XumaTek: May 2015

My wife, Doris, and I, had a great vacation in the Caribbean this past February. We spent a week on St. Maarten/St. Martin (Dutch side/French side, respectively) followed by a week of sailing among the Windward Islands on the Star Clipper. This post is to discuss the photography aspects of the trip and some brief highlights.

First of all, what camera kit did I take. When traveling, I like to pack light so I take my Lumix GX7 and two lenses. The GX7 is my "mama bear" camera and can do much of what my GH4 can do, at least what I need for travel photos. I also leave my "best" lenses at home and, instead, opt for the Lumix 14-140mm and the Lumix 7-14mm. These two lenses give me the 35mm equivalent of 14mm to 280mm, a 20-1 spread. The bag is my trusty LowePro Passport II, a very flexible bag for traveling because it can expand with a zip allowing me to quickly stash a windbreaker or such in the extra space. What else is in the bag? Five additional 32 GB SD cards (plus a 64 GB SD card in the camera), two additional batteries (with one in the camera), a BosStrap, a Lance wrist strap, Olympus FL-300R remote flash, portable battery charger, electronic remote shutter release, and a GorillaPod Hybrid mini-tripod. This entire kit weighs five pounds and with the camera in my hands, the bag is a mere three pounds. This is a very light and portable travel camera setup.

I took a lot of video (probably two hours or so) on this trip plus about 600 stills. All of the video was 1080p at 60 fps. The clip below is of the New Status Drum Band. They are based in Phillipsburg but play all around the island. The drummers are boys and girls ages 7 to 17; they are very good. Remember to turn on the sound.

The photo below is of Front Street in Phillipsburg, Sint Maarten. We stayed at Holland House Beach Hotel, a very nice place to stay. Most of Front Street is made of small jewelry stores specializing in diamonds; I assume because of the Amsterdam connection.