Pan-Pacific Parade, 6/10/12

It was a joy to watch the performers from Japan entertain us with their culture as well as embrace hula. Many of them shared what an honor it is to perform hula here in Hawaii. This festival or the Japanese word Matsuri is a 3 day event and culminates with a parade.  Pan-Pacific-festival.com/Aboutus.

As with many parades, other groups also participated.  

Shun Wah, her friend and I got a spot facing Waikiki Beach - it was a perfect day.

Many of the hula dancers were so happy to see this lady. As you can see, I did not get a good shot of her but I presume she went to Japan to teach them hula.

 B-Tribe was awesome as they did "double dutch". Earlier I saw them at the Ala Moana Center Stage.

After dinner at the Royal Hawaiian Shopping Center's food court, we came across these ladies performing for the tourist and us locals. Turned out there were 4 halaus (hula schools).

Rented a Canon 5D Mark III, 6/2/12

OMG, I rented a Canon 5D Mark lll for 1 day, when Erick wanted to go to the zoo and my Canon 50D was in the mainland for repair. It was fun with Erick, Sookie and her children. Sookie is getting the camera bug.

This gibbon was having so much fun swinging around . Hee hee this was my best shot. Notice I could not get all of her.

Rusty was drinking water that he got from a faucet (he turned on and off) and Violet covered herself with this bag - it was very hot.  It was so hard to take a picture of them because they were facing a fence that you could not get to. So from far away, I made this picture and had to crop it so you could see what they were doing.

My ISO was 12,800. For those of you who are photo nuts like me - this was an incredible setting - and this camera could do it without too much noise.  The darkness of the "reptile section" and the glass made this picture very challenging.

I still wanted to use my rented camera. We met again @8 pm to make pictures under low light - always a challenge. This time Shun Wah joined us and she had an opportunity to check out this camera. We both use Canon, Erick and Sookie use Nikon.

My ISO ranged from 500 - 25,600. ISO allows the camera to capture more light and to take faster pictures.

 This is a smiley bike, I think it has 6 seats and 3 wheels.

 I enjoyed these guys.

Thanks Erick, Shun Wah and Sookie for a fun time in Waikiki.  Do I want this camera? Yes!!!!!

(One last note, due to me using another camera - the software I have did not recognize my "raw" files - which would mean I could not see the pictures.

Solution: import the pictures to iPhoto then export them as jpg. I then could see the pictures, edit them, and share them.)

Hawaii Eisa Drum Festival, 5/12/12

I am very happy with the Eyes of Hawaii photo club. I am also happy they posted this event under photo opportunities.  It was almost like a club outing as many of us went to enjoy this festival.  

"Eisa is a form of dance and drumming unique to Okinawa…the festival will have the largest gathering of Eisa drummers…there will be a gathering of the Shisa (Okinawan Lion Dogs) with the debut of a brand new Shisha."

Daiichi Hirata, an acclaimed artist, choreographer and director, came from Okinawa.  We were so fortunate to see his performance.  

At the close - all the participants were on stage.  The Eisa clubs took turns playing.  This Hawaiian Chanter and Daiichi had opened the ceremony - it was touching seeing the 2 cultures coming together.