Had the opportunity to visit Halong Bay yesterday and here's a little bit to share with everyone.

Firstly some general information on the place :

Ha Long Bay (Vietnamese: Vịnh Hạ Long) is a UNESCO World Heritage site located in Quảng Ninh province, Vietnam. The bay features thousands of limestone karsts and isles in various sizes and shapes.

"Ha Long" is literally translated as "Bay of Descending Dragons"

Ha Long Bay is in northeastern Vietnam, from E106°56' to E107°37' and from N20°43' to N21°09'. The bay stretches from Yên Hưng district, past Hạ Long city, Cẩm Phả town to Vân Đồn district, bordered on the south and southeast by the Gulf of Tonkin, on the north by China and on the west and southwest by Cát Bà island. The bay has a 120 kilometre long coastline and is approximately 1,553 square kilometres in size with 1969 islets. The area designated by UNESCO as the World Natural Heritage Site includes 434 km² with 775 islets, of which the core zone is delimited by 69 points: Đầu Gỗ island on the west, Ba Hầm lake on the south and Cống Tây island on the east. The protected area is from the Cái Dăm petrol store to Quang Hanh commune, Cẩm Phả town and the surrounding giants zone.

Source : Wikipedia

And now for the photos :

#1 - The Journey


#2 - Halong Bay Panorama


#3 - Within the Bay...


#4 - Twilight Halong Bay



Large sizes can be found on my flickr.

Thanks in advance and viewing, comments or critiques.

This post has been edited by darthbaboon: Nov 14 2008, 12:33 AM

I like the panaroma!!! Stitched or cropped?

Stitched from multiple 50mm shots.

very clean stitching. which software used?

Thanks.

very nice merging , can be wall paper already.
and the #3 is very nice , 7 blades aperture made it.

Awesome~!

Thanks mate!

CS3. It's a built in function called File>Automate>Photomerge.

Thank you! Glad you like it!

i like #3 the most.
doesnt mean others are not nice. good job.

Nice work, I like the last one. Don't mind if I offer some nitpicking criticism:

#1 is a bit too dark. The details are lost in the shadow.

#3 is nice but unfortunately both the boats in the foreground was chopped off. Could have aim the lens lower? At least the 3rd boat (smallest one) could be in full.

Thanks Wyluxx!

Okay.. will take note of #1.

I think what happened was what I call "lost in transition". When I stitch the shots, they all come out on separate levels cause I'm not using a tripod to pan. So when I cropped the panorama to get an even rectangle instead of a multi-angle polygon, some of the lower details are lost.

TS, u went Halong Bay with stryker colleagues??

y no color versyun??? Nice panaroma though! so many pics stitching together

#3 is the WOW factor!

#3 is nice.