Botswana 2008

This year's Botswana's trip had a number of surprises.  On arrival at Savuti we found the Savuti Channel flowing.  This is a first for something like 24 years.  Simply astonishing.  So instead of seeing dusty elephants coming down to the small waterholes in droves, we found wading lions (and apparently swimming Cheetah), trying to get to their usual side of the Channel, and a variety of diverse wildlife not ordinarily seen at Savuti.  And then at Duba, we had magnificent lightning storms, a lazy and uncoordinated Duba lion pride but lots of dusty elephants!  All in all, the diversity of wildlife was outstanding - we have updated this site with our trip report and some of the hundreds of photographs taken.  

We're now getting prepared for Antarctica - this will be our second expedition to South Georgia, the Falklands and the Antarctic Peninsula.  We set off in two weeks and in the meantime we are hoping to get our hands on two of the new Canon 5D Mark 2.  We have contacts scouring Japan for us, given the wait list everywhere else.  So, it's a bit of a nail biter before we get away...

Very tragic news in Mumbai of course.  Words fail during times like these.  

Hoping you are all well and safe.  

Julie and Adam

Finland: bears, wolves, mushrooms and berries! - 31 August 2008

Friday morning before the Bank Holiday weekend saw us meeting up in Heathrow Terminal 1 to catch the Finnair flight to Helsinki. A couple of hours at Helsinki airport allowed us to have a light dinner before the flight up to Kajaani. We were picked up and asked if we wanted a good night's sleep or straight to one of the hides. We looked at each other, grinned and all agreed we were there to see bears so straight to the hide please. Just after midnight in pitch dark we made ourselves comfortable in the hide and settled down for a few hours sleep.

Next morning we sat looking into the mist at about 4.30am and suddenly saw a bear appearing from the trees straight across from us.



High ISOs and we were snapping away .... then someone spotted something else ... although we continued snapping at the bear. Then we recognised the other animal. It was a wolf! Then another bear appeared from the left and we had to make some choices. The light was getting better and the sun was clearing the mist away and we had a fantastic first morning in the wilds of Finland.



After about 8am the bears disappeared to go back to sleep and we were getting hungry. We were picked up and taken back to base camp where we had a great Finnish breakfast before heading for bed at about 10am! Up for a 4pm dinner (meatballs, cheese and and some great juices) and then taken to another hide. This evening proved to be madly busy. Bears were appearing left and right and more wolves! We were snapping away and all of us managed to get some great images. As the sun was setting the bears were walking right up to our hide and one looked right in. Scary! As we tried to sleep in our sleeping bags we would hear the bears splashing in the water but it was too dark to get any shots by then.



Next morning Adam was up first at 4.30am and whispered "everyone up ... bears". It was still quite dark but right in front of the hide a bear was 'posing' then suddenly something spooked him and he raced across a shallow lake spray flying all over the place. More bears appeared and we managed to get some more shots as the light improved. Most of the time the bears were tolerant of each other and indeed of the wolves. Sometimes they would get aggressive and there would be some growling and teeth baring!


By 8.30am the bears had disappeared and we walked up to the road to be picked up for another fine breakfast. We were not so tired this time so we spent a little time photographing the mushrooms and berries which littered the forest floor around the cottage.



For our last evening we returned to the hide we were in on the first morning. More bear action all evening and we managed to get more shots than we expected. Lots of great bears until the light faded at about 9pm. Back to base for the luxury of sleeping in a bed! The base camp is an old logging cottage which is right by a beautiful lake. There was a sauna following which a few of the Finns jumped into the lake. We all wimped out and had hot showers!



A 4.15am wake-up call on our last day to get us back to Kajaani airport for our early morning flight. On the way home we managed to spend a few hours in Helsinki, tried the excellent tram system, fed some seagulls in the harbour until we were told off and then a spot of lunch before the flight home.

A plug for Finnair which was really excellent. No trouble with our rather extensive (and expensive) handluggage!

Great trip, short but lots of action. We will be returning in June 2009.

Julie and Adam

Recovering pictures from corrupted flash cards - 30 August 2008

As we arrived back from Finland earlier this week (blog report soon to appear) I tripped up and fell flat on my face. Never mind the cuts, bruises or my face ... I dropped the camera bag! That evening we were downloading our cards and Julie's Sandisk extreme III 16Gb card showed NO photos on it. Not at all good. Two possible causes: first my having dropped it and secondly that most of the shots were taken on a Canon EOS 1Ds Mark II and then the card was taken out and put into a Canon 5D. This seems to break the index and corrupt the card.

Julie tried to recover the images using Lexar's image rescue program which has serviced us well in the past. This took ages to review the card, (we're talking hours), and then told us it could recover only 135 images. This was hopeless as we knew that there were hundreds of bear and wolf shots on the card.

Quick research suggested that Sandisk's RescuePRO might do the trick. $34 later it was on our main Mac. Within an hour it had recovered 719 images from the card. That is 584 more than using Lexar's program.


Lessons for us:

1. It was a short trip to Finland so we had opted not to back-up the photos as we went along. Never again.

2. Swapping cards between two different models of camera is not advisable.

Clearly, RescuePRO highly recommended!

Adam

India expedition 2009 - 8 August 2008

In March 2009 we will be returning to India for another Tiger special. But there will be more, temples, villages and fantastic opportunities for people shots. You will be able to find a description of the trip on the top left of our home page.

Why india? Rather then what we say, this is what the French scholar Romaine Rolland said: "If there is one place on the face of earth where all the dreams of living men have found a home from the very earliest days when man began the dream of existence, it is India!"

We will visit four reserves, three specifically to maximise the chances of photographing and watching one of these:



If you want any further details, give us a call or send an email ... we cannot wait!

Julie and Adam

Printing on the HP Designjet Z3100 - 26 July 2008

Prints from the HP Z3100 have proved very popular. In our recent trip to Uganda and Rwanda Wendy won the competition to print off 20 feet of shots. She was round a few weeks ago and produced some absolutely stunning prints on Hahnemuhle Photo Rag paper. This has a matt finish with a textured surface and is now our standard for most of our commercial work.

Shortly after Julie came back from Svalbard she was asked to assist with an office renovation, The owner of the business wanted some coooool matching prints of the cold north to suit the company's own coolness! We ran off a set of trial prints, the owners loved them and we went into full scale production. The results are really stunning. Few monitors are able to match the quality of a professionally produced print. We do wonder if some people miss out on some of the magic from their shots simply because they only look at them on an iPod, their blog or on a computer screen.

This is the one the owner liked best:



All our clients can use our printers to produce stunning prints and indeed we encourage this.

Adam and Julie

Svalbard - Spitsberg: Polar Bears and Ice - June 2008

Just back from a week on the good ship Origo, breaking ice and exploring Svalbard's waters. In search of Polar Bears of course, and yes, we were successful. We had two separate viewings, the first from a distance, a mother and young one near their Seal kill from the evening before. We attempted to get closer through the ice but the ice started to close around us and the captain wasn't happy so regrettably we had to back out of the ice, but not after firing off some shots at least. A bird flew over and the mother, ever alert, looked up and sideways and then, with the noise of Origo in reverse, the two took off across the ice and we were unable to find them later.

Our second viewing was during breakfast a few days later. The bridge had called us up out of bed earlier, around 6.30am, and we all rushed up on board but were unable to find the captain's Polar Bear. We gave up and sat down to breakfast at 8am, but part way through breakfast someone saw our Polar Bear coming up out of the water and onto the ice. Of course no-one caught that on camera, but we were all up on deck pretty quickly and had a great session, firing away as the Polar Bear, probably a two year old male, advanced toward the ship. It looked as if we were going to get a paws on the side of the ship shot, but one of our group accidently banged their tripod on the railing and our Bear ran off in alarm, occasionally rolling in the snow when it was further away. Needless to say, everyone was disappointed and one person very embarassed, but it was pure magic while it lasted!



The sea ice stopped us from heading around the top of the islands and exploring the eastern side but we spent the week exploring the fjords on the western side. The ice landscape was enchanting and it was impossible not to try your hand at landscape photography. Having said that, we didn't see as impressive ice sculptures as we have seen in Antarctica but we believe it is possible to see these in some of the fjords further north. There were many sea and migratory birds, fabulous Walrus and Seals and it's a very impressive one week trip, we saw a lot, compared to Antarctica for which you need three weeks.

Please keep an eye out for a full trip report plus additional photos which will be on this website within the next 10 days and we are researching a return trip for June 2009 or 2010 in a small vessel, either to Svalbard or to Greenland or both so please let us know if you are interested in principle, as we will only be taking a very small group.



All the best.

Julie and Adam

Bears in Finland; 2nd recce! - 18 May 2008

Just back from a second recce to northern Finland, Bear watching of
course. I have to say I am very impressed with the warm hospitality,
great food and of course wildlife opportunities in Finland.
The airfare to get there is a bit of a stumbler given it's so close -
you can fly to Dubai for about the same price! But once you're
there, everything is affordable.

On this trip we sampled a reindeer burger which was cooked on an
outdoor grill, Finnish style and we ate around the grill outdoors in
+2C but it was one of those memorable meals, a bit like a picnic
lunch in the African bush, right up there with life's magical
moments. We spent two nights in two different hides, both were
excellent in their own way and you will see from the following
photographs, the light conditions are quite variable. The hides were
delightfully warm and well set up for photographers and artists,
(more on that later), and people just wanting to view the Bears.



On the first evening we only saw a couple of Bears and from some
distance but it was quite a special viewing - the setting was great
and I was in a two person hide with a Dutch artist called Erik Van
Ommen. Quite a magical, cold arena for the Bears to come into and a
bit of a wait, keeping really quiet of course because Bears are
incredibly shy and this is the start of the season. By the end of
the season, in August, just before they start thinking about
hibernating again, they are pretty brash and come much closer to the
hides.



We had two Bears come into view, initially we were training
our binoculars to find them and then we switched to looking through
our lenses. I'd start firing off some shots and behind me I could
hear Eric's pencil working furiously. There was another Bear
appearance after a couple of hours waiting so in between viewings I
took a look at Eric's drawings which are impressive. You can see
these on his website:

http://www.erik-van-ommen.nl/

The second hide produced quite a lot of Bears coming and going and
they were closer. Even though they were closer, they were still
quite difficult to shoot because they are so large and brown and the
light is a bit tricky. Their behaviour is interesting as they seem
to saunter mindlessly most of the time and then become quite intent
with their foraging for food. They then scurry off quite quickly,
rarely looking back so it's a bit of work getting eye contact and an
interesting shot.



Anyway, here are some of the shots taken, some snow still on the
ground. Let me know what you think and please keep in mind our next
trip to the Bears in August, our last Bear trip for the year. The
details for the trip are at:

http://www.shutterspeedtravel.com/finlandaug2008.asp

The conditions will be different then - much
warmer with brighter light, almost 24/7 so lots of viewing hours over
three nights. There will also be time for beers and laughs and some
photo viewing and workshops so please let us know ASAP if you want to
join us. The dates are August 22-25.

Getting ready for Spitsbergen and Polar Bears in June now! Watch
this space...

Hope all is well with you all.

Julie