A local photographer in Maui who takes and sells close up wave photographs in his Front Street gallery shared some of the techniques with me. I tried them out at Keanae Point and had some decent results. While I don’t have a camera housing for the “inside of a wave” kind of danger, I got as close as I dared and pulled the camera away after the shutter closed.
The basic requirements for photographers who want to shoot detailed water in motion are:
- A long depth of field to get a clear background and foreground at the same time. F18 to 22
- A very fast shutter speed 1/1000 or faster
- Plenty of light, a High ISO or a decent combination. Obviously, you can’t shoot late afternoon or dusk without a high range of ISO to compensate for the lower light conditions.
This first shot gets the foreground and close-up detail of the water, but I didn’t include the background.
This one comes closer to the intended effect:
