US TRIP # 1 Hawaii

Last 06.24.08 my wife (Arden) and I flew to the U.S.A. and Hawaii was our first of 5 stops :).

AALLLLOOOHHHAAA!!!!!

We are in the island for 3 days and we are soo amazed by how warm and culture driven this state is... Everywhere you go and shops that we go in you always get a warm ALOHA and if you do something for them you always get a nice reply MAHALO... it sounds and felt weird but once you get used to it, you start doing the same thing.... hehehehehe.... anyways, here are some photos... enjoy...

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6. Hawaii's Magnet store... 1,000's of magnets and everything is about Hawaii... 


7. The view from the Hilton Village... even at night, this place is still picture perfect...


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9. The Famous Diamond Head, its not a volcano though, its just a crater...


10. We did a submarine drive and got this green turtle to pose for me.... its kinda hard to shoot underwater specially inside the sub with almost a 5inch think glass plus the water density... I think we were 110 feet deep on this one with a 12 year old war vessel.

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12. Pano view of the island of O'ahu, waikiki beach area....


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15. Sunset at Paradise Cove, we did our first Luau.


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17. Hawaii wouldn't be complete with out the grass skirt female hula dancers... :)....


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19. Hula Dancers... 


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22.  Fire Dancer dude.... :)


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D3 amazing camera

Last sunday 06.15.08, I did the wedding of Ritchie and Tanya in cebu city (will post some highlights of the wedding soon).  I never really believed what people say about the D3, and how it is THE BEST camera ever in the Nikon camera family, well I witness it 1st hand last sunday and it is THE BEST camera ever!!!!!!  For the first time, I shot the entire wedding in available light!!!! I guess it was a great test for the camera; to test not only its noise capability but also the camera's white balance especially at the reception where it was sooo dark and the lights where PAR 64 hot lights with colors green, blue, red, magenta and yellow!!!!!! 

Since I started shooting weddings, I have been a really big fan of off camera flash, I normally used 2-3 off camera flash with assistants holding it but with the lack of man power, I was forced to shoot the reception with what ever light that is available, rather than mounting a flash on my camera since I loved to use the 70-200 2.8 vr lense.  Of course everyone knows that if you are shooting available light, you are bound not to get the proper skin tones (which is very important) with the color light gels that I've just mentioned, I knew the risk that I took. The ISO's that I used for most of the shots in this wedding was 1600-2500... here are the images that are straight from the camera no photoshop just resized for web file not even color correct my images. by the way, the images where all shot in jpeg large fine, reception where all AUTO WB ( I know, Im crazy I didn't shot the reception in raw). hehehehe...

here are the images:

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14. Benrick (son of Ryan [bro of the groom] and Gen2x) saw him playing a gameboy which provided illumination on his face... amazing camera... ISO 1600, 70-200 2.8

15. While the couple enjoyed a presentation on the screen, my main light was the screen and had a kicker light from the candles of their table.. :) shot at ISO 2500, 85mm 1.8

16. During their first dance together, shot this with my 14-24mm 2.8 lens, the flare coming from the left was from a video light on a stand that illuminated the couple. ISO 1600

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I know that the images on the reception doesn't have a perfect skin tone, some have magenta cast, red, yellow, green but I think the D3 has given me the output that is close to or near perfect result despite the given scenario of ambient light during the reception. Overall, I am very happy with the output that the D3 has produced!!! Kudos to the Nikon Team of Engineers... :)...

Thanks for viewing... Cheerss!!!!

Ben