Jeff Cable's Blog: August 2021

Sunday, August 29, 2021

More photos from our safari in Tanzania: Elephant, lion, leopard and more

I am now sitting at a beautiful lodge right next to the Mara River in Kenya, as we transition from the first photo tour (in Tanzania) to the second photo tour (in Botswana). We are still going out for safari with the guests who are joining us for both trips, but also taking it easier and getting caught up (since the Internet here is decent).

This gives me a chance to push out another blog to all of you.

This first image is one of my favorites from the Tarangire Park. I saw this herd of elephants with ages varying from the very young to the more mature adults, and decided to take a wide shot to include the mountain in the background. I love the pretty scene, but especially the smallest elephant in the middle of the pack, who is in mid stride.

I used that same mountain as a backdrop for this bird which happened to fly by as I was photographing the elephants. I absolutely love the subject tracking ability of the Canon R5 to lock in on fast moving objects and get them in perfect focus.

One of the signature symbols of the Taragire Park is the Boabab tree which is unique to this area.

From Tarangire, we flew a small plane up to the Northern part of the Serengeti to a totally different terrain. Our first cat sighting was this leopard and her cubs. They are so beautiful!

At one point, the mother leopard left her one cub at the top of rock. Look at those eyes!

Not far from our tent lodge, we found this large male lion...

...and even better, this female lion and her four cubs. At first we had two of the cubs with mom, and then were treated to all four.

I love having all the cubs in this photo, but more importantly the interaction between the mother and cub.

The cubs came down off the rock and were coming towards our vehicle. It was the perfect time for a photo. I used the Canon RF100-500mm lens to focus on the first cub and let the others go slightly out of focus in the background.

The mother lion came right after the cubs. I love the way that both the adult and cub are in the same position of their stride in this photo.

This youngster was in the middle of a yawn when I caught this photo. By the way, 99 percent of the time, when you see a photo like this, it is a yawn and not a lion being mad. Whenever a cat yawns, I always remind our guests to burst off frames. Even though it was just a yawn, I liked the way that this little cub looks like he is trying to be a future king of the jungle in this shot.

Later that same day, we had a large herd of elephant cruise right next to our vehicles. I waited for the youngest elephant to show through in the middle of the pack and get this shot.

A short time later we saw this really tiny elephant following it's mother close behind. How cute is this?

We all took many photos of this young elephant. If I had been shooting video, you would hear all of us in the vehicle saying "ahhhh...that is so cute!"

I have many more images to share with you, when time and internet access permits. Next up will be photos from the Great Migration.

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Tuesday, August 24, 2021

Safari in Tanzania - about as opposite of the Olympic experience as possible

A couple of weeks ago I was writing blogs from Tokyo and now I am sitting here surrounded by the plains of the Northern Serengeti. It was a really quick turnaround at home, with me never really getting time adjusted before heading off again, But I am not complaining, as I love it here in Tanzania, and we had a bunch of guests for our photo tour who were ready to see something other than the walls of their homes.

The good news is, this is a more relaxing pace than the Olympics. But like the Olympics, the days are really long here. There are some many amazing things to see, that we are typically on safari for ten to twelve hours a day.

With that...let's get to some photos!

The first part of this photo tour started in the Tarangire Park, which is widely known for the large amount of elephants. But there are plenty of other animals there too. One of our first sightings were these zebra at one of the local watering holes.

I saw this ox pecker on the back of a zebra and suggested to our guests that they isolate that in a photo. Oh, I should mention that on this trip I am using two Canon R5 cameras and both the Canon RF100-500mm lens and a Canon 24-105mm lens.

I was tracking this bird in flight and got lucky enough to catch the bird right as it flew by a giraffe.

Here is a group shot of our photo tour attendees (for this portion of the trip). As you can see, we are not hurting for camera gear. Thanks so much to Canon Professional Services for loaning a bunch of gear to the group!

When people think of the wildlife in Africa, they usually think of the big animals. But all living things here will amaze you. Look at the colors in this lilac-breasted roller. Amazing!

As I mentioned, Taragire Park has a lot of elephants. We saw these two loving each other and had to capture that in our cameras.

It is so awesome to see large family groups, with youngsters of varying ages.

The size and power of the elephant is something everyone should see and experience in person.

Our first lion sighting was early in the morning. This female was surrounded by flies (which you can see in the photo if you look closely).

She walked straight toward our vehicle, so I got down as low as I could to get this straight-on shot. I wanted to show our guests how getting low could bring us more into the lion's world.

We also got to see a couple of her cubs. This was one of my favorite cub images at the time. Since I took this, we have seen many more. I will blog those later.

On our third morning in Tanzania, we found some cheetah hanging out near our lodge. I just love these animals! This youngster was yawning, and we all fired off photos.

On our fourth day, we all woke up early to pack up and move to our next lodge. I happened to look outside my tent and saw this beautiful sunrise. It was a great start to the day.

I have so many more images to share with you all. I just need the time to write and an Internet connection strong enough to post the blog. Both are scarce over here!

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Sunday, August 15, 2021

Tokyo Olympics - By the Numbers!

I have been home for almost a week now and the Olympics are officially behind us (well...at least for the next 6 months), I am still waiting for that one night of sleep where I do not wake up wide awake at some crazy hour. During one of those early morning quiet moments, I had a thought to share a final summation of the Olympics with all of you. Here are those statistics and some of my favorite photos.

Total blog viewership: 493,000 views

Total Olympic blog posts: 45

Days in Tokyo: 21 (14 quarantined)

Miles walked: 128 miles

Hours spent on buses: Approximately 40 hours

Images captured during the Games: Approx. 40,000

Images kept: 23,000

Favorite images: 318

Portfolio shots: 45

Camera used the most: Canon R3 (pre-production)

Favorite moment: Women of USA Water Polo winning gold (and getting to put the camera down and celebrate that with them)

It is always an honor and privilege to wear (or even touch) a gold medal, and so I was super excited to have that opportunity once again. You can tell that I was happy at that moment! (Funny story about this photo. I was just going to have someone take an iPhone shot of me, but Rachel Fattal said that she would take it with my Canon R5. I showed her how to use the back button focus, and zoom, and she did great! Photo credit to her.)

Favorite thing in Tokyo: The people (and the air conditioning)

Least favorite thing about the trip: Not being able to eat good Japanese food

Top 10 favorite images:

Ashley Johnson is arguably the best female goaltender of all time in water polo, and this photo shows how athletic she is, but looks calm doing what she does best.

Not having photographed basketball in the past, and having the wrong lens at the time, I was really happy to get this peak of action shot during the USA vs. France game. I love the outstretched arms, expression and backlighting in this photo.

I knew that this photo would be one of my favorites from the moment I captured it. I saw how the Brazilian volleyball player was perfectly framed within the net and loved it. Some planning, and a little bit of luck too!

This was another photo that I knew I liked instantly. Catching the BMX rider high in the sky, with the airplane in the background. More good timing and luck!

Motion panning is really difficult, especially when trying to follow the action at 1/20th of a second. This photo works for me (although there are a couple of others I like almost as much) because of the blur, the clarity of the horse and rider, and the position of the horse in the jump.

I love the concentration that you see in Suni Lee's face in this photo, with the beam and logos below her.

I love using the multi-exposure mode in the Canon cameras, and this one had just the right amount of motion in both athletes. I also love that you can clearly see that it is the American vs the German (with the colors of their masks).

Johnny Hooper has so much strength in his legs that he can kick himself incredibly high out of the water. I was hoping to get a photo of him like this, and it took until the very last game to get it. I also love the trail of water coming off the ball.

This photo shows the incredible emotion in the women's faces after winning the gold medals! (I knew that I would be shooting their team photo from this location after the medal ceremony, and thought ahead to bring a flash. This really helped me get good lighting on their faces without blowing out the background.)

This last photo was taken on the pool deck well after the women's medal ceremony. Due to the pandemic, there would be no team party this time around. But after all the press interviews, we had an impromptu team celebration on the deck afterwards. I asked all the women to sit down and have some fun (to get a more informal team victory photo).

I would like to thank each and every one of you, once again, for following along on this journey with me. There were so many of you who were kind enough to send emails and leave positive comments, and that means so much to me. It was your incredible feedback that kept me inspired to write the multiple blog posts every day. Thank you!

Now it is time to repack my bags and head to Tanzania, Kenya and Botswana. I normally do not blog from Africa (since we are on safari all day and the Internet is not very good), but I am going to try my best to blog once a week. I know that we are going to see some amazing sites, and I am excited to share those with you as well. Stay tuned!

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Wednesday, August 11, 2021

Some of the funny moments from the Olympics in Tokyo

I am back at home and totally jet lagged. Not only from the flight and the time change, but also from running at that crazy Olympic pace for 3 weeks. But as I look back on the experience, I feel so lucky to have been in Tokyo for the Olympics, and to have all the experiences I did.

Even though I posted about 40 blog posts from the Games, there were some really funny moments which never made the blog, and I just had to share them with you.

Me changing jobs

Almost every day of the Olympics, I would end up shooting water polo right next to the Aussies who were shooting video for the Olympic Broadcast System (OBS). They were super nice guys and we always had fun during the breaks. On one of the days I jokingly said "Hey, we should switch jobs. I will shoot the video and you can shoot the still images." The next thing I know, I was being educated on how to work the boom. It was very cool - and all manual focus!

I wasn't the only cable in the bathroom

I was in the press bathroom more than once a day for numerous weeks in the water polo venue before I noticed this cabling that was running over one of the stalls. I guess I was not the only cable in the room at the time.

The nice dinner that never happened

There was one night when Greg (from USA Water Polo) and another friend and I were done with everything and thought we would get some dinner in Tokyo. We had been in Japan for 14 days and were looking forward to getting out of the Olympic bubble and having a nice Japanese dinner.

Unfortunately, it was way past 8pm and most everything was closed (due to the state of emergency). But we did stumble upon this cool gold medal display.

Instead of having a nice dinner, we ended up all going back to our respective hotels and getting food at the only place that was open, the local 7-11.

USA vs Spain - The duel

The men of USA Water Polo were about to have a game against the men from Spain. I got to the venue early (as always) and ran into this photographer from Spain. We had a great time talking and then decided to take this photo of us squaring off. We ended up losing the game. Good thing I didn't place any bets. I should mention that during all the stress of the Olympics, all of us photographers get along really well, which makes it all the more enjoyable.

A breakfast without chicken?

For more than twenty days, we ate the same breakfast with chicken, rice and miso soup. It was the running joke when we arrived every morning and said "Oh wow - chicken for breakfast this morning!" Well...a couple of times, they changed it up on us and served hamburger. I tried many times to get an omelette and was repeatedly told "we only serve those for lunch". Classic!

You know you are tired when...

Less than a week ago, I got dressed in the morning and went down to breakfast. I ate and then returned to my room to pack up. I got everything ready for the day and went outside to wait for the press bus. I got on that bus and then another, and traveled for 45 minutes to the Main Press Center (MPC). It was hours later that I was walking and noticed a tag sticking out of my shirt. Yep - I had been wearing my shirt inside out the entire first part of the day. I was slightly embarrassed, but then just laughed about it. I ducked into the closest bathroom and put the shirt on correctly. Nobody even noticed (since we are all exhausted). Or they did and never said anything.

And no, I do NOT have a picture of this. :)

Speaking of being tired

By the third week of the Olympics, just about anything goes. We are all so wiped out, that people will try to sleep anywhere. I saw this guy catching some Zs on one of the hard seats in the MPC and just had to shoot a picture.

Canon's favorite images

I was walking by the Canon booth in the MPC and was looking at the photos they were highlighting. "Not bad!" I thought. I was literally walking away before I noticed that four of them were mine.

Where is everyone?

It was the last couple of days of the Olympics and I was a bit brain dead. After shooting water polo, I was excited to go and photograph the new Olympic sport of Skateboarding. Earlier in the day, I saw that they were posting updates from that sport, but did not think anything of it. I took a bus to the venue, and I was the only one who got off. I thought that was weird. After walking for a couple of minutes to get to the venue I was was greeted by a volunteer who basically said to me "Why are you here?" The event had been that morning (not an evening event) and it was all done. Ooops! But the good news was...I caught this amazing sunset, before heading off to the Sport Climbing venue to photograph there.

My room with a view

You may recall my story about moving a lot of the furniture from my room to the hallway (to make space for my camera gear and clothing)...

That furniture stayed out there for three weeks. For all I know, it is still in the hallway.

And I forgot to tell you all about my amazing view out the window. Yep, this is it. I looked out to the building next door.

The 408 coincidence

At home I live in the 408 area code, so when I checked into the hotel and they told me I was in room 408, I laughed and thought "I won't forget that." The last day of the Olympics, I was using my last free Taxi ticket, and asked the volunteers if they could call a cab for me. They did so, and as was the custom, they handed me a small piece of paper with the taxi number (so I knew which one was mine). What was that taxi number? 408 of course.

Maggie took my phone, but I had her gold medal!

Hours after the women of USA Polo had won the gold medal, we were having fun on the pool deck. I was taking portraits of all the team members and having a good time too. I asked Maggie Steffens (captain of the team) if I could wear her gold medal, and then she grabbed my phone and took this selfie of us. Needless to say, we were all smiles!

Well folks, I hope that you all got a good laugh from all of this. I know I did!

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