42 15 June 2019 I http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk I subscribe 0330 333 1113
Testbench
zooms (even though they lack the WR
designation) so I could avoid having to
change lenses too often.
Putting the X-T3 to the test
Our first port of call was Nouméa, the capital
of the French territory of New Caledonia, and
a modern European-style city of 180,000
inhabitants. However, it’s not very photogenic
and we arrived on a Sunday so, as it is French,
almost everything was closed. Fortunately it
has a world-class aquarium which was open.
The late departure time meant that this was
the only port where I’d be able to photograph
the ship at night. But dusk’s sudden arrival
caught me by surprise, so I was forced to
rest the camera against a post at 1/8sec and
trust that the optical image stabilisation in the
18-55mm lens would do the rest. It did.
Nouméa was very different from my mental
image of the South Pacific which, admittedly,
was drawn mostly from movies like the Mutiny
on the Bounty. But while I never expected our
ship to be greeted by hundreds of canoes and
the sound of drumming, many of the other
islands on our itinerary had changed little since
Captain Bligh’s time. Some of the stops were
the kind of deserted atolls where you half
expected to find Tom Hanks talking to a
volleyball. If these places aren’t isolated
enough the Maasdam also runs a fleet of
Zodiacs, led by a team of marine biologists,
which take guests on trips into even more
remote and inaccessible spots. On most of
these islands the best sightseeing is found
underwater on the spectacular coral reefs.
The photo opportunities above the waterline
are limited – there are only so many pictures
you can take of palm trees.
My highlight of the trip was in Vanuatu, which
is one of those places, like Timbuctu, that most
people have heard of but few can find on a
map. The Mele Cascades are a series of
‘Some of the stops were the kind of deserted atolls where
you half expected to find Tom Hanks talking to a volleyball’
I love the fall-off from the 56mm lens, used at wide apertures Fujinon XF56mm F1.2 R, 1/60sec at f/1.4, ISO 800 On the bridge, the X-T3 coped well with the contrast