NEX-5 (16mm, f/8, 1/500 sec, ISO200)
Finally we have made it back to the coast. We started at Carpinteria thanks to a lovely french lady from the tourist info. It needs a French person to get some insider tips in California. Carpinteria is less busy than Santa Barbara and has a very nice campsite on the beach.
NEX-5 (25mm, f/6.3, 1/640 sec, ISO200)
I always thought that we are living in a nice place just outside of Vienna surrounded by forests but of course there is one thing missing: the sea. Despite I’m not a big fan of the style of this house I’m willing to change. So if you are the owner please send me an email. What a location! From porch to beach in one step.
NEX-5 (55mm, f/7.1, 1/160 sec, ISO200)
The first half of our vacation was mainly about traveling long distances by car. The second half was walking beaches and sightseeing in Monterey and in San Francisco. I’m still missing those walks on the beach during sunset.
NEX-5 (18mm, f/3.5, 1/2 sec, ISO1600)
This was the campsite. First row on the beach. It was more like a parking lot with very little distance in between the vehicles but the view was great. What a place!
“Roam like a tourist and shot like a pro”. This was a Sony NEX ad I saw on the billboards during that vacation. A commercial never was so right. It is such a joy to walk on beaches or in cities without a big camera. A lot of people traveling without a camera today. They just use their smartphones. While smartphones are getting better they are still crap when it comes to taking pictures. Phones take terrible images if light is low or if there is a lot of contrast in the image. I guess that’s why they are called phones not cameras.
I took a lot of images with my iPhone within the last year but only a couple of them are really good. Smartphones are getting closer to compact cameras but I would not use a small sensor camera either. I stopped using compact cameras the day I got my Sony NEX.
Here is a recommendation to all the smartphone shooters: Get a real camera. A phone is a phone and should be used for phone calls but don’t use it as your main camera on a great vacation. Someday you might regret it.
BTW the shot above was taken at 1600ASA and with an exposure time of 0,6 seconds without a tripod. Try to do that with your smartphone.