There is an increasing desire and most certainly pressure today for professional and amateur adventurers alike to return home with more than just a few pics hastily snapped with a compact digital. You can get some great shots on a compact but they are not in the same league to what you can capture with a DSLR. It can be a intimidating (not to mention pricey) leap up but the results are worth it.
If you have any desire to publicize your expedition when you are safe and warm back in the real world you need to come up with the goods. Now, with ever increasing access to intuitive photography and videography kit the competition has really hotted up.
I am no gun with the camera but I am getting there. The I took to Iran recently was a godsend. Tough and lightweight, it allowed me the flexibility to experiment with all sorts of aperture and shutter settings, conveniently helped out by an on-screen guide (ie. move a particular setting one way and the foreground will be in focus, move it another and the opposite occurs). For a relative newbie such as myself it was brilliant. At the same time, the auto settings were able to capture some awesome shots with the click of a button. The shot below was taken using the sunset auto setting and I reckon it came out pretty well. Below that a self-portrait taken with the portrait auto setting (click on either for a larger image). Neither have been manipulated in any way and I am confident I could squeeze some extra sharpness out of both should I run them through Photoshop. I won't be winning any prizes but they are not bad. What do you think?
One of the best in the business at the moment using DSLR's to capture moving HD images has to be who I have mentioned before on my website. Check out one of his clips below. Very cool.
I hope to get my hands on Sony's new Alpha DSLRs with HD video recording later in the year and start giving Renan a run for his money! Keep an eye out!