Cruise photography

[ceburoo]

In February I will be taking 20 day cruise from Sydney to Hong Kong. My plan is to take a photo of the sunrise and sunset on each day. What problems will I encounter with available light or lack thereof taking a photo of a sunrise/sunset from a moving boat that could also be in rough seas.
Likewise when we are departing the cities eg. Sydney it will be early evening (dusk) taking photos of the cityscape could present its own set of problems.
Im sure there has to be some people out there who have encountered and overcome and taken some great holiday snaps on a cruise. I hope you will be able to pass on your experiences and solutions

[Sime]

Sydney to HK is bound to be rather a large boat - I've spent some time wandering up and down the Fjords in Norway on a boat that wouldn't be as big and I had no issues - hand held or tripod on deck.

This was hand held on deck.

[yrot.tory]

that is gorgeous!
thanks for sharing

[ceburoo]

Thanks Sime for that info. great photos and for sure I wont be seeing any of that sort of scenary where I will be going. Yes it is quite a large boat.

Maybe my fears are unfounded then as I thought taking a sunrise/sunset for example on a slow shutter speed (obviously using a tripod) that the movement of the boat maybe in rough seas would not give me a good result.

[fletch]

Taking photos from boats is not that difficult in good light. The shot below was hand held on deck @ 1/160s.



However I think you will find it very difficult in low light. Using a tripod won't be possible if the boat is actually underway, even though the big boats are very steady they still rock and vibrate from the engines. The bigest issue will be that the boat is actually moving along quite quickly. Even a big cruise ship is traveling at 20 knots. Try taking a shot of a sunset from a car moving at 20 miles an hour!

You will need to keep your shutter speed up to ensure you avoid any motion blur, that probably means at least 1/20s but test it out. To do this you will need to open up your aperture and raise your ISO which may create other issues.

Do some research on flickr to see how other people solved the issue