Hey Ripley!

[Kirislin]

How was the Whale watching, and where are the pics???? waiting waiting waiting

[Ripley]

you'll be waiting for a while, sorry. I'm just hopeless when it comes to processing so I won't get to it until the weekend. I did download them though and am stoked to have some sharp shots as it's always a lottery with the ocean swell. I'll tell you what we saw though: Fairy penguin, dolphins, one fur seal, shearwaters and a couple of albatross. I took one photo of an albatross in flight and then concentrated on finding some whales. I used my 50D and the AF works great in it, a bit better than the 30D.

We went out past the heads into the open ocean where it got a bit bumpy but nothing too bad. Then we came across a pod of humpbacks. They were showing their bellies and slapping their flukes on the water in a sort of whale ballet. I stayed put in one position and just hoped for the best and was rewarded with a few breaching shots and slapping their pecs on the ocean so I'm so happy I got some breaching shots. Also got a tail shot that I think is sharp enough but I had to shoot through people's heads - thank god I'm tall. This nice German guy let me squeeze in next to him so that was nice of him. I didn't need the teleconverter so that was good. At one point I thought if this whale comes any closer, I'm not going to be able to fit him in the frame (I had a 300mm). No time to keep fiddling with the camera changing settings as you would miss shots, but I did have to dial in some - exposure compensation with their white bellies on display. But that's the fun, you don't know what they are going to do. They are just so amazing.

Edited October 18, 2010 by Ripley

[Kirislin]

Oh Phooey, I cant wait to see them. Glad you are happy with the 50D too.

[Ripley]

It does throw a magenta cast but if you photograph in raw, it's easily corrected in PS.

Here is the trip report with photos of what we saw as one of the crew members takes photos. Photos of his can be seen here:

http://www.sydneywhalewatching.com/sightin...sighting_id=531

the Blog:

"The whales were everywhere. A playful pod of 3 humpbacks were sighted breaching as Explorer navigated through Sydney Heads at approximately 1.45 pm. The breaching could be seen from afar as the seas were flattening nicely. These whales were only 4 miles offshore and as we came within 200m of the pod they rolled over on their backs waving both pectoral fins simultaneously. They were certainly in a good mood to have a frolic. A pod of Common Dolphins also came jumping over as we slowly cruised along beside. Another pod of 2 whales were following a short distance behind. From breaching to fluke up dives, tail and pec fin slapping to the graceful tail flukes were witnessed this afternoon.

Other vessels were out this afternoon also enjoying the brilliant conditions and there were literally whales everywhere. "

Worth doing if you are in along the east coast atm, the whale watching season ends in Nov.

eta: they run the operations well. There isn't allowed to be many boats near the whales so we moved on and ended up finding another pod and were the only boat there, I chose a smaller boat to go on as it's usually less people on them.

Edited October 18, 2010 by Ripley

[lic_82]

Cant wait to see them Ripley I love your work