Shooting Sea Lions

I'm hoping to shoot sea lions at Bird Island off Rock Point MX this November.

What techniques should I use to capture them best? What lenses?

I'm using a D70 in an Ikelite housing. I was thinking the 12-24mm for flexibility and 2 DS125s to blast away as fast as possible.

I also have the 10.5mm, 15mm FE, 60mm and 105mm. I can also use filters with the two fisheyes if need be.

Cool, one of my favorite subjects! As you know, sealions are extremely fast. They range in size from dog sized to like 10' if they are the California Sealions (z. californianus?)

I would recommend using the 12-24 as teh base lens, and also the 15mm fisheye. If you want to stop the motion, then shoot them at 1/250th and adjust ISO accordingly. If you want to go w/ the motion, then slow it down and use rear curtain sync. I bet a 1/30th image would be cool if you pan w/the lion's face.

Have fun!

James

I agree with James in terms of lens choices and techniques.

The 12-24mm is probably a good choice as a starting point for capturing individuals. It will allow you to take pictures of the entire animal, as well as portrait shots (they sometimes mark a pause to check you out).

After an initial dive, you may want to switch to the 10.5mm if you come accross groups of sea lions that you can approach.

In general I agree with the recommendations, but it really depends on what you want to achieve. For example, I was recently set up with my 100mm macro lens when a friendly harbor seal pup decided to play. Although this certainly wouldn't be my first choice of lens, it worked well for face portraits.

I have a Rocky Point Trip Report over at:

http://wetpixel.com/forums/index.php?showt...mp;#entry109746

The sea lions were fantastic! "Groups of Sea Lions I could approach"? I was mobbed by them!

The main thing I learned was bring more ammo. I usually set up the camera in the hotel for 2 dives and don't plan to open the housing on the boat. It usually works well for me. But this time a 1gb card 158 shots was nowhere near enough. Halfway through the first dive I was deleting. I ran out of strobe power too. New item on my shopping list is 2 spare batteries for the DS-125s!

Also, the vis is poor in Rocky Point so I could have done as well with the 15mm since I kept it at 12mm the entire dive to increase sharpness. This is mandatory as even the very close shots aren't terribly sharp. Fortunately when the sea lions are bighting your dome you don't need to zoom in.