NZPhotographer Issue 23, September 2019

KELLY, PLEASE INTRODUCE YOURSELF TO US...
I live on Auckland’s North Shore with my 17 year old
son, Sebastian. I have a 19 year long history working
within the hospitality and customer service industries
and began my amateur photography journey in 2015
when I bought my first DSLR, a Nikon D3300.
I primarily bought a camera to take shots of my son
on the basketball court and ended up doing multiple
contracts for Basketball NZ after they saw some of
my shots. I then diversified and began taking shots of
almost everything I could to practice and get better
at other styles of photography.
Landscapes, wildlife, travel and long exposure
photography are my favourites now. I still take sports
photography shots, but they aren’t so much my focus
anymore.
WHAT ARE YOU SHOOTING WITH?
My current weapon of choice is the Nikon D500. I love
the functionality and speed of the body, it’s not too
heavy when shooting handheld and I find it produces
such high-quality RAW images.
I have three lenses, the first is a Tokina AT-X Pro,
11-16mm, f/2.8 which I love for landscapes and, with
my Hoya 10 stop ND filter and remote shutter control,
long exposures. Then I have my Nikkor FS kit set lenses,
18-55mm & 70-200mm which are great multi use lenses
and finally my Tamron SP 70-300mm, f/4-5.6 which I use
for wildlife photography.
I use an extreme pro 256GB SanDisk memory card
because of the super-fast processing, a Godox
speedlight flash and a Joby Gorillapod as my tripod
but am looking to get a larger tripod as a more stable
base for my long exposures. I shoot exclusively in
manual mode, but rarely do I take the ISO off auto, I
just adjust the f stop and shutter speed.
TELL US ABOUT YOUR O’HARE AIRPORT
PHOTO...
My son and I were travelling to North Carolina for him
to trial for a college basketball team and we had to
go from LAX to O’Hare then onto Greensboro in NC.
This photo was taken during our stopover in O’Hare
Airport in Chicago.
Upon leaving the plane, we needed to move from
one terminal to another and to get to the second
terminal, we needed to go down a large steep
staircase and along the travelator shown in the
image.
The lights along the roof changed colour and I was
mesmerised by the sight. It was spectacular, and I
couldn’t help myself but to get my camera out of my
hand luggage and take a couple of shots.
I opted to go down the most central lane heading
the right way and take the shot, so the lines of the
10 NZPhotographer
handrails were as centred as possible. I had to avoid
people coming up behind me and didn’t want to
get in the way, so it was a super quick few shots fired,
hoping that I’d got the shot.
WHAT WAS HAPPENING BEHIND THE CAMERA?
My son was super tired and less than impressed
that I was holding him up from getting his breakfast
because I was ‘taking more photos’ haha.
ARE YOU HAPPY WITH THE PHOTO, WHAT DO
YOU LIKE/DISLIKE ABOUT IT?
I always liked this image, especially as it was taken on
the fly, with no real planning or time to perfect it. The
fact that the passengers in the photo are somewhat
blurry initially annoyed me, but now I feel they tell
a story of how rushed people can be at one of the
largest airports in the United States and how they
don’t take the time to stop and look around in such a
busy place.
I like to take photos free of people so I tried to take
this with the least amount of people in the frame,
but in retrospect, I quite like the silhouettes of weary
travellers in the image and I think it adds to the
aesthetic of the image as a whole.
I don’t know if there is anything I could have done
better, maybe got a different angle of the space
from off the travelator with a more stable non-moving
spot, but it just wasn’t going to happen with a hungry
teenager hounding me haha.
WHAT DID YOU LEARN FROM TAKING THIS
PHOTO?
The main thing I learned from taking this image is to
take chances, take opportunities to get the shot,
regardless of what is happening around you, what
people may think of you or where you are. The most
challenging shot can often be the most rewarding.
WHERE CAN WE FIND YOU ONLINE?
www.instagram.com/kells1photography
www.facebook.com/kells1photography
albums.excio.io/profile/KellsPhotography
BEHIND THE SHOT IS PROUDLY
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