Going to the Salton Sea!

Photo by C. Strife on flick

I’m a really, really lucky lady. This weekend I get to co camping at The Salton Sea Natl. Park, California. That’s really cool enough as it is. I could just say I’m bringing my camera and a tripod and leave it at that. But it actually gets even better. 5 professional photographers are getting there a day ahead of me to scout out locations and tell me where the best shooting is.

I know. I already said I was lucky.

Why and how do I have it so good? It’s b/c I’m a student in the photography department at Santa Monica College and this weekend is the photo department camping trip.

The Salton Sea is all about decay and faded glory. And dead fish. It’s a great big evaporating inland sea out in the desert near the Mexican border. It used to be a resort area, but the water that fed the Sea got rerouted to water golf courses or something in San Diego so it’s drying up both literally and economically.

Photo by Brian Auer on Flickr

Photo by slworking2 on Flickr

The sea might be drying up, but it’s been raining like crazy this spring so there may be a desert wild flower display about 80 miles away. We’ll see. That would be like icing on the cake.

Here’s What I’m Bringing-

• Canon 50D
• Promaster SLR (model unknown) Film Camera
• Nikon FA SLR Film Camera
• 17-40mm Lens for 50D
• 100mm macro lens for 50D
• 32-70 zoom for the Promaster
• 50mm for the Nikon
• 28-200 Tokina lens for the Nikon (haven’t tried this one out yet but it came with the camera so what the heck…)
• 2 8GB memory cards for the 50D
• Wolverine external hard drive with a lot o room on it
• MacBook
• 2 rolls of Fujichrome Velvia ISO 50 (slide film, probably for the Nikon)
• 1 roll of Fujichrome Velvia ISO 100 (slide film, probably for the Nikon)
• 2 rolls of  Kodak Tri-X (b+x film, maybe for the Promaster)
• 1 roll of Rollie Pan ISO 25 (really slow speed b+w film for a class assignment)
• Circular polarizing filter for the 17-40 lens
• Neutral density filter for the 17-40 lens
• A cable release for the SLRs
• A remote shutter release for the 50D
• my new tripod and pistol grip ball head (which I like more now than I did when I bought it…)
• LensPen x2 b/c you never know…
• rocket blower
• 24 inch circular reflector (white on one side, silver on the other)
• maybe my Solio solar charger just in case
• extra batteries for the 50D (I have 4 in all)
• Oh, and the camping gear. This is a camping trip after all. Hopefully Tony will be willing to help me out with that   : /

I want to get a split neutral density filter (or graduated neutral density filter) also. Don’t know if I’ll have time to get that before the trip. I hope I do…

I want to save the slide film for, like, perfect light. I’ve never used it before and apparently there’s no latitude. What does that mean? Click this button to find out»

Photo by Lee Otis on flickr

I’m just so excited. I know I’m bringing a TON of stuff. But it’s like I told my friend Stella.. how often do you get an opportunity like this? I’m going to an incredibly photographically interesting location. And there will be like 5 pro photogs scouting locations and helping us get the best shots. This is one of those pull out all the stops moments. I already own most of this stuff (‘cept the film) so I might as well bring it with.

This is also exactly why I bought that second SLR, the Nikon. I can load the Promaster with b+w film and have color film in the Nikon and just switch cameras rather than switching film. Or worse, wasting film.

Ok, I’m super excited. I just realized I need to start rounding up all of this stuff and charging batteries etc. I’ll definitely update when I get back from the trip, and share some shots with you.