Members’ Gallery (Digital)
Sam Schaen and Marilyn Gaizband
Sam Schaen and Marilyn Gaizband were members of NVPS from September 2003 until 2017.They bought a home in Green Valley AZ and spend their winters there. The pair consider themselves serious amateur photographers. They met in 1983 and celebrated their 32nd anniversary in April. Marilyn became seriously interested in photography when her sister gave her a Nikkormat camera for her 30th birthday. She taught Sam photography, including black & white darkroom processing shortly after they met. Sam, in return, taught Marilyn about computers. Both are now retired. They currently use Nikon D750 bodies and share a variety of Nikon lenses from wide angle (16-35mm) to telephoto (200mm-400mm).
The couple is most interested in nature photography and bird photography in particular. They enjoy travelling around the world in pursuit of their hobby. Some favorite U.S. locations include Bombay Hook in Delaware, wetlands on the east coast of Florida, Bosque del Apache in New Mexico, and Blackwater Refuge in Cambridge, MD. They have photographed in a number of countries, including Kenya, Argentina, Brazil, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Scotland, the Falkland Islands, Antarctica, Spitsbergen. Their next big trip is to China in 2019.
Cuba
The images in their Members’ Gallery are from their trip to Cuba in March 2017. The tour was led by former NVPS member and frequent speaker, Corey Hilz, and a Cuban native who formerly was a history professor. The trip began and ended in Havana with stops in Vinales, Playa Largo (Bay of Pigs), Cienfuegos, and Trinidad. Outside of Havana, the group stayed in Casitas—essentially Bed and Breakfasts. Many Cuban families put extensions on their homes specifically to attract tourists. Cuba is a country of interesting contrasts. One can see a young women in a mini-skirt with a cell phone next to someone driving a horse-drawn cart. There are historic buildings as well as buildings desperately needing repair. And of course, there are the 1950s American Cars.
Members’ Gallery (Prints)
Kacy Turner
Kacy Turner has always had a love of creativity from producing stained glass panels to oil painting so her interest in photography was a natural progression. In the summer of 2014 Kacy bought her brother-in-law’s Canon 40-D camera. With very little technical knowledge but a whole lot of passion she began to recognize and appreciate photography as an art form and caught the competition bug right away.
Kacy joined the NVPS in November of 2016 and for the next six months in a row she entered all of the categories and won seven different awards. She earned two more awards when her prints were chosen by the end of year banquet judge. Kacy went on to win Class 1 Digital Photographer of the Year. This past November she entered the 2017 Nature Vision’s Expo competition and won the People’s Choice Award as well. Today she shoots with a Canon 6D Mark 2 and has learned a lot about post-processing using lynda.com classes. Photoshop is her favorite editing software.
You may all know Kacy as the smiling greeting Member’s Coordinator who sits at the name-tag table as you come in. Tonight you will get to see what she loves to photograph. Almost everything she photographs has a heartbeat. Kacy loves animals and big cats are her favorites!
Her philosophy is the same as most zoo’s these days and she uses her photos to educate people about the importance of conservation. She hopes people will fall in love with these animals close to home and then support animals in the wild. Her lifelong goal is to visit every zoo and animal sanctuary across the United States, all in good time.
Enjoy viewing her domestic W I L D collection!
