Namibia
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Photographing the Ghost Town of Kolmanskop
Just outside the small, quaint port town of Luderitz, Namibia is a popular tourist destination known as Kolmanskop. This former diamond mining town, where once diamonds could be collected from the surface sand as they lay glinting in the moonlight, has been abandoned and is now gradually being taken over by the sand, which gets…
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Easy Panoramic Photos – Southern Namibia Horizons
I’ve posted before about how you can take panoramic photos these days without one of those fancy panoramic cameras. Â Given the resolution of cameras these days, you can just take a slice from an ordinary photo of the horizon or something equally appropriate for panoramic photos, make sure it’s lined up straight, and crop. Â One…
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Lions and Impalas
At Goas watering hole, around the center of the driveable part of Etosha National Park, we stumbled upon a pride of lions – it must have been seven. But the really strange thing was the impalas and the way they behaved in the presence of the lions. Rather than just leave and go to a…
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Lion Encounter
In most parts of the world, seeing a lion is a very much controlled experience – typically in a zoo. In Etosha National Park in Namibia, you have to keep your camera handy because there’s no telling when you’ll see a large animal – or even if you’ll see one at all. In spite of…
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Animal Shorts!
A handful of short wildlife videos from a recent trip. In the first, we discover how the “puff adder” got its name. Then, see a group of banded mongooses – mongeese? – doing silly things. Finally, a crocodile enjoys a snack, like clockwork, at 2 pm on Saturday. The videos are all taken at Kempinski…
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Zebras at Dusk
The “golden hour” directly before sunset offers really interesting options for photography. If you’re on a game drive in Namibia at the right time in the right place, you can get some truly stunning photos. Unfortunately, however, you’re at the mercy of the driver many times, and if you’re facing directly into the sun it…
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Windhoek to Swakopmund: the Scenic Route
You can get from Namibia’s capital, Windhoek, to the coastal city of Swakopmund, in around 4 hours via a paved road with one lane in each direction. Or you can head directly west from Windhoek, and you’ll quickly hit a gravel road (with a somewhat ironic “100 kph” speed limit sign) that provides a much…
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Scenes from the Caprivi: Nkasa Lupala Tented Lodge
There’s this cool new tent lodge “in the middle of nowhere” up in the Caprivi. So named because it sits just along the edge of the national park of the same name (formerly known as Mamili), this cluster of luxury raised tents sits in the middle of the Kwando-Linyanti river system, a labyrinth of narrow…
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Caprivi is for the Birds
Caprivi is that northeasternmost region in Namibia that looks so odd on a map. I’m sure there is a really interesting historical reason dating from the colonial days for Caprivi being part of Namibia. But for now it just sticks out there, too thin to really even qualify as a panhandle. It borders Angola, Zambia,…
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Scenes from the Kavango
The thing you notice about the Kavango region is the endlessly long, straight roads. You expect it in Nebraska or Kansas, but somehow here the roads seem surprising. The main road running east-west through this region bordering Namibia’s northern border with Angola is well-maintained and passes village after village of thatched huts, reed fences, yellow…
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Under the Namibian Sky (Time Lapse)
Namibia is truly one of the most amazing places for stargazing – sparse population, cloudless sky… Here is a timelapse by a group of folks who spent 10 days (and nights) on a Namibian farm doing just that. Add a bunch of time on a computer making this video. I didn’t see a figure, but…
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Cheetahs and Leopards
Had the opportunity to do some filming of cheetahs and leopards (well, actually just one leopard) recently. They make excellent photo and video subjects! The first was an amazing opportunity at Okonjima & Africats, (about 2 hours north of Windhoek, Namibia) – I blogged about it once before – when we found 3 cheetahs lounging…
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Supermoon + cheetahs: nature goes out of her way to cooperate
Namibia really is an amazing place for photographers. On this occasion, everything lined up, but as a photographer I was unfortunately not fully up to the task. Still, some amazing photos. The location: Okonjima / Africat, where two organizations collaborate on a 22,000 hectare plot of African bush to rehabilitate injured carnivores. Africat has taken…
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Photographing a Leopard
Leopards make excellent photographic subjects, but they tend to stay hidden in the wild – when they’re not trying to EAT you. Seriously, some subjects are best photographed in captivity or a controlled situation. This particular leopard is in a pretty large pen, but he gets fed daily. The experience can be unnerving -sitting in…
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What’s with these alien plants in my yard?
Moving to southern Africa has led me to discover all sorts of strange and bizarre plants that don’t behave the way my grade-school teachers taught me the way they ought to. First, I thought this tree was dying last spring (i.e. October in the southern hemisphere), when all its leaves started falling off. Then it…
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Best music for hanging out with giraffes
When you’re editing vacation videos, it’s always fun to come up with the best music – ideally one that conveys the right mood, maybe something that relates to the place you’re visiting. But sometimes the best music to convey the mood is no music at all. In this video, we managed to get awfully close…
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Our Coast, Your Photo Contest Entries
The entire TAZM Pictures crew entered a local photo contest sponsored by the Windhoek newspaper, The Namibian, and Studio 77, a photography studio. The contest was set up to raise awareness about the fragility of the Namibian coast, most of which is one or another national park (37% of Namibia consists of national parks). You…
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Life and Death at Avis
We have this pretty amazing reservoir just outside Windhoek created by Avis dam – it’s a wildlife protected area / bird sanctuary / dog walking area / jogging area. And fishing/boating pond. And you can get some awesome pictures out there if you pay attention. Examples: An egret takes flight Pretty good fishing at…
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Namibian fairy circles – mystery solved?
There’s an odd phenomenon in southern Africa – especially in Namibia – that the locals call “fairy circles”, whereby vegetation refuses to grow inside a circle of anywhere from 3 to 10 meters in diameter. Even stranger, the circles are dynamic – apparently they grow and “die”, to be filled in by grasses. While they…
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Video: Sossusvlei and Namib Desert from the air
I had an amazing trip to the Namib Desert recently. The oldest desert in the world, the Namib is where the Tsauchab river ends, seeping into the ground amid towering ochre dunes. A few gnarled, dried camelthorn trees stand on the baked clay pans that explode into blossom just a few weeks per year. Surely…
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Windhoek’s Informal Settlements
According to some statistics, 60 percent of Namibia’s urban dwellers, 25 percent of all Namibians live in so-called “informal settlements.” They come to Windhoek in search of jobs, opportunities and a better life. And in spite of the fact that Windhoek enjoys a reputation as a city which has taken better care of its newest…
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Namibian Blues. Or German.
When 18 white dudes from southern Africa with German names get together for a blues show, you know it’s gonna be authentic. Or was that ironic. Anyway, enjoyed a rare blues show in Windhoek a couple weeks ago when local “Mojo Blues Band” teamed up with the 11-piece brass “Wikiaphoniker Orchestra.” Although at times there…
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Video: 24 Hours at Etosha
Along the southern fringes of Etosha National Park, Namibia’s flagship park, are scattered a handful of camps and watering holes. The oldest of these is Okaukuejo, 18 km from Anderson gate in the southwest corner of the park. At Okaukuejo, the “bush chalets” are oriented around the watering hole in a westward-facing orientation, which makes…
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Video – Elephants at Okaukuejo
We spotted the first elephant in the distance, and soon noticed he was followed by many more, all neatly in line, ears flapping and trunks swinging in that crazy, bouncy, elephant way. Eventually 32 of them arrived at the watering hole at Okaukuejo Camp,where they drank, bathed, played, and in some cases were a little peeved with…