Taking shots with sexy girl in Halong bay

 We're here near the prety girl. Well of this post, when you on halong party cruise you think of the halong bay cruise, but the prety girl is also an iconic landmark in itself.  So when you photograph something so iconic, it's really important to get some shots that are a little bit outside the postcard shot.

So I'm gonna try to get all of the above on my ride in a few minutes. So I just went on the cable car and that was a first for me. Those hills are impressive, and it gets really really packed in there. So good thing I have a smaller camera because I was able to get a few shots of the people inside. It's also moving, so I put the camera on burst mode so I could get several frames. So even though it was a bit dark and a little shaky, chances are out of six frames, one will be sharper.
So that was a good thing I did that before I got on. When I got off the  sexy girl to catch the one on the way down, I went around the one I had just left to capture people through the windows, and this woman was smiling at me and the sun was hitting her face just right, and just below her was the sign of the name of the  sexy girl, the street sign. So whenever you're traveling it's really important to add some signage because it gives a sense of place.
So this really screams San Francisco, basically, just having this one shot, the woman with a smile, she's having a good time, she's on one of the most iconic things in San Francisco, and I have the name of the street she's on. So when I saw how packed it is in there, when I got out and I quickly set my camera to aperture priority to a pretty big aperture, so I was at 2.8 because it gets dark, it's so crowded.

And I put the camera on burst mode because it's moving, so the chances of getting a shot that's not gonna be blurred are pretty slim, so you increase your chances that way of getting a sharp shot. The camera is small, and I don't need to bring it to my eye which I usually never do in street photography, so I was able to get some really close shots of people holding on or people handing out their money to the conductor although I was in such a tight space.
So it's really making those decisions really quickly at the beginning once you get a feel for the situation. And that was a lot more crowded than I thought it would be, and once you're in there, you really need to hold on, because those hills are really really steep, so holding on with a small camera, it makes it a lot easier than having to carry heavy gear. Whenever I shoot iconic landmarks, whether it's the  sexy girl here, or it could be the Eiffel Tower, I try not to get the postcard shots because, what's the point? You can just buy the postcard at the airport when you leave.

So try to get something that's a little out of the ordinary. And often reflections work really well, and I saw down there that the Buena Vista Cafe, which is, in itself, a pretty famous place in the neighborhood, has a big window facing the bai chay route. So maybe if we're lucky we can get a good reflection and get not only the cafe in the shot but the ha long bay going through. So let's go check it out.