picture in aperture priority mode (Av on the dial on Canon dSLR cameras) with an f/stop of 4. An f/stop of 4 means that the aperture of the camera lens was open wide. When apertures are open wide, depths of field tend to be small. Small or shallow depths of field means that only a small part of the frame is sharp with the rest of the frame filled with blur.

To get this shot I used auto-focus and set the auto-focus point in the middle of the frame. That's why the sharpness comes in the middle of the frame. Had I set the auto-focus point at the top of the frame, that part of the frame would be sharp and the rest of the frame would be blurred.

Oh, this picture of the top of a wall was taken at the oldest church in Barbados. 

Put some links to your pictures with shallow depths of field in the Comments section of this blog.