It’s Photo Friday… travel cameras?

Jamaica is well known for its beautiful beaches with many tourists photographing beautiful sunsets along with frolicking in the surf and white sand pics. I observed a pair of teenage girls spending at least 3 hours posing and taking pictures with their phone of themselves in their little bikinis as though they were Sports Illustrated swimsuit models. On a morning walk along the shore I looked to the left and discovered that I had found a nude beach of primarily senior citizens. Hmmm… I decided that was NOT a photographic opportunity, but it certainly was an eye opening experience! Oh, to be so comfortable in your own skin.
I was trying out a used (but new to me) point and shoot camera, but was disappointed in the features not available (like RAW only in low ISO’s, focus was so-o-o-o frustratingly slow, settings were buried so deep into the menu and slow to access). We have been searching and analyzing on the internet and comparing models vs. price.
My question is: What is the best, yet small travel camera for photographers who like to manually control settings and have fast, spot focus? Any thoughts out there???

SAMSUNG DIGITAL CAMERA

It’s Photo Friday – Evening Light

Every child begins the world again…. ~Henry David Thoreau

The wild yellow flowers were in their full beauty last night in the evening light.  Evening is the ideal time to capture some warm summer images.

Aperture Priority ~ 2.8 @ 1/1250 of a second ~ ISO 100 ~ Canon 5D Mark 2 ~ Canon 24-70 and 70-200 L lenses used. Blended an image of flowers with the image of mother/child. Warming filters also used.

It’s Photo Friday and I’m lovin’ summer!

Warm tones at twilight.

This is a blend of 2 images.

♦ The background is of prairie grass near a small slough facing the sunset during the last minutes of the summer solstice.  Camera was set at aperture priority 2.8 / 70-200 Canon L lens / Canon 5D Mark 2 and focused on the grasses in the foreground with flare from the setting sun.  The background is straight out of the camera with no editing.

♦Top image of the child was taken earlier in the same evening as she was walking on a gravel road using the same camera at aperture priority 2.8 with more direct side lighting.  I did some touch-up with the face blending and softening the highlighted area on the side of her face, lightened the shadow detail and used Kubota action, Golden Delish.  Dragged image to the background and opacity was decreased to allow the background grasses to show through and used the eraser tool to blend the transition between the two images.