Oahu: How to Take Great Photos in Paradise, No Experience Required

Update: When visited Honolulu in 2019, arriving by cruise ship this time, we took this same photo tour and it was wonderful! See 2019 photos and info here. If you want to go right to the most exciting part of this post, check out the info about our first encounter with an automated Japanese toilet, which we’re still giggling about..…too much information on that later.

We think the newfangled toilet discovery is just the first of many oddities (odd to us, anyway) that we’ll discover now that our two-month journey is finally underway. One problem, though – we did a bang-up job getting ready for this trip, but because we neglected one very crucial thing, we had to go to school on our first day of vacation.

What did we forget? Well, once upon a time both of us could make our way around a manual SLR camera, but automated everything robbed us of what we once knew. (We robbed ourselves, of course, because we got lazy. Curses technology.) When I set up an Instagram account to complement the trip webpage I thought, “Whoa… I really need to take better pictures” but promptly forgot about it, other than to follow National Geographic’s Instagram feed and get frightened by all the perfection just by scrolling. So back to school for us! On a morning teach-n-tour drive with Oahu Photography Tours, we took our seats on a bus that transported us to our open-air classroom.

And guess what? This is how all school should be! We learned useful photography

strategies while soaking up the stunning beauty of Oahu, on an 80% rain-clouds-mist kind of day. Those potential photoshoot spoilers mattered not a whit, since this island really is paradise-on-earth. And we learned that even with the simplest of cameras, anyone can take great pictures anywhere, even on cloudy days.

Proof in point: We shot the following photographs using all of our devices, but I confess that most of these shots came from the phones (practice, practice, practice, to get to National Geographic). But it’s a start, and we have the rest of the trip to improve. And Spoiler Alert: I even used my new photography skills to get a decent Japanese toilet pic! Don’t worry; it’s just the toilet.

SOME THINGS WE LEARNED

We headed to Sandy’s Beach on Oahu’s southeastern shore to catch the sunrise. Sandy’s Beach is famous for its sparkling white sand beach, pounding waves, and powerful shorebreaks, but this isn’t a picture of Sandy Beach, because my pictures still sucked at this stage.

Padre shot some photo-worthy memorial markers at Sandy Beach, though (see cats-and-crypts section below). At this stage, our wonderful guide Christian was doing lots of hand-holding, showing me how to set my old Canon T2i up, use the tripod, and adjust settings. Even at the end of the tour I was still dependent on him to find the best camera setting combinations, but in just five hours I got to where I could experiment on my own, even though most of my Canon pics weren’t publish-worthy yet. So we’ll return to Sandy’s Beach someday to capture that perfect shot.

These photographs come from Waimanalo Bay Beach Park, winner of 2015’s Best Beaches in America award. Lined with old growth Australian ironwood trees, Waimanalo was almost empty at 8:00 am, and its vast white sands/sea/trees setting provided the sought-after combination of air, earth, and water elements that make great picture-taking simple. And the vanishing point perspective of the road through the trees, we learned, adds depth and drama to a photograph while emphasizing the large scale of the landscape.

Next we learned how to take advantage of viewpoint in photographs of the majestic Ko’olau Mountains. We shot through roadside scrub, and trust me, Padre would have weed-whacked this hedge to ribbons back at home if I didn’t stop him.

But this hedge served its purpose in helping us create a fabulous viewpoint. Christian kept pointing out how simple choices like this peek through a curtain of lush greenery makes for a great shot, and it doesn’t matter what type of camera you use.

CATS AND CRYPTS

And since it’s us, there have to be Annette’s kitties and Padre’s old stuff. I was going to say ‘dead stuff’ but don’t want people to get the wrong idea about Padre. He served as a pastoral counselor to elders and their families for years, so he understands how rituals like roadside memorials help the living grieve in ways that may not make sense logically, but make sense spiritually.

When I explained about our kitties and dead things photographs, our guide Christian suggested the “Cats and Crypts” heading. We kind of like it, so Cats and Crypts it is.

And I found a Hawaiian kitty! I promptly named her ‘Kapu’ after one of my childhood kitties, named Kapu – no joke.

My mom and dad loved Hawaii, and Dad travelled here frequently on business. Mom named my childhood cat Kapu, which means ‘forbidden’, reasoning that if her name was Kapu she would ‘keep out’ of fights. That didn’t work – not by a long shot/that cat was a brawler – but it was a great name, and she was a great cat.

My new orange friend, safely tucked behind her garden arbor, serenely observed all the silly tourists taking her picture. Pressure’s on, though: On the blog so far I have Key West and Hawaiian cats; will I find Australian and Japanese kitties? I hope so, and I want it duly noted that my task is harder than Padre’s because there are religious sites all over Southeast Asia. Probably cats, too, but they hide behind things like arbors so we’ll see.

PHOTOGRAPH OF THE DAY: SOMETIMES YOU GET LUCKY

My favorite photograph of the day is the first one in this post of the smiling group of kids. I took that at the Pali Lookout at Nu-uanu Pali State Park, where the windward coastal view of Oahu was jaw-dropping despite the increasing raindrops, and I just happened to be in the right place at the right time.

People are pulling on ponchos right and left, but these kids are pulling out flags. It’s a student tour group, just like the groups we used to help chaperone, and the rain did not dampen their smiles in any way. Their joy in the moment reminded me of all the student tours we have been involved with over our lifetimes, from our participation as assistant leaders, to being the parents (and aunt/uncle!) of foreign exchange and tour-participant students. Travel really does change things, and I can’t think of a better way to launch a life than to start with a student tour like the one these lucky kids are enjoying right now.

AND FINALLY, THE TOILETS AND UPGRADES

I dunno why, but the last two times we’ve checked into hotels we’ve been upgraded. I think it’s because I’ve used Expedia so much they think I’m a stockholder or something, but I’m not complaining. It happened again, and our one-bedroom view suite came equipped with the infamous toilet. It’s way beyond a bidet, if you’re familiar with one of those, and we had heard about the toilets of Tokyo and expected to see such things there. Turns out that Japanese tourists love Waikiki, so it figures.

So this thing washes, dries, oscillates, and THE SEAT IS HEATED. No kidding. Better than seat warmers in a car by far.

But what I hope you’ll notice about this picture is not the fancy accouterments; No, pay attention to the panoramic viewpoint and the moody noir filter choice – my I-phone did that! If you’ve never used the panoramic function on your I-phone camera, time to learn and it’s really easy. Christian showed us how, and now we’re getting amazing shots with our I-phones, like the next one of the view from our upgraded room (thank you Expedia. They did not pay me to write that).

Tonight we’re excited to be having dinner with my Oahu-based nephew and family,  and tomorrow we’re up early to head Down Under. Maybe we’ll find kitties, old things, crocodiles, and kangaroos  there. And maybe we’ll be snapping photos like pros by then and the critters will pose for us; wouldn’t that be grand? If they do, we’ll be ready!