CRUISES AND TOURS TO GALAPAGOS

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26 enero 2023

Photo and Video in Galapagos

Photography opportunities are endless in Galapagos so make sure you bring your camera and video gear. If you are planning on purchasing new equipment you will need sufficient time to purchase and receive anything you buy before you leave home. Make sure to add plenty of memory cards and extra batteries to your equipment list. Media cards are sold in many shops, especially in Puerto Ayora , but yachts/ships usually stop there only once during the week, the variety is limited, and it will cost much more than at home. I recommend bringing a laptop computer along, so you can see and play with your images while you’re on the trip. It is also a good idea to buy a small peripheral hard drive to download images and video as a backup and to give you more storage flexibility.

The Galápagos National Park does not allow you to use a flash photography on any wildlife on land. In some instances, the flash can be very harmful, especially to some birds dependent upon their eyesight for hunting at night, such as swallowtail gulls. It really isn’t a problem to use “fill flash» when photographing marine iguanas, tortoises, sea Lions or land iguanas, but you must go along with the instructions of your guide.

Thankfully, island visits are often made during the middle of the day when ambient light is sufficient for exposures, but you may want to bring small collapsible reflectors to compensate for harsh shadows. A small tripod or monopod is also a valuable accessory. It allows a wider variety of camera settings for different lighting conditions, but be careful where you set it down. If you don’t bring a tripod, and you have an automatic camera, try shooting on “continuous” and shoot several frames of the same image. This often helps in reducing camera jiggle after the first frame and gives you a selection of almost-the-same images to choose from. With digital photography, you have the luxury of taking an image and then re-shooting if you don’t like the results.