Steve Maxwell: Visions of life as an adventure
WHAT HAVE YOU BEEN PHOTOGRAPHING?
I grew up on the Northern Beaches of Sydney all my life but now reside in the Snowy Mountains. Some special places to shoot down there in the Kosciusko National Park, with its amazing waterfalls, snowscapes and of course our famous snowy mountain brumbies. I was a big part of the Save the Snowy Mountain Brumby campaign where they used all my drone footage and stills to promote the cause.
What I have been photographing lately is a lot of live horseriding promotions. I've been on a five day horse ride called Riley's Ride. It's a four day horseback ride tracking the last steps of The Man From Snowy River, Jack Riley. The ride commemorates his life and follows his last journey, where he was sick and was stretchered from Tom Groggin Station all the way to Corryong.
As far as underwater work and anything to do with the ocean, I've been capturing a lot of surfing wherever and diving out at Rottnest Island as I travel there a lot for work. There are many beautiful places to shoot over there. I also travel and capture imagery up in the Top End.
One of my favourite places to shoot up the NT is out at Corroboree Billabong. A lot of crocodiles, birds and buffalo. Its just an amazing place.
WHAT IS THE MOST IMPORTANT THING TO YOU?
My life has always been about adventure. To be able to share that with my family is the most important thing but also to be able to share vision with the world by capturing what I see.
WHAT ARE THE THINGS YOU DO THAT CAN HELP THE PLANET? YOUR FOCUS?
Well, being a part of Living Ocean is going to help the planet. I capture the mighty northern and southern migrations of Humpback and other whales. You know capturing the images of the cetaceans that travel the same way each year is very important. Its for the tracking, the behaviour, identification and the valuable information that we record.
I always respect the ocean, the surf and what I put into it and take out of it.
To be able to capture the beauty of this planet whether to be in the ocean, on land, or the animals and people that walk on this earth, That's very important to me to be able to share that with the world.
WHAT EQUIPMENT ARE YOU USING AT THE MOMENT?
Equipment I'm using at the moment is a Canon 5D Mark 4. For underwater I use an Aquatek housing. I also use a GoPro Hero7 Black. My favourite lens is the 800mm Canon 5.6 lens (above). On our research boat, on the open ocean, the crew call me the 'Human Gimbal'. I'm just about to get a DJI Osmo pocket for some steady cam stuff.
My favourite housing for the GoPro includes a Split housing dome port from Split Gadgets Australia. Gives a beautiful over and underwater view and I integrate the frame grab images to get some great stills from the 4K footage. So not having to worry about trying to click for stills as well, you just film it and then find your best shot later on in edit and extract that frame.
I also use my iPhone XS Max a lot. It's the easiest camera to carry and now has amazing clarity and usability for social media and other quick reportage images.
ANY TIPS ON SHOOTING?
Most importantly with water housing photography above the water is you don't want droplets on your lens.There are a number of ways you can fix or prevent this. Whether they always work or not or not is a gamble. Wetting the lens with saliva or using a product like Rain X works, however its never 100%. Its a personal method that has to be worked out'
If I am 'shooting' whales from a boat for instance, keeping as steady as possible is quite challenging with rough seas and with a 800mm lens, its all about a steady stance. You need to adopt a wide footing with flexible legs and keep clear of anything. Its an art.
With the drone it just takes hours of practice to get good and it's all about the angle. Its tricky as both the boat and whales are changing position, so flying via the controller is VIP with an observer calling relative positions. Its all about hand launch and retrieval.
As far as drones are concerned obviously the bigger and more expensive ones are purpose-built for commercials or cinematography. If you just want to capture 4K footage, all you need is a little Mavic which does a great job, easy to use and of course hardly weighs anything and it just fits in your backpack.
I do a lot of backcountry adventures in the Snowy Mountains, so having less weight on my back is very important and that's why the little Mavic just sits easily in your backpack. Away you go and it's easy to set up in minutes. For me, most important tip would be to try and capture your image so that it's something different. Again it's all about the angle.
Mavic Pro 2 & Zoom, and Split Dome port for GoPro Hero7 Black
WHAT PRODUCTION SOFTWARE DO YOU USE FOR VIDEO AND STILLS?
I really just use Lightroom for the photos and for my video production I use Final Cut Pro X.
YOUR DREAM JOB?
If I were sponsored and could travel the world to photograph any subject matter you wanted what would it be? It would be something like being a cinematographer for David Attenborough.
For images, film production and assignments contact:
wildmanfilmproductions@yahoo.com
+61 438 383 112