I'm sitting in Los Angeles waiting for my flight back, so I decided to share some of my tips for photographing Maui. For this tripped, I packed along a Nikon F100 film camera, a Nikon D750, a 50 mm f/1.8 and a Sigma ART 20 mm f/1.4. I was limited to two lenses due to space because of the flights, however, these two did a good job at covering a wide range of needs while shooting.

The vast majority of my shooting consisted of film, so there will be a full post on that coming in the future. For the film, I shot Ektar 100 and Portra 160, and I believe the shots will turn out really well. Let's begin.

Michael Neal

One town that I stayed in is Paia, and there is a really laid back vibe there. I tried to capture a lot of little things about the town - the little beauties that people may miss in contrast to the large impressiveness of the island.

Michael Neal

Michael Neal

I also visited a little area called Kula, and I specifically spent time at their botanical garden. I love shooting isolated wildflowers wide open, and at f/1.4, the bokeh is really pleasing.

Michael Neal

The depth of field can be extremely shallow, so finding an appropriate focus point can prove challenging. However, if done correctly, the blown background is really very visually pleasing.

Michael Neal

While there wasn't a lot of opportunities to shoot black and white in Hawaii (due to the beauty in the colors there), I did like how this shot turned out of a nice grainy wood fence in the botanical.

I'll close this article with a couple more shots of the little beauties, and in the meantime stay tuned for my upcoming article featuring many more film shots from my time spent on the island.

Michael Neal

Michael Neal