INSIDE

FUN WAYS TO IMPROVE YOUR DIGITAL PHOTOGRAPHY

p h o t o December 2008
Edition 3

INSIDE ASSIGNMENT: SPORT

The theory of sports photography
DEADLINES: FRAMING IT
Skills for newspaper photographers
SKILL FACTOR: SHOT COUNTS
How to work to a shot count to improve your success rate
PROCESS: BURNING and DODGING
An old school way to make your images better
TRAVELSHOOTER: ON ASSIGNMENT
Cambodia: Ankor Wat
TECH NOTES: ELEMENTS 7
Adobes new software

Hi guys,
This month we take a look a couple
of subjects dear to my heart - sports
photography and snapping in Cam-
bodia. I love shooting sports. Even
though you plan your shots it’s not
until you open them up later on your
laptop that you really get to know
whether or not you have a great shot
in the bag. This month’s assignment
covers what you need to know about
sports photography and ways to im-
prove your skill set. We also look at
framing your photos to get more im-
pactful images from rather boring
subjects. There is also a brief review
of the new Abode Photoshop Ele-
ments 7 software which I use all the
time as I find it easier to use for most
photographic situations than CS.
Cambodia is one of my favourite des-
tinations and I always marvel at all
the new photo ops I discover each
time I visit there. It sad, that over the
2 individual personal use.
INSIDE photo
What reinforces the content of a photograph is the
sense of rhythm – the relationship between shapes and
values. - Henri Cartier-Bresson
contents Edition 3, December 2008
INSIDE ASSIGNMENT: SPORTS
Sports - fun in the sun p4
DEADLINES: FRAMING IT
The story behind the photos in p22
newspapers
past 8 years I have seen it grow from more than 2000 people logging on
a backwater village into a modern last month so we will try and keep
day tourist hub with all the annoying this new puppy going strong.All the PROCESS:
trends you often find at places like best to all our friends around the
Burning and dodging p24
this, but I still love going back and ex- world celebrating the many different
ploring the many different temples religious festivals coming up this
and sights there and yes, I think the month. Keep on shooting great im-
local Khmer people are still some of ages.
the friendliest around, so enjoy your
SKILL FACTOR: SHOT COUNTS
p
trip to the land of Ankor. John C
Working to a shot list p30
On a sad note a couple of good pho-
tographers who helped me indirectly
along the way have passed over and PUBLISHER/EDITOR/DESIGNER/
our condolences go out to the fami- PHOTOGRAPHER/WRITER:
lies of Dick Poole and Brian Curtis. John Cosgrove TRAVELSHOOTER:ON ASSIGNMENT
Travelshooter1@gmail.com
Also I note the passing of
INSIDE Photo e-magazine is published Cambodian Odyssey - looking at p34
PHOTOVIDEOi magazine, a possible by: Siem Reap and Ankor Wat
A couple of real beauties: Canons 1200mm and
sign of the economic times, but Kath 600mm white lenses. INSIDE Photo
and I would like to thank all who 5 Council Street
helped us achieve our dream of run- St Kilda
ning our own magazine in Singapore Dunedin LAST FRAME:
over the past 6 years. New Zealand
Now we are back here in New
Ph: + 64 3 4555998 p50
www.insidephoto.info
Zealand and INSIDE PHOTO is going Material published in INSIDE Photo is copyrighted and
ahead in leaps and bounds with cannot be reproduced (or photocopied) other than for
This e-zine was produced using the new QuarkXpress 8 page design software 3
Sports Photography

Capturing all the action

D espite perusing countless volumes on the subject of sports photography over
the years, the best advice I ever found for generating great sports and action
photos comes from Sportsshooter.com founder Robert Hanashiro, a USA TODAY staff
photographer and developer of the world’s best web site for sports photography.
“Shoot at the HIGHEST shutter speed you can ... which in turn, means you're shoot-
ing at a much WIDER lens opening and cleaning up your background. So get rid of
your crappy backgrounds because they ruin photos. “
4 5
 While shooting a childrens triathlon recently, I experimented with the flow of the com-
petitors coming out of the sea on the swimming leg and then running through the show-
ers before they climbed aboard their bicycles and raced away. Because there was no sun
to give me any sparkling backlit shots I decided to blur out the action and simply held
the camera still as the athletes raced through the water. Shot with a Nikon D100 set at
1/30th of a second @ f16, it came out better than I had planned and the organisers liked
it because it gave them a timeless marketing shot to pitch to Osim, the sponsors.
6 7
 “Get rid of your backgrounds”
T hat eloquently sums up the difference between
a great sports photo and a record shot of some-
one playing sport. Get rid of a distracting back-
3 frames a second or does it shoot at a higher capture
rate to give you a better than average chance to stop the
action.
ground and this in turn focuses all your viewers’
attention on the dramatic moment you have just Single shot or ten frames a second?
captured. A friend of mine did actually attend the
Today most DSLR cameras come with at least 3
famous sports shooter academy run annually by
frames per second of capture rate (usually called
Robert, and he told me that yes indeed Robert con-
High-speed continuous mode), the higher the dollar
tinually instructs attendees to get rid of their crappy
value - the faster the capture rate and we can now
backgrounds.
get nine or ten frames a second from either of the
Sports photography is a fun way to extend yourself two top preferred sports shooter dream camera
as a photographer because it forces you to push the bodies, the Nikon D3 or the Canon EOS 1D MkIII.
boundaries of your creative limits. In auto every- But what does that give us in terms of great shots?
thing mode any fool can shoot a cyclist riding past To shoot those great sports photos you have to plan
but can you do it in a way that attracts the eye and your shot. If we can see the ‘peak of action’ mo-
solicits the response “Wow how did they get that?” ment happening in the viewfinder then we are not
You don’t have to be an ardent sports fan, you don’t capturing it as the mirror is down. What 3/5/9 or 10
even have to know the intricacies of the sport you frames per second gives us is a varying
are shooting today, and all you needs is a creative amount of successful hit rates on
eye and a desire to shoot things in a different way capturing at least
than others. It would be nice to have one
of those super fast 300 /
400 / 500 / 600 / 800mm
lenses but I can’t justify it to
the wife. All you need to know
is what are the limits of your gear
and how to use them to maximize
your shooting experience.
u Know your camera’s limits in terms of
auto-focusing speeds versus motor drive
(capture rate) speeds versus shutter speeds.
u Know what are the limits of your lenses in
terms of focusing speed and minimum exposures a couple of
and then find where the optimum sweet spots are strong ac-
on your lenses. tion pho-
tos from
Then it is time to set up your camera to record a sequence we
the action: are shooting.
u Consider the apertures: Do you use a short depth of At 3 frames a
field below f5.6 to blow out the background or try and in- second we
clude everything in the frame? have one chance in three
u Consider your shutter speeds: Fast or slow speeds to of capturing the peak of
get different results? Under 250th of a second you are
action moment.
going to get movement in your images above 1/250th you
will freeze the action. Action always works
u Consider the ISO rating: Do you use the highest your like the arc of a ball rising up
camera will give you snappy pictures of frozen moments and then descending back to
in time at the risk of noise or do you try and use the low- earth. Ideally we want to snap
est ISO the lighting conditions allow.
the photo when the ball is at
u Consider your capture rates: Does your camera offer
8 9
 Five Frames a Second the top of the arc because it pauses briefly due to
the forces of thrust/drag and gravity all working on
it at the same time but at 3 frames a second we
have to plan the moment when we depress the
best shot
shutter to allow it time to capture the peak action
5 because we have .33 of a second between each cap-
ture and a lot can happen in that short time.
okay shot
4 At 5 frames a second we have about 2.5 chances
okay shot
frames per second
of getting a good shot. One shot as it nears the peak
moment, another at the top and maybe one more
3 as it descends.
At 10 frames a second we have a 60/40 chance of
getting the moment. You would think that the faster
2 mind over matter equation and this is where the
the capture rates the better chance we have. But
when you become addicted to shooting at 10 FPS
then more often than not you will miss the action
1 you have to override the left side of the brain saying
because you are relying on the camera to shoot the
pictures and you are not using your skill to capture
the moment. It is called shot gunning and believe
0 me it only works 60% of the time.
Single frames require a lot of skill but offer the
0 seconds 1 best chance for results on pre-planned shots only.
These are set-up shots where you have decided to
snap a rider or runner as they cross a particular pre-
focused point on the road.
Multiple capture rates won’t work here because
Ten Frames a Second you will often snap a frame just as they arrive and
the next frame is captured when they have passed
10 your mark, missing the top shot.
I have found many top sports shooters still rely on
9 the old school skill of pre-focusing and single shot
best shot when they plan great artistic action pictures.
8 All high captures rates offers us is the ability to cap-
frames per second
ture more than one usable frame of the action.
7 you are already in the
This leads me onto an essential skill that all
sports photographers must work on and
6 develop - their Intuition.
5 Coaching tip - Old school trick
Intuition comes from the right side of the brain (the
creative side) while the left side looks after all the
4 okay shots okay shots other decision making processes. We know it more
commonly as that little voice that tells us when to
3 shoot and when to wait a bit longer before you de-
press the shutter button. It’s often really frustrating
2 that after spending hours shooting mountain bikers
zooming past, you review the results and all you see
1 are a whole bunch of dots in the middle of the
frame. “But” I hear you cry “They appeared big in
0 seconds 1 the viewfinder so I snapped them and yet they all
came out small – what gives?” Basically it happens
when you have let the left side dictate the shooting
process at the expense of the right side of your
10 brain.
When looking through the viewfinder we are often
only seeing 95-97% of the total viewing area and
then this field of view is further magnified 1.6x
times to cope with the digital sensor/lens crop fac-
tor so at times it makes it hard to know when to
shoot and when to wait a bit.
Throw into this equation the common fact that
when we look naturally at a subject with our eyes
we’re really only looking at the centre 18 degrees of
our field of vision, when you look through a cam-
eras view finder you crop that field of vision in even
tighter due to the lens so this often causes us to de-
press the shutter because we think the moving sub-
ject is closer than it really is. So it really becomes a
value of intuition comes into play. You now know
that the subject isn’t filling the frame just yet and
they are too close and wait a fraction longer before
depressing the shutter. DSLR’s are a great coaching
tool for photographers and they have helped us im-
prove our reaction times to capture spontaneous
moments.
TIP
Most endurance/athletic events are usually
multiple laps of a set track so practice on slower
competitors and use
your rear LCD to mon-
itor results so that
you can make changes
in viewing angle and
timing. Then when
then experts race by
groove to shoot great
pictures.
This can be practiced by setting the camera
onto single shot and manual focus mode. Pick a
point on the track and lock the focus down on
it. Now as the athletes’ race past you, time your
shutter release to match them stepping over
your pre-determined mark on the track then re-
view your results and make the necessary men-
tal adjustments to snap it just as their body
reaches the point in space directly above the
mark. This will teach you how to cope with
your digital cameras inherent shutter lag. Re-
member this is how we used to shoot sports all
those years before Auto Focus arrived.
11
On the subject of AUTO FOCUS let’s talk about
what are the good and bad features of it. TIP
Learn how many frames you can shoot at some-
Today’s’ DSLRs come packed full of electronics and one running towards you versus someone run-
one of the most appreciated is Auto-Focus. Simply ning parallel to you. Find out which one is
point and shoot and you will snap a sharp frame. In slower and remember it in your sports plan.
sports mode you will be using High-speed continu-
ous capture rate mode coupled to the AI Servo AF TIP
(Canon) or Dynamic Area AF (Nikon) or Continuous
Always use single spot autofocus rather than
AF (Sony) focusing mode on your camera. This is the
group, as subjects outside the centre of the
classic follow focus function of your lenses whereby
frame will impact on the AF causing it to ‘Hunt’
the camera attempts to keep the subject sharp by
and miss the shot.
predicting where it will be when the next exposure
occurs. And therein lies the first problem. Even Coaching – old school trick:
though you have a good capture rate when using
the C (continuous) button of say 3 fps, you may You can squeeze the maximum number of FPS
often not get exactly three frames per second each from your camera if you switch off the AF
The size difference is obvious between a the new Canon EF
time you hold the shutter button down because if mode, so use the manual pre-focus tip from
800mm f5.6 L series lens and the entry level Canon EFS 75-
your cameras AF system is slow and has to hunt for above when you need to shoot heaps of frames
Lenses 300mm IS f4.5-5.6 lens. Both do a great job within their limits
the subject then this will impact on how many of say an explosion or a subject that isn’t mov-
yet one weights 6.5kgs and the other only 400gms.
frames it shoots off continuously. ing too much like a diver or basketball player
jumping up to the hoop. Today the weapon of choice for a dedicated sports
Think of it this way: In Sports Mode your camera’s shooter starts at 300mm and then works its way up
AF function is trying to predict where the subject to the 600mm or even the new 800mm lenses. coming head on towards you at a slower shutter
will be in each frame so a lot of processing and bat- For us, our choice of lenses is much smaller and speed than one running past or parallel your lens at
The higher the value camera the better this process ranges from wide angle to 300mm and this is enough speed. It’s all down to how the shutter works but it’
tery resources are allocated to this function, then
works and that’s why sports shooters always try and to shoot good solid sports images, we just have to safe to know that when a runner is coming towards
now factor in all the processing and battery re-
get the best cameras to work with. learn to use them well. you it is possible to shoot him at a slower shutter
sources needed to capture an exposed frame and
BUT! Knowing the limits of your camera’s AF and The first part is to find our lenses sweet spot. This is speed well below 1/250th of a second and still get a
move it from the sensor through the A/D convertor
working around them, making them part of the cap- the point whereby it is focusing at its sharpest point sharp photo rather than shooting him running past
and then into your cameras color engine before fi-
ture process means that any DSLR or dCompact can edge to edge. Now most of us don’t own super ex- you at an angle and all you capture is a blur.
nally depositing it onto your CF card, you can see
shoot great sports photos’; it just needs you to use pensive glass so we have to work with the gear we
that on cheaper entry level cameras this means that
your intuition and skill to make it work. could afford. Experience (and some help from Practi- So using that 75-300mm lens you got as an acces-
something has to be sacrificed otherwise your bat-
tery will be dead in five frames and it is usually the cal Photography USA) had shown that f8-f9.5 on most sory when you brought your first DSLR you know it
capture rate and the autofocus operations. lenses is the best we are ever going to get in terms of is possible to shoot some great sports photos as
edge to edge sharpness. But in the sports arena we long as you know it and your cameras limits. p
know that we need to use the highest shutter speed
The AF-Drive button controls the selection of Auto Focus modes in possible to stop the action which necessitates us
your camera from One Shot (focus lock on half-press), AI Focus using the widest lens opening available to limit the
(locks but monitors movement) or AI Servo (continuous predictive depth of field and to give us a high shutter speed so
focus). The cool AI Focus mode on Canons initially locks just like One where do we trade one for the other on our 75-300
Shot mode but monitors the focused subject, if the subject moves f5.6 lens?
between frames it will automatically switch to an AI Servo opera- It’s not a fast AF lens but in bright sunshine it is okay
tion. The Drive mode selects Single shot or Continuous L (3 fps, wide open at f5.6, but when the clouds come over it
Continuous H (6.5 fps) or the two starts to get soft and to stop the action you need to
Self-Timer modes available. increase the ISO rating to keep the shutter speeds
high enough and then live with the resulting graini-
On most cameras there is a default sports mode in the scenic mode ness of the images.
selction panel or dial. It is represented by the running man logo and Remember that intuition mode; well this is where it
all comes into play. You need to plan your coverage
when selected it makes changes to the cameras operation. It auto-
of a game so watch and see who is making all the
matically selects Continuous High Capture rates, AI
plays or winning and then position yourself accord-
Servo Focus and defaults to Shutter priority to keep
ingly so that the players are coming towards you and
your shutter speeds high to freeze motion and pre- not running away from you. This way you can use a
vent camera shake. It is also a good mode to shoot feature of your lens and camera that most photogra-
the kids with. phers don’t know about. The ability to shoot a subject
13
Now lets get down to learning how
to shoot good sports photos.
S ports photography is all about
capturing the dramatic mo-
ments in time and to capture
u Now look around you at the local conditions:

them well we must use all our

skills and intuition. The first thing
we have to always remember is to
always shoot sport in such a way
that others will marvel at our abil-
ity to capture action successfully
Learn what at the limits on your lenses and sectionalize the playing
and creatively.
field into those areas you can get a full length vertical and horizontal
When you get to the match take
shot from. Remember dots in the middle of the frame are not good
the time to watch and see:
enough – fill the frame. To judge how far away you can shoot, in land-
scape or vertical mode it’s a full body shot with a bit of space top and
u Which side is making all
bottom – any further away and you are wasting your time. A 200mm
the winning plays? u Can you get a more dramatic lens will only really shoot out to 25m, a 300mm will get you to 40m
shot using rear curtain sync flash and a 500mm will shoot the half way mark.
methods or is it better to shoot
alfresco?
u Where is the sun coming from? Think about ways to use it to cre-
ate dramatic photos either with it behind you or in silhouette mode.
Look to the sky for dramatic cloud formations.

u What different viewing angles can you maximize to improve

your shooting experience? And what special techniques should you
u Which players are more use to improve your pictures? Can you get a better shot from over
photogenic or more active? there, or by lying on the ground looking up?

u Find out what are the limits on access to the sides of the field or
race track. In any federation governed match or event you usually have u What considerations do you
access to about a meter from the lines to allow the linesmen to do have to think about concerning
their job. your safety and those of the
At a major sports event this is usually dictated by TV coverage. Once I competitors? You never want to
had to shoot a netball international where the photographers could be injured or cause injury to any-
only shoot from a three meter long box on one side. one so ALWAYS think safety when
Not the best way to cover an event. So find out where you can stand covering sport especially any
that’s not going to be in the road of spectators or officials – ask some- sport that requires track based Ask someone or watch and see where other photographers are going
14
one if you don’t know. movement or motor vehicles. to figure out access and safety considerations. 15
 8 ways to get
great sports
shots

1
SPEED

2 LENSES
The choice of lens determines your unique viewpoint. Telephotos isolate the player
against a blurry background while Wide-angles include the viewer in the image by
showing what else was visible.

Speed can be portrayed in two ways:

Frozen moments in time captured at shutter speeds over 1/250th of a second or 2: Pan Action photos
where movement is visible through the use of slower shutter speeds below 125th of a second to blur the
subject. The general rule is to shoot sport at the highest shutter speed you can get depending on the light-
ing conditions.
Visit some of the best sports websites out there and look at their galleries for inspiration. www.photo-
sport.co.nz, www.sportshooter.com, www.siphoto.com, www.reuters.com, www.washington-
post.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/index.html, www.wpp.com, www.daveblackphotography.com,
www.bobmartin.com/, www.manginphotography.com/.
Do a search on Google for works by Tim Clayton, Chris Smith, Craig Golding to name a few of the superstars
of sports photography. Now combine all these factors into planning your coverage of the event and always
remember why you are doing it – to have fun.
16 17
 4
eMOTION

3
ANGLES Emotion: A fast shutter speed captures the emotion on the face of players as they strain and struggle with
the conditions and the moment.
Always try and view the world at a different angle to regular viewers. Crouch down, lie Reaction to the action: Keep on shooting after the peak moment of action has happened to capture what
down on the road, tilt the camera up or down and bend the perspective using wide others reactions to the goal being scored were.

5
angle lenses. Use whatever tools and tricks you have in the bag to create a distinctive
view point.
rEACTIONS

18 19
6
COLOUR

8
Colour: Think of ways of showing strong colour and then try and use all the range of colour combinations:
complementary, contrasting, monochromatic or spot.Pan action flash: Movement or dramatic moments
ARTISTIC
can be easily captured using rear curtain sync methods with your flash. It is a great way to open up the This is where you try combining all the different ways of shooting sport into distinc-
shadows and create a distinctive image. tive images showing a different view point/angle or colour combinations.

7
Pan aCTION
fLASH
20 21
 FRAMING IT
T he other day I was in the familiar
world of the press pack. We were
chasing our new Prime Minister John
Key, around Dunedin as he cam-
paigned unsuccessfully for local Na-
tional Party candidates in the recent
election. John Key hasn’t been one
of our usual media subjects here, un-
like the deposed Labour PM Helen
Clark, who had stormed into
Dunedin many times over the past
six months and had held several pub-
lic meetings, especially with the very
vocal student population. So shoot-
ing a good portrait of John Key was
going to be a struggle as he ap-
22
peared to be only speaking to the
party faithful rather than meeting
and greeting the people in the
street.
The usual suspects assembled D
Scene, the ODT, TV1/2/3 and 9, Fair-
fax and APN, radio and then the
press pack was further enlarged with
the breathless arrival (it took them
longer than normal to get rental cars
at the airport) of the Wellington
based Press gallery reporters and
media handlers.
So there we where, the locals and
the imports, all crowding around
John Key in a tiny stairwell at the
local National Party offices trying to
get a different shot. Whenever you
photograph government ministers or
celebrities you know it’s going to be
a struggle because there is always a
press pack crowding around so you
have to think of ways to change the
view point, to create unique photos thought about how I could improve them from all angles and then plan perts at making press conference
that are different than the usual the visual presentation. So I started your shots carefully. Go for the photos interesting) you will see that
press release headshots we often looking at ways to frame his face, unique angle to catch the eye of the they always look for different angles
see in the daily papers and that’s whether it is through a series of viewer. to make a boring news conference
were framing comes in. arms, or reflected in TV camera mon- Use all the lenses you have in your more interesting. Once you have the
As I jostled with the TV crews and re- itors or under the shoulders of the bag to come up with different view- angles then it is simply a matter of
porters all leaning over each other to reporters. There are many ways to points. When you look at wire pho- waiting for the subjects face to turn
get closer to John Key I shot the frame a subject so always walk tos (or the American newspapers like towards you and then capturing
usual face shots then stood back and around your subjects, looking at the Washington Post, they are ex- some emotion. p
23

I n both Adobe Photoshop CS and
PS Elements there has always been
many ways to complete common
tasks and it is no different with the
old photography tool of burning and
dodging images to define edges, con-
centrate a viewers eye on a particu-
lar aspect of the image or to simply
highlight a feature.
Adobe Photoshop has been
equipped with a burning and dodg-
ing tool ever since Photoshop V2.5.1
was shipped in 1993. PS Elements
followed in 2001 and it too had the
burn and dodge tool (quick key O).
It is designed to replicate the lovely
burning and dodging tricks we
learned in the darkroom.
Over the years I have used the Burn
and Dodge tool and was a bit disap-
pointed with the results, subsequent
versions addressed many different is-
sues and tools in Photoshop but the
B&D tool remained the same. So in
2000 I sat in on a lecture by the god
father of digital newspaper photog-
raphy Rob Galbraith and he showed
me a wonderful way to burn and
dodge pictures which left you with
complete control over the resulting
image in terms of saturation, opacity
and at the same applying non-de-
structive picture editing techniques
that preserve the original image.
Technique works in both Photoshop and
Elements. This lesson was prepared
using ADOBE Photoshop Elements 7
Step Five: take your time and
BEFORE check your progress by selecting the
eye icon on Burn & Dodge layer in
the layer palette to review your
progress with the base image. And
Step One: Copy the layer using CTRL+J to copy the background image.
Step Two: Create a new layer using SHIFT+CTRL+N, then change the layer
when you finish remember to save
the resulting image as either a .tiff
mode to OVERLAY and this allows you access to the check box beneath the or .psd so that you can edit it again
Mode selector. Check it to fill the layer with 50% gray (look to your Layers later. You will notice that this tech-
Palette to see a new layer filled with 50% gray appears). nique is also a good way to increase
subtly the saturation of an image
especially in areas of haze near the
horizon on a landscape.
This method of burning and dodg-
ing is a very good way to lighten and
darken specific areas on an image
without destroying the underlying
AFTER image data. p
Step Four: Carefully paint around
the picture working in Black on the
edges and any areas you want to
darken, then hitting the X key which
changes it to White and you can
then lighten faces, eyes etc. Make
each brush stroke a complete stroke
as the brush tool is an accumulative
step Three: Select a nice soft edge brush (quick key B) and lower the opacity tool so each time you brush a section
to about 20% then hit the D key to return the foreground/background colour it is adding 20% to the underlying
swatch to black and white. strokes – so the key trick here is to
finish your entire brush stroke before
lifting your finger off the mouse. If
you make a mistake simple use the X
key again to change colour and
lighten or darken the offending
stroke – or if you don’t like the result
simply delete the layer and start
again. 25
 Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 7 currently only available for Microsoft® Windows® XP SP 2 or 3 and Windows Vista®

Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 7 for Microsoft®

Windows® XP SP 2 or 3 and Windows Vista®
• More Functionality

7
ell here it is, the latest version of the
number one selling consumer photo ed-
iting software in the world today that aims to
make it so simple for digital photographers to
download, organise, edit, enhance and share
their images in a variety of new and exciting
ways.
Adobe has always been very honest in their
marketing of Photoshop Elements since its
launch in 2001. It was billed as a cheaper and
easier to use version of the world’s leading im-
aging manipulation software PHOTOPSHOP
CSx and to that end they are correct.

26
They dropped a lot of the functionality
of PHOTOSHOP to create ELEMENTS but
they have lost none of its usability.
For most users Elements is very easy to
use, navigate and create images with.
You don’t need to major in Photoshop to
quickly assemble and share your cre-
ations.
In fact right from the get-go Adobes en-
gineers made it a lot easier to use by in-
cluding groups of communally used
tasks and ideas into scripts so that all
you had to do was select, click and use.
• More tools
Top new features in Adobe Photoshop Elements 7
• Smart Brush
• Photomerge Scene Cleaner
• New Quick Fixes
• Toothbrush
• Bluer skies
• Black & White Paintbrush
• New Guided Edits
• Effects: Pencil Sketch, Old Fashioned, and more
• Actions: Slimming, Cropping, Captions, and more
• Adjustments: Levels, Fix Distortion
• Surface Blur
• New Web Gallery Templates
• Text Search box
• More Effects and Actions

• Smart Brush

27

Okay, for those advanced photog-
raphers brought up on a diet of
Photoshop a step backwards into
Elements is a bit like leaving the
car at home.
You will miss things like Actions,
major text controls, guides, LAB
adjustments, CMYK and colour
settings, paths and some multi-
media functionality.
But you will marvel at how the en-
gineers thought about what a
photographer would really need
to use to quickly move images
about and correct them and then
they grouped these tasks together
and made it a lot more intuitive
and accessible.
In fact as the versions rolled off
the production line over the past
eight years users started to notice
subtle changes whereby what ap-
peared in Elements was a taste of
what would likely be appearing in
the next version of CS.
But where Elements is at its
strongest apart from the cheap
cost (somewhere around $249
compared with $1450+ for CS3) is
its ability to group commonly
used tasks into one action or intu-
itive pictogram task window al-
lowing inexperienced users to
quickly achieve the same results as pros.
Take black and white conversions, Elements had a
click and use visual reference palette long before CS
did.
Those using both Photoshop systems know that ba-
sically most of what they do in CS is achievable in El-
ements with only some limitations.
Now hitting our shelves is the latest incantation of
Elements version 7 so let’s see what goodies are in
the bag here.
First up you will notice that they have retained the
dark gray screen theme to replicate Adobe Light-
room and Bridge in CS3/4 but now you can adjust
the overall brightness of the interface.
One of the features that’s catching the headlines is
28
the new Smart Brush
Found under the Full Edit
mode, the new Smart Brush
tool is a combination of the
Quick Selection tool and ad-
justment layers. Offering a
fast way to adjust, enhance,
and add up to 70 effects to
your photos.
Surface Blur
The Surface Blur filter, found under the Filter
menu’s Blur section, specializes in softening sur-
faces while keeping edges crisp and should be a
great filter for portraits.
Adobe® Photoshop® Elements 7 for Microsoft® Windows® XP SP 2 or 3 and Windows Vista®
Photomerge Scene Cleaner
Take a great group photo and there will always be
someone with their eyes closed in one frame so
now you can use the new Photomerge Scene
Cleaner to fix the problem while still retaining your
main background image. You will need at least two
frames of the image and the subjects you wish to
change must be in different locations in the images
but it’s real easy to open his eyes using the scene
cleaner – it works great also on landscapes with an-
noying people in them.
Quick Edit features.
In the Quick Edit mode you now access to a tool
called Whiten Teeth. Simply click the tool and care-
fully paint over the teeth to
whiten them. Joining the tooth-
brush is a Bluer skies enhancer,
which acts just like the toothbrush
in that you paint over the sky
areas and this increases the blue
in there to give you better looking
well saturated skies. The last new
tool on the Quick Edit palette is
the Black & White Paintbrush. All
three are paint brushes which
mimic the quick selection brush
and change the area you select –
a fun set of tools with lots of op-
tions.
Guided Edit
The Guided Edit mode has a few
enhancements to existing tools,
such as the ability to adjust levels,
how to go about fixing Keystone
Distortion, the new Photographic
Effects and the Actions Player. In
Photographic Effects, you are
able to quickly turn your photos
into works of art through some
simple, step-by-step instructions
covering Line Drawing, Old Fash-
ioned Photo, and Saturated Slide
Film Effect. The Action Player,
also found in the Automated Ac-
tions section is a set of commands
or tasks that can be automatically applied to an
image. While playing actions in Elements has been
possible in the past it’s still not able to record your
own actions. There are a host of new animated
web galleries with a wide choice of templates to
create richer more interactive sharing experiences
incorporating Adobe Flash® technology that lets the
family and your mates interact with your photos.
Add in new custom slide show features to create an
entertaining slide show complete with captions,
documentary-style pan and zoom effects, cool tran-
sitions, voice narration, and yes! music. To help you
find images quicker in the Organiser Adobe have
added a new Text Search box in Photoshop Ele-
ments 7 to help you find photos in a flash using
keywords for tags, dates, and now file information. p
29
Why am I here? Or how to increase
your hit rate with a shot count list
Ever stood in amongst a large mass of people or on the edge of National Park and couldn’t
find anything to photograph?
Surprisingly enough this happens a
lot to photographers.
The whole world may be erupting
around them in a cacophony of
30
sounds and visual effects and yet
they can’t see the forest for the
trees. They tightly grasp their cam-
eras and stress as they struggle to
see a single photo op.
The trick here is to immediately stop
and ask yourself this one simple
question. “Why am I here?”
As in most cases you should be able
to answer it then just look up and I’ll
guarantee that you will suddenly see
a whole raft of exciting photo oppor-
tunities.
Something will catch your eye then
suddenly it’s like a dark shroud has
been lifted from your eyes and you’ll
see photo ops by the hundreds.
It is a trick I use often as I race
around covering news and editorial
assignments.
It serves as an effective reboot to
your hand-eye co-ordination system
as it helps to refocus your eyes on
what is happening right in front of
you.
Try it out the next time you are out
and about in crowds of people.
The same goes for when you are out
with your local camera club.
Everybody is standing around chat-
ting away and shooting up a storm
but you can’t seem to see the photos
they are taking.
The 7 steps to making your own shot count
Step one: Identify why you are there and what you are trying to
achieve.
Step two: Set achievable goals or themes to shoot while you are
there.
Step three: Don’t race around shooting up a storm on nothing in the
misguided belief that you may snap a winner or two here or there.
Step Four: Look with your eyes and ears and find where the action is
happening.
Step Five: Start with a Shooting
plan and try and stick to it even
though you will often be dis-
tracted.
Step Six: Think safety at all times.
Step seven: Answer the old “Who
What When Were How” questions
honestly.
The end goal is to get
enough photos to offer
an effective coverage of
an event without too
much stress on your
part - keep it simple
31
 A sample shooting plan:

32 33

Ankor Wat: a land of temples
By John Cosgrove
With Images by Kath, John, Kacy and Jonathan Cosgrove
Surviving a short trip to Siem Reap to snap Ankor
Wat.
W hile the rest of the Cambodia slowly emerges
into the 21st century
after years of strife and neglect, Siem Reap has liter-
ally moved ahead in leaps and bounds to become
one of the hottest tourist destinations.
Asia has discovered Siem Reap and plane loads of
Japanese, Korean and mainland Chinese tourist’s
touchdown daily fuelling the local economy with
more than two million visitors a year.
But the old charm of the Khmer still prevails in Siem
Reap making it one of the most
photogenic destinations you will ever visit.
This breathtaking temple complex, the epitome of
the highly classical style of Khmer
architecture, has become a symbol of Cambodia
and is a source of great national pride, appearing
proudly displayed on the Cambodian national flag
34
and is the country’s prime attraction for visitors.
A Brief History of Ankor Wat
It’s well known that following his victory in 1066 at the Battle
of Hastings, William the Conqueror, granted the citizens of
the small city of London special privileges to keep all 18,000
of them under control. What’s hard to imagine is that while
this future bastion of western culture was slowly rising
from the first millennium, on the other side of the world a
colossal temple city housing more than a million inhabi-
tants was just reaching its full potential as a major centre
of religion, culture, trade and commerce in the South
East Asian region. Sadly Angkor Wat (meaning temple
city), would soon start to slowly succumb to the curse
of generations whereby one generation builds up the
wealth, the next consolidates that wealth and the
third spends or wastes it. Initially built as a significant
Hindu religious centre dedicated to Vishnu, it was
later converted to a Buddhist temple city.
Thought to only be about 1000 sq km in size, similar
in size to modern day Los Angeles, recent ground
sensing radar imagery has now put the size of the
city complex at Ankor Wat at more than 3000 sq km,
making it the largest pre-industrial complex of its
kind. Its eventual stagnation through miss-manage-
ment saw it being sacked in the mid 1400’s by the
kingdom of Siam before disappearing into the
annuals of history where its whereabouts re-
mained shrouded in myth and mystery for the
next 500 years.
In 1860 French explorer Henri Mouhot lit-
erarily stumbled across it and later de-
scribed Ankor Wat temple in his travel
notes as “A rival to that of Solomon,
erected by some ancient Michelangelo that
might take an honourable place beside our
most beautiful buildings. It is grander than any-
thing left to us by Greece or Rome.” Before the ruins
were found, even the locals thought the existence of
the temple city was a myth. Mouhot, other archaeolo-
gists and unscrupulous western traders then went
about systematically plundering the site for the next hun-
dred years. Mouhot, like other early Western visitors, mis-
takenly thought Ankor Wat was constructed around the
same time as Rome and was unable to believe that the
Khmers could have built such a spectacular temple. The
true history of Angkor Wat was later pieced together from
stylistic and epigraphic evidence accumulated during the
subsequent clearing and restoration work carried out across
the whole Angkor site in the 20th century. Work was inter-
rupted by the civil war and Khmer Rouge control of the coun-
try during the 1970s and 1980s, but relatively little structural
damage was done during this period other than the wholesale
theft and destruction of many thousands of Ankorian statues.
Due to Siem Reaps closeness to the Thailand border the
Khmer Rouge also peppered the sites with thousands of land
mines which are still a problem today in more remote sites. 35

A window serves as an effective frame for one of the hundreds of
faces at the famous Bayon Temple. Use the windows’ frame to
36 support your camera and don’t be afraid of adding a little flash.
Our two and a half day Siem Reap photo houses and hotels also arrange pick up from the airport,
expedition all done through the web before you arrive.
Plan your trip to Siem Reap and Ankor Wat well as unlike
Our arrival from Singapore at the brand new interna- those backpackers on an extended tour most of us only
tional terminal at Siem Reap in Cambodia aboard Silk Air have a 3 day long weekend to sample the delights of
Flight MI 633 was on a balmy Monday afternoon in Janu- Cambodia.
ary. The cool ‘Dry’ season running from November to
February is the best time to visit Cambodia while during
the ‘Wet’ season of June to October, monsoon rains Day 1 Monday Afternoon:
drown the country in a sea of mud and flood waters
We finally got to Ankor Wat around 5pm after navigating
making travel hard. Go then and you’ll have to plan your
our way through the tourist police security portal--and
day around the regular afternoon rains. But what you
the crowds only to be hustled out of the site at 7pm by
will get though is stunning white clouds and deep blue
guards clearing the site for a tourist pay-for-view light
skies after the daily afternoon rains finish. April through
show and meal event at $USD75 per person. They had
to June it’s just too damn hot and dusty to make it fun.
also closed the high steps inside Ankor Wat after a cou-
Getting through Siem Reap customs is an exercise in
ple of tourists fell down injuring themselves.
modern efficiency, quite unlike some other destinations
in Asia I could name. Modern immigration terminals There isn’t a lot to see at night after you get out of the
manned by pleasant and helpful staff record your details five block area around the Old Market area of Siem Reap
and take your photo after you have paid the obligatory town, near the southern end of town,. The are good
$USD20 single-entry tourist visa charge. (Note: If travel- street photo opportunities and the food is really cheap.
ling on by plane to visit Phnom Penh later, you will still So is the beer so sit back and enjoy a few at the Red
have to pay again at their terminal). Piano. They block all the streets off around the main
We planned our stay over a three day period to tie in restaurant and bar area after dark to make the place
with flight schedules. Siem Reap has the full gamut of more secure after the Bali bombings and it makes for a
accommodations from luxury four star hotels to back- better alfresco dinning and people watching experience.
packers flop houses. Use the web to find one that best
suits your budget. Note: Once you have negotiated your day rate from
Pre-booking our accommodations at one of the better the tuk-tuk or van drivers allow 30 minutes to get
guesthouses in Siem Reap – Earthwalkers (www.earth- through the Ankor Wat security portal and pay for a
walkers.no) where I have stayed several times now. three day pass $USD40 or a one week pass at
We booked a simple twin room with a fan and a bath- $USD60. Be warned, there are guards everywhere,
room attached which was cost us only $USD 15 a night. even in the remotest Wat, who will ask for your
AC is dearer and there are also family rooms and bunk pass. No pass leads to a lot of trouble so carry it
bed rooms available. This very modern European run everywhere.
guesthouse has a very good reputation for safety, and is
centrally located just off main Road No. 6 with easy ac-
cess to the magnificent tem- The tuk-tuks make for excellent photo platforms as the drivers don’t
ple sites of Angkor, the mind photographers asking them to stop all the time.
main city and to Siem Reap
International Airport. Local
Tuk-tuk and tourist van driv-
ers all know where it is and
those few preferred drivers
recommend by staff will
look after you very well.
They will negotiate a good
price for a day’s travel es-
corting you around the tem-
ple sites safe in the
knowledge that they will al-
ways be there waiting for
you when you get out of the
temple you are visiting.
Earthwalkers and most
other reputable guest 37

The strong golden light from the early morning sun is really amaz-
ing in Cambodia, giving us a bonus colour to work with as we vis-
ited the Pre Rup Temple site.
Day Two Tuesday:
Remember the sun screen, a hat and water.
Your shooting day is based around visiting several differ-
ent styled temples in the golden hours of early morning
or late in afternoon/evening and then resting, eating and
shopping during the midday because the hot tempera-
tures and strong sunlight makes it too hard to explore
even in this so called cool season. The first place you see
after clearing the police point is the 3.5km long Moat
around the Ankor Wat site. Stop and shoot the reflection
shots offered here. Then you have the choice of turning
38
left or right. We choose a right handed loop of the main
Ankor site to start at Pre Rup: a good place to start your
Ankor experience.
Next on the list was Ta Prohm with its trees growing up
Note: I hope you have a head for heights as many
of the temples have very steep sets of stairs which
you need to climb up to get the really unique pic-
tures of the surrounding areas. Take care and be
careful coming down – there is no shame in going
down backwards.
through the stone work. It is now a major tourist site so
you have to stick to the wooden walkways funnelling
tourists through the site. Here on a previous trip we
were surprised to find a couple of European women con-
ducting a nude shoot in amongst the crumbling stone
works as they dodged the tourist police. They said they
were travelling the world shooting themselves nude at
all the famous tourist sites. Now thanks to the film Lara
Croft Tomb raider, Ta Prohm has become a mecca for
snap happy tourists and guards that don’t like you wan-
dering off the walkways. If you really want to see what
how Ta Prohm looked only a few years ago before
Angelina Jolie made it famous, simply walk across the
Ta Prohm, a wonderful site filled with old trees growing out the temple walls,
lots of broken buildings and heaps of photo ops if you pardon the crowds.
road to the temple of Banteay Kdei which is largely unre-
stored and you will fill your CF cards with spectacular im-
ages of trees growing through the masonry. It is not on
the usual tourist circuit of Ankor Wat so it’s quiet and
peaceful and nobody annoys you. It will take you a cou-
ple of hours to wander through these temples so take
your time and enjoy it.
By now the sun is up high in the sky so off through the
impressive Victory gate and start looking around inside
the walled area of Ankor Thom. There you will find the
stunning Terrace of Elephants and a couple of interesting
temples, Baphuon and Phimeanakas, both of which are
currently undergoing full restoration to return them to
39
Visit Bayon during the late afternoon to get really good shadows and textures on the hundreds of faces and etchings there.
the glory of the mighty Bayon temple with its hundreds
of faces which dominates the main Ankor Thom site.
Built by Jayavarman VII, the Bayon temple stands in the
Note: Use the cloudy white balance setting to keep
that lovely golden light in your images.
On the walls of the Terrace of elephants you can find wonderful light and
shadow images on the bas reliefs carved into the sandstone there.
40
center of Angkor Thom. Its 54 towers and 216 faces of
the deity Avalokiteshvara look best during the golden
hours as the sun shines on the faces. The Bayon has over
1.3 Km of bas-reliefs corresponding to more than 11.000
figures. Most of them depict every day’s life scene of the
Cambodia in the XII century. Photographically it is as
popular as Ankor Wat.
Guides tell unwary tourists that the hundreds of large
faces replicated all over this very large tourist site and on
the four gates are really renditions of Jayavarman VII,
who wanted his subjects to know that he knew every-
thing about them – sort of like a medieval big brother
watching their every move.
Bayon is spectacular and I found that bending the per-
spective, using different viewpoints and using a zoom
lens to crop tightly made for more interesting shots. Try
framing the head shots with the many windows at the
temple and then include in some of the tourists to give
you a size comparison.
Lunch Time – return to the city centre and relax in one of
the many restaurants. You might even consider a visit to
the famous Foreign Correspondents Club and gallery at
its new location up near the Royal residence by the Siem
Reap River. Check out the stunning works by local ex-pat
photographer John McDermott who has been photo-
graphing Southeast Asia since the early 1990s in his
The best time of the day to photograph Ankor Wat is late afternnon as the sun is behind you and casting a golden glow over the temple complex.
unique fine art style. already areas including the towers, the tallest at 71 me-
tres high, are off-limits because the constant wear and
Around 3pm: It’s time to head back to Ankor Wat to tear has made the structures unsafe and in real danger
catch the late afternoon sun and sunset around this fa- of collapsing.
mous temple. Again, once you have navigated the hordes
of trinket sellers at the gates, you are free to wander Just before you turn at the moat to visit the Ankor Wat
slowly up the kilometre long walkway to the main temple site is Phnom Bakheng, where each night at sunset,
area. Take your time as the golden late afternoon sun hordes of buses drop off hundreds of tourists who
creates interesting shadows on the many walls, carved
windows and archways in the buildings surrounding the
complex.
Expect lots of visitors and tour parties all marching to a
different beat. Hindus constructed the temple in the
12th century, with a gilded central tower representing
Mount Meru, mythical home of the gods and the center
of the spiritual and physical universes.
Sadly over the past eight years since I started visiting
Ankor Wat I have noticed that it is buckling under the
pressure of millions of tourists visiting the world’s largest
religious monument.
Looking back at photos I first took in 2000 I have noticed
that there is a distinctive amount of erosion in the build-
ing structures, stone carvings and finer detail. Global
warming, the increased pollution from the millions of
tourists driving up to the site each year and the pay-for- Climbing up for a better view, they are now putting up rails to help tourists to
view events hosted on the site are the main causes for go up and down these very steep steps without falling and hurting themselves.
the rapid erosion of this delicate sandstone structure and 41
 scramble up the There is enough choice in the restaurant area including
Note: By all means visit the
steps or ride on French, Western, Indian, Khmer, Japanese, Korean, Singa-
roadside vendors for art works,
the backs of ele- porean, Italian or Chinese so you can eat somewhere dif-
drinks and trinkets but watch
phants to the ferent each meal time and you will still never sample all
out for the kids forced to sell
small temple on the culinary delights available in Siem Reap.
tourist guides and postcards
top of this small
and the small children used as
hill to catch a Day Three Wednesday:
beggars by their parents. When
glimpse of the All templed out after a full day looking at the many dif-
you buy from these kids you are
sunset views, ferent styles of temples on offer from the more than 600
encouraging their parents to
which I am told available in the Ankor Archaeological Park area we
keep on using them for the
are really spec- headed out at 9am for the old market in Siem Reap to
sympathy sales and this keeps
tacular. I would get some people and detail shots before heading down
them out of the many schools
recommend vis- to the Tonle Sap lake area. The market area is complex so
specially built by foreigners in
iting Phnom make sure all the members of your party know where to
Siem Reap to give disadvan-
Bakheng during meet up at what time if your get separated. On offer are
taged children a chance at an
the morning the wet and dry markets which make great photo sub-
education.
hours and you jects, just watch where you put your feet.
will be re-
warded with a The massive Tonle Sap fresh water lake controls the lives
nice, quiet and colourful temple with the odd elephant of the entire Cambodian population. It is known for its
wandering around it if you are lucky. Just remember that fishing and from the floating villages on its banks you can
this strategic hill was one of the last bastions of the travel by boat to and from Phnom Penh on daily services
Khmer Rouge and was only cleared of mines a few years which take about 4.5 hours each way.
ago so don’t wander off the formed tracks or steps.
At its lowest during the month of May, Tonle Sap lake
7pm: Back to the guest house to cool off in the pool and measures only about 2500 sq km and is only about a
wash away the road dust from travelling in the tuk-tuks metre deep but when Himalayan meltwater and the
before we head into town again for a meal and drink. monsoon rains arrive down the mighty Mekong River at
Phnom Penh during the wet season it reverses the flow River children spend mot of their lives hawking on the floating villages around the shores of the Tonle Sap lake district. Use a long tele-lens to isolate them from the
messy backgrounds which are often hazy.

From the top of the hill on the way to Tonle Sap lake you can look out over the catchment area which will be flooded in the wet season.

42 43
of the Tonle Sap River and the lake becomes a giant flood
relief area expanding to more than 15,000 sq kms and a
depth of more than 8 metres. When the waters recede
they deposit fertile mud for the planting of rice and
other crops. The lake was designated by UNESCO in 1997
as a Biosphere Reserve and this included the Prek Toal
reserve, a sanctuary for a wide range of water birds, in-
cluding three endangered species – spot-billed pelicans,
greater adjutant storks, and the white-winged ducks.
Prek Toal lies on the northwest edge of the lake in the
dry season and is easily reached from Siem Reap, al-
though you’ll have to take an organised tour.
Tuk-tuk and air-con van drivers will always negotiate a
special rate for driving down to Tonle Sap Lake. Why? I
don’t know because it’s about the same distance from
the guest house to the Ankor Thom site and return as it
is to the lake edge depending on the time of year. This
year the lakes edge was a lot closer and it was only a
short distance from the only other hill in the whole dis-
trict which looks out over the Lake District. Stopping off
at the picturesque village at the base of this small hill, lo-
cated about 10kms down the road from Siem Reap, we
walked up it in the blazing morning sun. Our van driver
had the sense to go off for a haircut and a sleep while we
clambered up the hill to view the ancient but working
monastery at the top and shoot some landscapes out
Outside the main city area there are many wonderful photo ops in the villages that line the main roads. Take your time and don’t rusgh things and you will come
across some really wonderful sights. Set the camera to AI Focus to allow you the chance to shoot moving and still subjects and don’t forget to vary your angles.
44
over the water.
As I said before always take your Ankor Wat passes
everywhere you go as we were again stopped by guards
and asked to produce them. They didn’t mind us shoot-
ing pictures of the anti-aircraft battery pre-positioned up
there, they just wanted to make sure we had the right
passes to be on the site.
The monastery is a working model and the old bits are
over on the lake side so it was worth the climb, (again,
Note: Men - always ask a local adult before photo-
graphing children as recent publicity surrounding
high profile sex tours and the child sex trade have
tarnished male photographers so be prepared for
barbed comments from locals if you are seen photo-
graphing children. The local government is strongly
enforcing child sex laws so be warned.
don’t venture off the tracks –mines might be there - you
never know). The buildings there are really starting to
crumble under the climate conditions and may well be
gone in a few years if not restored. But I would say that
they are really way down the pecking order for funds
(Above) One of the friendly monks at the hill top monestry, shot with a 120mm lens and small aperture to remove the background.
(Below)Everything floats on the lake even the churches take your tele-zoom to get closer to your subjects and set the AF to servo to catch the moving shots.
45
compared to main Ankor Wat area.
Back down on the flat and a short ride to the boat area
and this is where things started to go a bit pear shaped.
We had booked a small tour as it offered us a chance to
ride by boat out onto the lake area for a couple of hours,
looking at the floating villages and shooting some photos
there.
Once we were underway with our ‘guides’ who we
hadn’t asked for, another boat suddenly pulled up along-
side and a young woman leapt aboard loaded down with
soft drinks. Targeting the children first she started hand-
ing them opened cans of Coke and Fanta to drink then
threw the boat driver and the two guides a can of beer
each, before finishing up looking at me and holding out
her hand for payment - all in the space of just 30 sec-
onds. I had to pay for drinks at an exorbitant price before
she leapt aboard the circling jet boat and speed off. She
tried the same trick on the return journey but this time I
advised her about the prospect of sex and travel and
pushed her craft away before she could leap aboard our
boat.
The voyage continued along the river and we marvelled
at how entire communities lived, worked and played on
the muddy river banks. There were homes, bars and
restaurants, schools, commercial business, churches,
The old and the new: a buddist monk walks past one of the many construction sites in Siem Reap which employ hundreds of young workers.
46
medical centres and even a basketball court, all floating
along on colourful boats.
As we neared the lake proper we were taken to a floating
restaurant for a meal along with a number of other
tourist boats laden down with European tourists, (yes!
you know the drivers were getting kickbacks from the
owner for bringing customers there but what can you
do).
No sooner had we boarded it, a number of smaller boats
appeared alongside filled with children and women
hawking live snakes, drinks and other tourist junk. They
were Vietnamese river people our guides advised us and
not to be trusted.
They also started demanding payment when they saw us
taking a photo of two cute kids in one of those iconic
Asian circular boats. Not one to miss a photo op I simply
changed to a longer tele-zoom and shot from further
away so they didn’t see me.
Snakes seem to be the common tourist photo-op around
here and they (the Vietnamese river people) had a nasty
habit of coming alongside and throwing the snakes
aboard then demanding money.
Escaping from the restaurant we next visited a house
boat with an alligator pen attached and it wasn’t worth
the money to watch a few smelly alligators trashing
around in a tiny cage as the owners prodded them with a
Note: Buy the colourful Cambodian scarves, they
make good barriers to the road dust as you travel in
the tuk-tuks and are also good sun screens if you
forget your hat.
stick.
Back to dry land where the boat driver and guides all had
their hands out with a smile on their faces, and it was
back into Siem Reap to relax with a pizza at the le tigre de
papier (the paper tiger restaurant), a drink and watch the
sunset.
On the way back we stopped a few times to catch images
of kids playing in the river and out on the paddy fields.
Day Four Thursday:
Depart Siem Reap (via Phnom Penh) MI 622, departing at
1040 and arriving at 1520
Allowing the usual 2 hours to get through check in and
customs etc at the small but busy Siem Reap airport. You
can book a tuk-tuk from the guest house to the airport
but because they only use the best and safest drivers it’s
common to use the same driver each day you are there
and he will often be the one taking you back out to the
airport. The average Khmer is a very kind and respectful
person, always cheerful and eager to please, it’s just the
lure of the tourist dollar has started to encroach on their
usual pleasant spirit and manners so watch out for those
few that can ruin your stay.
If your flight leaves later in the day I would recommend
visiting the war museum they have built nearby which is
filled with rusting mine damaged vehicles and war para-
phernalia graphically showing the damage caused by
mines in the area. The most sobering part is a map show-
ing just how densely mined the province of Siem Reap
was mined before the overthrow of the Khmer Rouge late
in the 90’s.
The bottom line
Siem Reap and Ankor Wat are very beautiful places and
extremely photogenic. You can’t see everything so take
your time and plan to see a cross section of different tem-
ple styles in the time you have there. Consider the heat
and the amazing light they get there in the golden hours.
“Ar kun” (thank you in Khmer) p
47
 Shot list for Siem Reap
Because you can become templed out very quickly
here it is advisable to make a shot list and try and
achieve most of it each day. This will expand your se-
lection of photos from just shooting tourist snap
shots.

n The road side from the tuk-tuk as you drive

around – arrange with your driver before hand and
make sure he understands that you will be stopping
often. If he’s good then tip him and he will be back
tomorrow ready to stop for everything, adding a sec-
ond set of eyes.

n Look for buildings, odd sights, animals and chil-

dren playing in the rivers.

n Try shooting other travellers also riding on tuk-

tuks or bicycles.
Plan your temple circuit each day to do certain tem-
ples in the morning and then break for lunch before
visiting afternoon temples such as Ankor Wat, Bayon
and any west facing temple. This will allow you to
capture a good cross section of the many styles and
designs used in the 600 years of construction.

n Look for scenic’s showing how flat Cambodia is

and then seek out hilltops for aerial views.
Frame your shots – look for windows, doorways or
arch ways to frame temple sights.

n Vary your angles and think low for tall - high for
small.

n Spend one day just shooting using your tele-

zoom and close cropping subjects and carvings.

n Shoot outside only in the golden hours which

are sunrise until about 9.30am and from 3pm till
dusk in Cambodia – it’s very dusty that’s the clue as
to the long hours of golden light found here.

n Spend one afternoon just shooting highlights

versus shadows (set your camera to matrix exposure
mode and the camera will default to highlights leav-
ing the shadows black) –cool.

n Shoot faces but ask first.

n Experiment with light and shadow on the plenty

of rocks and statues lying around at the many
restoration sites.

48 49
 Spring has arrived down in the deep south and it is
a good time to get out and shoot the colourful
blossoms and tulips. Use your tele-zoom to isolate
good looking blooms and shoot with a shallow
(under f5.6) aperture to blur out the background.

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