testmeat photoblog

just before i went to africa i upgraded my camera kit and bought a new nikon d810. it's been nine years since my first nikon slr, and three years since i got my nikon d5300, but that's been playing up in the last few months so i felt justified in splashing out and finally going full frame. with work and holiday planning taking up so much of my time i didn't really get a chance to use it much until i found myself watching the sunrise on top of table mountain. i quickly realised that this camera is quite a step up from my previous one, and i had a lot to learn. with every other camera i've ever used when you hold down the shutter halfway you lock the focus and exposure, allowing you to recompose the picture before taking the shot. for some reason unbeknownst to me my new camera was set up differently and constantly refocussed every time you moved, which made for an extremely challenging experience as i tried to frame the shots i wanted whilst fighting against a rising sun and an autofocus i could not control. despite these difficult conditions i'm still really proud of this photo - it's of a maasai guy called samuel who had never left kenya before and saw the ocean for the first time in his life. i can only imagine the awe and wonder he must have been feeling when he saw the sun rise over a big, strange city from a huge table top mountain. i've seen a fair few sunrises, sunsets and mountains in my life and i still got tingles from it.

here's the original