commercial and travel photographer Susan Seubert shoots Travel and Leisure Magazine’s Cover

It is with great pleasure to announce that an image I shot for the August 2010 issue of Travel and Leisure Magazine is gracing the cover.  The job was loads of fun to shoot because we were asked to cover some amazing hotels in Hawaii, including the Four Seasons Hualalai on the Big Island, plus the Halekulani in Waikiki and the Kahala Hotel and Resort, both on Oahu.  I photographed a range of images at each property including food, swimming pools, interior architecture, people and the surrounding landscape.  One of the highlights was covering the Atlantic Bottlenose Dolphins at Dolphin Quest, one of the Kahala resort’s amenities.  The aim of Dolphin Quest is to educate guests about these fascinating marine mammals, all while getting kisses and rubbing their tummies.  Did you know that dolphins shed their skin 12 times a day?  That’s why they are so soft.

Although I live on Maui for part of the year, The Big Island always has a special place in my heart because it feels so primal with its vast lava fields and jungles.  There aren’t many of the white, sandy beaches that most of the other main islands offer, but exploring the tide pools in front of the Hualalai, (which happens to also have a vast sand beach), was a marvelous experience.  I felt like a child as I saw shrimp, sea slugs, snowflake eels and more green sea turtles than I’ve ever encountered before, all languishing in the shallows.  Be careful, however, as there are also many sea urchins which will poke directly into the bottom of your foot!  Once again, my job has given me a wealth of experiences I shall not soon forget.  Aloha!

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Photographer Susan Seubert finalist in Editorial Portraiture in PDN Faces Contest

It is with great pleasure to announce that my work has been recognized by Photo District News Magazine in their annual Faces contest in the category of editorial portraiture.  The image that won was from a photo shoot I did for National Geographic Traveler Magazine about dining in Sydney.  My editor had assigned me to shoot the project with the broad missive that the images could include anything that had to do with Sydney or Food in Sydney.  That is a broad topic for a relatively short shoot, so we chose a few locations that were iconic to Sydney, Bondi Beach being one of them.  This image was made with a Hasselblad with an 80mm 2.8 lens, hand held, and there’s only one frame.  The swimming club itself is a marvelous place to photograph, and has been probably thousands of times, but this moment ended up being whimsical and unexpected.  This picture was published with the story, “Sydney a la Carte,” was chosen by Keith Bellows, editor-in-chief of National Geographic Traveler, as one of the best travel images in 2009, and now PDN has recognized it as well.  Thank you to all for your support and I look forward to having opportunities to make more inspired imagery in the very near future.

as announced in the July 2010 issue of Photo District News!

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Editorial Photographer Susan Seubert shoots Chris Solinsky for the New York Times

Because I’ve never been known to be a sports photographer, the call from the photo editor at the sports desk of the New York Times was unexpected, as was the assignment: to shoot a portrait of long distance runner Chris Solinsky at the Nike campus.  He has created quite a stir in the running community by being the first non-African to beat the 26 minute record in the 10,000 meter event.  When I arrived Chris looked like he just got off the bus from the Midwest, dressed in a Hurley t-shirt and shorts.  Not until Nike outfitted him in running attire that I could finally see why he is so newsworthy.  We tried a number of poses, but without putting him in a line-up of other runners, whom he would no doubt dwarf, how was I to visually communicate his stature?  The photo that ran in the article was the one that showed off his musculature.  He’s in a push up position and I’m lying on the ground in front of him, with the camera looking straight at him. You can see the blood rushing to his face as he stayed in this pose for a couple of minutes, which also made the muscles in his arms and shoulders tighten and expand.  It seemed to be the portrait that the editors thought to be most successful, as it’s the picture that ran with the story, which can be read here.

Chris Solinsky for the New York Times

All the images were made with the Canon 5D Mark II and the Canon 50mm 1.2 lens.  The digital files were edited in Photomechanic and processed using Adobe’s Lightroom software.

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