Peru Photo Tour - Capturing really cool photos in the Sacred Valley

After touring Lima for a day and a half, we flew to the city of Cusco. But once landing at this high altitude city, we get on our bus and head down into the Sacred Valley. We do this for 3 reasons:

1. It gives people time to adjust to the 12,000 foot altitude

2. There are some beautiful areas to visit in the valley

3. This is on the way to Machu Picchu

Our first visit in the Sacred Valley was to a hummingbird garden where we can view these amazing birds (and species) and capture some cool photos. For these images, I was using the Canon R6 Mark II and the Canon RF 100-500mm lens. I watched these two hummingbirds sparring and started firing off photos. In a split second the bird on the left spread its tail feathers, which looks so beautiful!

I was calling out settings as we all tried to track these fast moving birds. I challenged everyone to get good motion in their wings, but while keeping their faces in perfect focus.

We watched as other birds came to visit the area.

Most of the other birds flew slower, less erratic and landed often, making them easier to capture.

But we were there mainly to capture the hummingbirds. Since we were there in the morning, the sunlight was at our backs, which really brought out the amazing color in the birds.

About 10 minutes later, the two hummingbirds were back at it. I liked the way that the one on the left had lifted it's feathers by the face.

It was fun to capture images of the hummingbirds in different positions. I caught this one flying right towards me.

The one hummingbird that we wanted to capture (even more than the others) was the Sword-billed hummingbird which is specific to this high-altitude region, This is the only bird who's beak is bigger than it's body. We were lucky enough to have numerous visits from the Sword-billed during our one hour visit.

After photographing the birds, we were off to visit the local woman artisans who create beautiful alpaca wool garments. They showed our group how they add color to the wool using only natural materials.  

This was also a perfect place to teach portraiture and how to use available light to light our subjects...

...and to capture detail images to tell the story of the process. 

Since I had been to this same location last year and figured that I would see some of the same people, I printed many of my portraits (on the Canon Pro-1000 printer) to bring them as gifts. It was fun to find this nice woman who was one of my favorite subjects of the last photo tour, and get a photo of her holding the print.

Our next stop was for lunch, and not at just any restaurant. This is also a highlight of the photo tour, because we have lunch at a location which has many llama and alpaca. 

My guests always love this spot!

I was shooting with the Canon R5 Mark II and RF 24-105mm f/4 lens and had this one llama who came right up to me. I put the lens right up to it's face, used the face and eye detection to focus on the eyes, and took this shot. Too funny.

Speaking of funny looking subjects...I even had my photo taken at the restaurant. (Photo credit: Gretchen A.)

After lunch we visited the salt mines. These mines have been in existence for more than 1000 years! Each one of these pools is owned by a different family, and has been handed down for many generations.

Since I had photographed these mines using a wide lens during the previous photo tour, I decided to use my Canon RF 100-500mm lens this time around, to get some tight shots of the people collecting salt. And of course, I had to purchase more of the flavored salt for myself and my brother (who was with me on the previous trip).

The next blog post will feature photos from Machu Picchu!

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• Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!

• Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Costa Rica, Peru, Galapagos, Alaska and more.

• You can purchase Jeff Cable Photography images from my new fine art site at: https://fineart.jeffcable.com/

• If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
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Peru - The first couple days before the photo tour

After landing and getting some sleep for the night, it was great to get out and walk around Lima. I had some guests that came in early, so we walked around and had some relaxing time before the trip officially started. 

We walked 4 blocks from the hotel and had a great view over the coastline. I decided to travel light and just took my iPhone 16 Pro with me. 

We had a great time watching the paragliders in action.

The next day most everyone had arrived and we offered a day of sightseeing before the photo tour actually started. The weather had turned overcast but this provided nice even light for our photos. This is the pre-Incan ruins which are right in the middle of Lima. I encouraged everyone to photograph the ruins with some of the city visible in the background to show how this exists amongst the newer city dwellings.

We saw these colorful umbrellas out in the distance and our guide told us that this was a makeshift restaurant. Once again, the cloudy weather helped to create this interesting scene.

We were walking around the La Punta area and having fun photographing the colors of the area. Now I was back to using my Canon R5 Mark II with the Canon RF 24-105mm f/4 lens. 

The area has great buildings and lots of cool murals painted on the sides. 

At one point, I saw this guy come out of a door and I loved his look. He thought he was interrupting us and quickly closed the door. If you have travelled with me, you know how I roll. I knocked on the door and asked if we could photograph him. He became a favorite portrait of the day for most of my guests.

We also visited the local market where everyone had a great day taking photographs.

I caught this moment when Shelly (one of my guests) was talking to one of the merchants. I love the smiles shared by them.

Everyone walked around the market and I was giving them ideas of camera settings and angle's to shoot.

You can not go to Lima and not get a cream filled churro from Churro San Francisco!!! I treated the group to this local delight and they all LOVED them.

We were about to get into our van to head to lunch when I saw this one man hanging out in the corner of this building. I took this photo and then did some work in Adobe Photoshop to darken the whole image but leave the man exposed correctly. 

After lunch, we visited another area of Lima and I saw this woman sitting on a bench in a park.  I quickly framed this shot and captured the moment. 

We were about to end our day when I saw a bike rider pass by us. I quickly killed my shutter speed (to 1/15 sec) and panned along with the rider. I showed this to all my guests and they wanted to give this a try, so we spent the next 20 minutes motion panning bikes as they passed by us.

And then we were off to the Sacred Valley for more fun. Stay tuned for those photos.

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• Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!

• Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Costa Rica, Peru, Galapagos, Alaska and more.

• You can purchase Jeff Cable Photography images from my new fine art site at: https://fineart.jeffcable.com/

• If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
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The difference between the Canon R1, Canon R5 Mark II and the older Canon R3

A fellow photographer friend recently sent me a message and asked me how much the Canon R1 differed from the Canon R3. He also wanted to know the difference between the newer R1 and Canon R5 Mark II. After a year of using the Canon R1 (both pre-production and the final product), Canon R5 Mark II, and receiving numerous questions like this, I thought it would be good to share my thoughts with all of you.

Let me start with the big differences between the Canon R1 and Canon R3 (in order of importance to me).

Both the Canon R3 and Canon R1 are top-of-the-line cameras from Canon and have that feel when you pick them up. At first grip, it is hard to feel or see much difference between the two camera models. One thing I love about Canon cameras is that when you get used to using one of them, the similarities are so close that a person can go between one model and another without much of a learning curve.

It is like driving a car. You can get into almost any vehicle and drive, regardless of the engine performance and handling. But that performance and handling can make a huge difference if you want to do something more than just drive from point A to point B. The Canon R1 lets you drive harder and better than you could with R3. When you get into the guts of the Canon R1, there are numerous improvements that really make the camera stand out vs the preceding model.

Focus

As I have mentioned numerous times in the past, the focus system of the Canon R1 is noticeably faster and "stickier" than the Canon R3. This was VERY noticeable when I was photographing the fast-moving Olympic athletes in Paris and the R1 tracked them so well. My take rate of tack sharp images was so much better than with any other camera.  

Pre-Capture

This is one feature that I have used many times and find it absolutely indispensable when photographing unpredictable wildlife, birds about to take flight, and sports which I am less familiar with. I don't use pre-capture all the time, but love having the feature in the camera when those moments arrive. And I should mention that this ability to go back a half second and grab frames I might have otherwise missed, has yielded me many great photos I would not have captured with the Canon R3. 

Dual CFexpress Slots

One of the things that irritated me (yes - it really bugged me a lot!) about the Canon R3 is that Canon chose to include one CFexpress card slot and one SD card slot in the camera. If you read my blog a lot, you know that I always shoot RAW images to BOTH card slots (to make darned sure that I have my images even if a memory card were to fail). I really hated the fact that the Canon R3 limited by capture abilities, when shooting at fast frame rates, to the speed of the much slower SD cards. Arghhhh! I actually missed numerous photos at the Summer Olympics in Tokyo because of this. Thankfully, Canon opted for two of the faster CFexpress card slots in the Canon R1 so I can blast off shots almost endlessly, if needed, and not be slowed down by the older and slower SD cards.

Eye Control

Just to be clear, I am not talking about the eye detection of the new mirrorless cameras, where the camera can lock in on the subject's eyes or face. Eye control on the Canon R1 and Canon R5 Mark II is the feature that allows the camera to determine which subject I am looking at and move the focus point to that subject. I know that the Canon R3 had this feature as well, but I find that with the much improved technology in the Canon R1, it now makes this useable for the first time. I tried this on the Canon R3 and found it unresponsive and distracting. The same feature in the Canon R1 is incredibly accurate and helpful in almost all scenarios. 

Burst Rate

The Canon R1 can capture images at a faster burst rate (40fps) than the R3 (30fps), but this is not a critical factor for me since 40fps is rarely used in my case.

Higher Resolution Viewfinder and LCD

The Canon R1 has almost double the resolution in the viewfinder as compared to the Canon R3. Although I find this nice, I never really had a problem with the viewfinder of the R3.

Now let me address the difference between the Canon R1 and the Canon R5 Mark II (in order of importance to me).

Both of these cameras offer exceptional focus speed and accuracy, and they share the pre-capture and pupil detection features. But there are some key differences which offer advantages to each model. Although both cameras are exceptional in my opinion, I use them interchangeably depending on what I am photographing. My choice is almost always predicated on what resolution I desire and the physical size and weight of the camera. 

Resolution

Even though the Canon R5 Mark II is the less expensive camera, it actually has a higher resolution sensor (45 megapixels) as compared to the Canon R1 (24 megapixels), but that does not mean that it is my camera of choice for all my photography.  I love having the higher resolution when photographing wildlife so that I have more ability to crop and have a high resolution image, and often choose the Canon R5 Mark II for my photo tours for this reason.

As I mentioned, the increased resolution does not mean that the Canon R5 Mark II is the best camera for me at all times, When I am photographing sports and personal events (bar mitzvah, weddings, corporate events...), I prefer not to have the highest resolution, as most images I am delivering are not going to be enlarged to a billboard size print. They are often being printed at 4x6, 5x7, or 8x10 or going into an album. In these cases 24MP is plenty. 

Physical Size

One of the obvious differences between the Canon R1 and Canon R5 Mark II is the physical size and weight of the cameras when holding them in your hand. 

Sometimes bigger is better. I really love using the Canon R1 for portraits and events since I am often turning the camera and shooting portrait (tall) vs. landscape (wide) and I love having all the redundant buttons on the camera grip. I also prefer the larger batteries for these types of situations, because when I am working an event, I am moving too fast to worry about battery life.

Sometimes smaller is better. This is why I often choose the Canon R5 Mark II for my photo tours, since it is easier to travel with the smaller and lighter Canon R5 Mark II and Canon R6 Mark II combination. Not only is the camera smaller and lighter in weight, as compared to the Canon R1, but it also uses the smaller batteries and shares the same small battery charger with the R6.

Eye Control

Both the Canon R1 and Canon R5 Mark II have the eye control, but I can tell you that this feature is MUCH better on the R1. This is probably due to the much larger eye piece and amount of detection on the Canon R1. 

Card slots

As I mentioned before, I am not a big fan of mixed memory card slots, especially when one of the card slots is a slower SD slot. Canon created the Canon R5 Mark II with a mix of a CFexpress slot and a SD slot (much like the older Canon R3). With that said, it is nice to travel with a single memory card reader which has both CFexpress and SD slots. This saves me a little more space when on the road.

Wrapping this all up

All of these cameras are excellent bodies for any photographer, capturing images at fast burst rates and with excellent focus abilities, but as you can see, they each have their pluses and minuses. If you are struggling with a purchase decision, I hope this helps you make a good choice.

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• Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!

• Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Costa Rica, Peru, Galapagos, Alaska and more.

• You can purchase Jeff Cable Photography images from my new fine art site at: https://fineart.jeffcable.com/

• If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
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The Dolphins of Costa Rica!

When I tell people about my photo tour to the rain forest of Costa Rica, they typically think about monkeys and sloths, but they don't usually think about dolphins and other marine life. After making countless trips to the Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica, I am confident that my guests will get to see some amazing wildlife in and above the water. During my last photo tour, we once again had the chance to be entertained out on the Gulfo Dolce.

We started our 4 hour boat trip with a couple of Bottle-nosed dolphin sightings, but they were not very active, so we moved on.  As we were out looking for a different pod of dolphins, we saw this Frigatebird that had just collected some lunch.

As the bird flew by our boat, it dropped the fish and many of us captured images of the bird as it lost it's prey.

We also saw one of the same birds doing low flights over the dolphin hoping for some easy snacks.

I asked our boat captain to circle around and give the dolphins some wake to play with. This always yields awesome photos!

For this excursion, I chose to take the Canon R5 Mark II camera and the Canon RF 100-500mm lens. I chose this camera over the Canon R1, because I knew that I might be cropping in on my images and wanted the increased resolution for this reason.

Even though the Bottle-nosed dolphins tend to be more docile in the water, I know that the Spotted dolphins will jump high out of the water. 

For many of my guests, this was a highlight of the trip. And since dolphins are my favorite animals, I am right there with them.

This photo is one of my favorites from the trip, and is now the background image on my Mac desktop.

I encouraged my guests to fire off at a high frame rate, since the action happens quickly. I was shooting at 12fps when these four dolphins jumped up at the same time! How lucky was that?

At one point I was photographing a dolphin which was right by our other boat. (Note: I use multiple boats since I don't want to cram too many people on one larger boat.) Right as I was firing off some shots, a whole bunch of dolphins surfaced at the same time. I love that this photo shows how close we get to the dolphins on our excursion.

There is nothing better than calm waters, a nice breeze, and these types of sightings!

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• Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!

• Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Costa Rica, Peru, Galapagos, Alaska and more.

• You can purchase Jeff Cable Photography images from my new fine art site at: https://fineart.jeffcable.com/

• If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
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The B&H BILD Show: An amazing and VERY BUSY photo show!

The B&H BILD show is now over and is was an amazing time for everyone who attended. Having done countless photos shows over the last 20 years, this was the busiest show I have seen in more than a decade.

I showed up for the first day and there was a line to enter the show, and it stretched for many blocks. Honestly, for the last 10 years I have seen the photo shows slowly shrink in size, but that changed this time around.  I am going to guess that there were 30,000 attendees across the 2 days.

I took this photo on the second day, when the crowds were not as busy as Day 1, but it was still packed.

On the first day of the show I made booth appearances at ProGrade Digital, who make the best memory cards and readers...

...and DataColor who make the best color calibrators. It was really fun to share my experiences with everyone who came by their booths.

Speaking of fun, on the first evening of the show there was a NYC City Cruise sponsored by Canon. We had way too much fun on this boat, with great old friends, news friends, and an open bar! That's trouble! :)

The next morning I woke up and got ready for my presentation. My voice was a little shot from the night before, but after a good cup of hot coffee and some water I was ready to go!

It was really fun to present to a packed room with standing room only. I would like to thank all of you who attended the presentation.

I talked for 45 minutes about what it was like to photograph the Olympics for Team USA, and showed many of my favorite photos.

Laura was nice enough to capture images of me up on stage...

...and it was fun to see so many social media posts from the audience after the presentation.

This was a first - as someone asked me to sign their DataColor Spyder Pro. 

People have asked me if this presentation is available online. As of now, it is not, but I do believe that B&H is going to post it very soon. Keep an eye open for that to happen.

Now I am flying home from New York to repack and head out to South America for the Peru and Galapagos photo tours!

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• Subscribe to the Jeff Cable Photography Blog by clicking HERE!

• Check out my upcoming photo tours to amazing places around the world. I have photo tours to Costa Rica, Peru, Galapagos, Alaska and more.

• You can purchase Jeff Cable Photography images from my new fine art site at: https://fineart.jeffcable.com/

• If you are interested in purchasing ANY equipment, please click here to go to B&H Photo, as I get a referral from them if you enter this way. It does not change the cost to you in any way, but it helps me keep this blog up and running.
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