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Author Topic: 2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica  (Read 18343 times)

robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #20 on: February 16, 2009, 10:34:50 pm »

Anne and I have just returned from 3 days on the Southern Pacific Coast of Costa Rica. It is really amazing - the same cooperative people with beautiful smiling faces and the appearance of sincerity.

While I love scenery and nature, my real love is capturing people - both as story images and also as closer up portraits displaying their beautiful looks and personalities. My standard way of shooting is to take some shots of the people in their environment - and then have them pose for a portrait. I end up with tins of variety this way.

This morning while walking the streets of the costal town of Quepos, this business owner walked out on to the street to impress us with his food. I asked if I could take a picture and after agreeing he motioned to the sign  above the door of his establishment. I showed him the results on the camera screen and then he introduced me to his wife. I think that his pride shows through as he cradles his wife and looks at her admiringly:





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A stunning view as this man journeyed along the beach on his horse:




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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #21 on: February 16, 2009, 11:20:14 pm »

I absolutely love photographing children - connect with them very well in a short period of time - and the resulting images are always compelling with their innocence and sincerity.

These 3 children were at the bus station - sitting on the benches with their parents, waiting for their bus to arrive. I was patient befor asking if I could take a foto - - - with the little girl in yellow, I had to wait until her mother was done breast feeding her before asking. While initially I wasn't going to take a picture of the last girl, she was sitting beside me and was persistent in getting my attention so that I would not leave her out.



Initially I was going to crop out the little boy on the right side - however I am intrigued by the way he is looking at the girl observing what is going on:


What a great free spirit - - - I hope she has fond memories of this moment when older:


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I just cannot imagine having this kind of success taking pictures of children in public, in my home country. I have been approached and questioned by security staff at fairs and other public venues when photographing my grandchildren from a distance. It is such a shame and at the same time frustrating, as a photographer who loves to take candid images of real people in their every day environment. Hence I will continue to journey to Costa Rica to satisfy my passion for this style of photography and response from the subjects.
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #22 on: February 18, 2009, 06:37:12 pm »

THE ONLY THING MISSING IS THAT I WASN'T THE OFFICIAL WEDDING PHOTOGRAPHER


Maybe next year !

While enjoying paradise on the Southern Pacific beaches of COSTA RICA, I came across 2 weddings taking place in the same area as the sun dropped below the horizon. I was eating when I noticed the first wedding and so grabbed my camera to get a couple of long shots. The second bride and groom passed by me in my car as I was getting ready to head home. In the 3 rapid fire shots that I took, she was obviously aware of me and was posing for my camera. Until I saw the final shots back home, I thought that they were the same wedding.


Olympus E-3 : 554 mm focal length : f5.6 @ 1/80'th : 1000 ISO


Olympus E-3 : 140 mm focal length : f4 @ 1/160'th : 1000 ISO


Olympus E-3 : 148 mm focal length : f4 @ 1/160'th : 1000 ISO

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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #23 on: February 19, 2009, 07:46:25 am »

THE EYES HAVE IT

Parrot Eye


Moth Wing


Painted Wall
« Last Edit: February 19, 2009, 07:56:30 am by robertwatcher »
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #24 on: February 19, 2009, 09:36:22 am »

A shot that I just love to the look of . . .

. . . my wife Anne (multitasking as usual with bags of groceries and binoculars in hand), and the 2 friends that came down with us this year - - - - standing on the busy streets around the Central Park in Alajuela looking at a huge flock of Parrots up in the park trees.


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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #25 on: February 20, 2009, 07:40:35 pm »

OLD TIME OX CART MANUFACTURER

One project that Anne and I hoped that we would get around to this year, was to head up into the mountain town of Sarchi and hopefully find out where the manufacture took place of Costa Rica's claim to fame - - - it's Ox Cart.

Anne's internet research last night, turned up to main manufacturers:

1 ) Joaquin Chaverri Cart Factory - which is much older but caters to  more modern manufacturing technique - - - it is in South Sarchi

2 ) Taller Eloy Alfaro workshop in North Sarchi. This one while slightly newer, was of much more appeal to me because it uses old school techniques including water wheel driven saws, planes, routers, etc.

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We have just returned from the 3 hour hair pin trip up in to the mountains and 2 1/2 hour trip home by Bus. We were told that it would be hard to find the place - and so hoped that locals would help us out. A man on the streets in Sarchi, directed us to exact location letting us know that it is a "old house"

It was a great experience as we were free to walk around the workers capturing images of all of the old equipment and methods. I shot some 135 images of all details. Here are just a few:

Here is the workshop ("old home")




Cardboard patterns and brushes with heavy use
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #26 on: February 20, 2009, 07:41:34 pm »

Cutting through these trees, put quite a load on the water wheel driven belts - and the saw blade would regularly come to a halt


A little water on the leather belts for some grip, would seem to help out


The second floor where assembly of the carts takes place - - - was a scary experience with it's thin floor boards with large gaps allowing us to see the goings on below. Here is a work bench on that floor
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #27 on: February 20, 2009, 07:42:26 pm »

A water wheel driven planer


Complete with Wooden Drive Wheels


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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #28 on: February 20, 2009, 07:43:10 pm »

The Painting process





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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #29 on: February 20, 2009, 10:17:24 pm »

AH - a tourist shot of me - - - the guy who hardly ever gets his picture taken.

Anne insisted that we take a "Tourist" shot of each other in front of Costa Rica's most prominent tourist attraction - - - the giant ox cart in the central park of Sarchi Norte.



And the reciprocal one that I took of Anne


Hey - we have to act like tourists at least once during our excursion!
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #30 on: February 22, 2009, 04:18:25 pm »

I HAVE NO IDEA WHY . . .

but people of Costa Rica, in general - - - are aware of cameras (and caucasian I'm sure) and find ways of providing me with great pictures and opportunities.

Of course that has been evident to me along - but these recent experiences made me much more aware of it.

While shooting out over the harbour at this small fishing town, I saw a small boat passing by me. I was quite a distance away and not terribly visible being behind trees shooting from this vantage point:



I took my shot of them sorting out their fish - and a few subsequent ones as they passed by:


Then I saw the man at the back bend down as they moved away from me:


Only to return upright - turn towards me with an example of his successful catch that day:
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #31 on: February 22, 2009, 05:31:31 pm »

And then another somewhat similar situation yesterday while Anne and I were wondering through some of the "back streets" of the capital city San Jose . . .

. . . I noticed this packed and cramped meat market and decided to take a shot from outdoors of the Kaos. I no sooner got in to position and a few of the fellows behind the counter started yelling at me and hollering "foto foto". I grabbed the shot as they were doing so and then entered squeezing in front of the patrons to get the shots they wanted of them handling their goods.

Unfortunately I was not as prepared as I normally would have been - as I had my aperture set to f6.3 for more DOF for the from the hip street shooting I was set up for and doing. I took the shots in the moment and then when I left, realized that shutter speeds were very low and may have been too slow to get the shots successfully. Most however turned out fine - benefiting from the IS (image stabilization)  feature of my E-510 and E-3:

All shots taken with Olympus E-510 : 12-60mm f2.8/4 : f6.3 @ 1/15'th to 1/40'th : 800 ISO









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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #32 on: February 22, 2009, 05:39:14 pm »

And then there was this fellow who I noticed while walking in the Central Market. I took this shot and then he came up and grabbed Anne - implying that I take a picture - - - after showing him the shot on the back of the camera, I started to walk away when he came after me insisting that I take his business card. I soon noticed that he was pointing at his email address on it and was wanting me to send him a copy of the foto (which I have done):



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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #33 on: February 23, 2009, 05:36:07 pm »

One Year Later

About a week ago Anne and I received an email through our Travel Virgins Contact Page with a message entirely written in Spanish. While our Spanish isn't massively improved over last year, we were able to roughly decipher the message. In Spanish it was:

Quote
soy el de anteojos que sale en la foto de pizza hut alajuela, la que esta al lado de blusa
blanca es ahora mi esposa. Vi todas sus fotos, que bueno que disfruten de los paisajes de
nuestro pais.me alegro. sigan viniendo.pura vida.

We figured out that it was one of the fellows in a Photo that we took on our last day saying Good Bye to the city of Alajuela when we left last year. We popped into a Pizza Hut downtown that we had not tried and got a great photo story of the mechanics and delivery fellows working on their motor cycles outside the front door. I also took a couple of shots of the staff inside and then left never to go back.

We also gathered from  the email message that it was the man with the glasses and that he and the lady in the white top were either now married or would be getting married. I sent a reply email with "Gracious" as I knew no Spanish sentences to reply...

. . . Here is the picture from last year that he had come across on the web (I may have written down the url for him on a piece of paper last year - I'm not sure):



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Well - Anne and I had to return to the Pizza Hut this afternoon for a Deep Dish Personal Pizza - - - hoping that we might recognize the people in the photo from last year and see if they remembered us. Of course I had my Olympus E-510 around my neck to jog their memory.

While we did not see the man in glasses (that emailed me), the female Manager with white blouse was there. We smiled at each other and then with the help of a waiter that knew a little English - he explained to her that we were the ones who took their picture last year. She (and a few others who were there at that time) remembered well and were excited to see us.

We just had to do an updated portrait for 2009. Next thing I see is the Manager (in white blouse) on the phone. I picked up that she was phoning the man in glasses (her fiance it turns out) and next thing I know he shows up in a van and reaches out to shake my hand and tell me that he had emailed me (at least I think that is what he was saying). Here is the updated 2009 portrait with some of the same faces:

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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #34 on: February 23, 2009, 05:37:16 pm »

I had to get them in the mood and so started having fun with this man slicking back his hair so he'd look good:



That led to some fun shots of the bunch:



including this final one where I rubbed my hair slicking it back - so that he would do the same:

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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #35 on: February 27, 2009, 06:42:34 am »

Walking the streets in a small town : The Human Element





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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #36 on: February 27, 2009, 06:43:44 am »

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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #37 on: February 27, 2009, 06:44:27 am »

Close Encounters

A Woman resting on her door enjoying the activity on her street


This very small Street Vending Tent framed the man interestingly in  the lower corner amongst his many hats


Always a Sleeping Dog - and often at bus stops where you want to sit. You just have to work around it
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #38 on: February 27, 2009, 07:43:28 am »

Wandering the Jungles : The Animal Kingdom

All taken with Olympus E-3 and 70-300mm Zuiko lens

A Little Gecko sitting beside us watching the waves crash in on the Carribean Coastline


Sloth perched high high up in the tree tops


Very small Deadly Viper wrapped around a branch just feet away from where we walked
« Last Edit: February 27, 2009, 07:44:06 am by robertwatcher »
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robertwatcher

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2009 Lots Of Photography From Costa Rica
« Reply #39 on: February 27, 2009, 07:44:50 am »

Capuchin Monkey sitting just over my head, appearing to be saying "No Photos"


Howler Monkey having a snack


Impressive Colours of a Toucan
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