Photodigitary

Simple Things

Today I was up in the Santa Monica Mountains Recreation Area, which is a spectacular place very close to Los Angeles. I was hiking with a couple of friends up by Sandstone Peak. We were there at dawn and hiked through the morning. Some really stunning scenes, but I haven’t edited the shoot yet.

When we climbed up to Sandstone Peak, the highest point in the Santa Monica Mountains, we saw a great view all around us … and two empty, discarded water bottles. This is a sad thing that people cannot take their own bottles out. These things are not going to decompose, they degrade the environment and the experience. Plus cloning them out of a photo is annoying at best.

So I picked them up, crushed them and put them in a pocket. They had no weight so they had no effect on the rest of our 6-mile hike. Why they would be trouble for anyone to take back, I have no idea.

I often pick up trash found when I am out photographing. It is a shame we have to do that, but I hope you will give a thought to keeping our natural areas looking their best, too. I think I am going to put a small trash bag into my camera pack just for this purpose.

Posted in Nature, landscape photography, nature photography | 3 Comments »

Rain

I was just in New England last month visiting some family there and doing some workshops at the NANPA Road Show in Rhode Island. I had decided to go to Cape Cod first after arriving in Boston — I had not been there for a long time. I only had a day … and it was raining. Then when I got to Maine, it was still raining! It had been raining before I got there, rained when I got there, and rained most of the time I was there. The photo here is of daisies in a field in Maine, and it was raining when I took the photo. Yet one thing I really like about the photo is all of the water drops.

For whatever reason, rain has rarely kept me from getting out and enjoying nature and even photographing in it. There is a beauty there that is definitely unlike sunny days. Sure, you get wet, but it can be worth it. Some things that are key for me in order to do this:

• Gore-Tex boots (these are truly a wonderful piece of gear and keep your feet dry without your feet sweating like a purely waterproof boot will do)
• Gore-Tex rain jacket and pants (I really love Gore-Tex fabrics — yes, it is expensive, but it is really worth it. You don’t sweat or feel clammy inside this clothing like you do with waterproof gear in summer conditions)
• A dry microfiber cloth (gear will get wet and a microfiber cloth will soak up the moisture. I found a whole bag of these at Sam’s Club — they were made for mechanics, but work great for all sorts of things and they were about $10 for a large bag of them)
• An umbrella (I have a small, highly portable umbrella that is not a problem to carry. You can hold it over your camera and tripod even in downpours, though it doesn’t work well in wind)
• A cover for the camera (you can get a very nice plastic cover made by OpTech designed specifically for cameras from many camera stores; another great cover is a shower cap that you pick up from your hotel room on your next trip)

Never keep your camera under a waterproof jacket (Gore-Tex is okay) — moisture builds up inside there and will get inside your camera, including lenses, which you don’t want to happen. Once you have been out in the rain, it is a good idea to completely dry off your camera when you go inside. In addition, leave your bag open to dry out as well.

You do have to be careful about this when it is hot and humid in the rain and you are in a location that is really keeping the air conditioning on too much so it is very cool there. Your camera can get cold like the room, then when you take it outside, the moisture will condense on and in the camera, which is not good. If you must keep your camera in such conditions, keep it either in a plastic bag until it warms up outdoors or keep your camera bag tightly closed until the gear has warmed up.

Rain can offer a quite, peaceful time to be outdoors. Plus, colors can be rich and interesting.

Posted in Digital camera techniques, Nature, nature photography | Comments Off

New Blog

I have started a new blog totally unlike this one with a friend, Chuck Summers. It is called SeeingCreation.com. Chuck is a pastor and a very fine photographer. He and I have talked for a long time about creating something with a spiritual connection to nature and nature photography. I know it is not for everyone, but check it out and see — seeingcreation.com. We will be posting regularly with nature photography and thoughts about nature from a spiritual side.

Posted in Nature, nature photography | 4 Comments »

Costa Rica Photography

If you are interested in something very special for your photography, you might consider a trip to Costa Rica. I am leading a photo tour there this summer, in July, so this is, as they say on Car Talk, the department of shameless commerce. But I do this with great love. Costa Rica is truly one of my favorite places to visit. It is a wonderful country that likes Americans and it is filled with great photo opportunities. We will be spending some time in the rainforest and cloud forest there. And of course we will be looking at how to make the most of digital photography in this place. 

The rainforest is not, as many people think, something that covers Costa Rica (though it once did if the cloud forest, a higher altitude rainforest, is included). The country is very agricultural, so you drive through a lot of farmland. But the remnants of rainforest are there and pretty amazing. I love the rich diversity of plants, the really  neat waterfalls, the really amazing walk through a rainforest, the incredible amazing birds and more. 

You can see more about the trip at www.holbrooktravel.com/RobSheppardCostaRica2009.

Posted in Nature, Workshops and Classes, landscape photography, nature photography | Comments Off

HDR to the Rescue

Recently, I was in the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area northwest of Los Angeles. This is a fantastic part of the national park system. It has spectacular views and locations but it is a bit too fragmented to be an actual national park.

I had gone to Castro Crest, a high point covered with chaparral. Chaparral is a native shrub-based ecosystem that covers much of the mountains of southern California. It is an underappreciated, and definitely under photographed, part of nature. I have started a personal project of really exploring and photographing the chaparral of my now adopted state of California. It really is a very important and significant part of the natural world here, but most nature photographers have ignored it, sadly.

One reason the chaparral is hard to photograph is that the plants making up the community are mostly dark. So, photographing in early light, toward the sun is challenging, to say the least. When I was up at Castro Crest, there was a cloud cover in the valley below, which made for a very interesting scene. And even more challenging as no camera built today could handle the tonal range of bright clouds near the sun to dark chaparral. As you look at the photo at the beginning of this text, you may have taken it for granted that this is “normal” … and it is, but for our eyes, not for the camera. The exposure range is way outside of the camera’s capabilities.

So I shot with HDR in mind. I made many exposures of a number of scenes. I then put them together in LR/Enfuse with Lightroom. I like the workflow for this program, plus it allows me to optimize images in Lightroom for better output through LR/Enfuse (okay, technically, LR/Enfuse is an exposure blending program, not true HDR, but it works very well for the purposes stated here).

One of the final shots is shown at the beginning of this text. I put three of the exposure variations for that shot below.

Posted in Digital Photo Techniques, Digital camera techniques, Nature, landscape photography, nature photography | Comments Off

Fires and Nature Photography

Right now I am at the Palm Beach Photographic Centre in Florida doing a workshop on nature photography. Our group went up to Jonathan Dickinson State Park north of Jupiter yesterday where we found an area that had been recently burned. This was a prescribed fire in the coastal scrub area of the park — fire is a natural part of this ecosystem, so the area is burned every 3-5 years.

The class had great fun in the burned area. The greens of the newly sprouting plants against the blacks of the burned plants and ash were fantastic visual elements. This is a totally natural part of this system. Plants that look dead and destroyed are not — they resprout readily.

I talked to one of the rangers and she told me how misunderstood this was. The park people we talked to were glad to have someone understand the importance of this fire and photographing it to share with others. This is an important part of nature photography, I believe, the sharing of what we see with others. Nature photographers are the eyes of much of the public.

This really is shown by our experience at this burned area. So often, the only experience most people have with fire is the coverage of bad wildfires that destroy homes and other property. Smoky the Bear did too good a job and so everyone not only fears fire, but also believes it is always destructive to nature. In fact, it is a key part of many ecosystems and is not destructive, but regenerative. This was obvious from our visit to Jonathan Dickinson State Park.

It is interesting that nature photographers often avoid these types of photographs. I think this comes because fires seem to be destructive. Yet, most areas do regenerate quickly, and all areas that have fire as a natural part of the ecosystem really do “recover” and look very, very interesting for photography very quickly. This is an important part of nature and can provide some neat opportunities for photography.

Posted in Nature, landscape photography, nature photography | 1 Comment »

Your Photos?

Illinois prairie under powerlines.

I just got back from the NANPA Summit. NANPA is the North American Nature Photography Association and an excellent organization dedicated to supporting nature photographers and nature photography — www.nanpa.org.

I was doing some critiques with students. I would talk to them about their interests, then see some of their personal work, then some work they had done at programs they were involved with at the summit. It was very interesting to see something about their work that represents something in many photographers’ work — photographs that represented the photographer’s heart vs. photographs that were done to please others.

I would look at the photographs the students had brought with them. Then I looked at the work done under the guidance of the older photographers there as leaders. I could see the young people’s heart in their earlier photographers, but I missed seeing them in the new images. This was very clear. I even asked one student where they had gone during this field trip and if they had done this photos (nicely done, though) for themselves or really more to “please the adults.” They had to be honest and say it was the latter.

This is such a common thing in photography — taking pictures not based on our core interests and visual personality, but to please others. We all have done it. We take certain photos because we think we have to because of what we see in images from people or hear from teachers we respect. We all will change how we take pictures at times because we got praise for a certain type of photograph, whether that praise came from a pro’s critique, a camera club competition or an editor. We will start avoiding certain types of photos because we got some sort of direct or implied criticism or dislike of a photo, also coming from such things as a pro’s critique, club competition or an editor.

There is no question we can learn from others, and critiques, criticisms and comments about our images can help us better see what we do right and wrong with our photos. However, this becomes a problem when you start changing your photography from what you love and value to someone else’s love and value. I had even asked one of the students where a certain type of photo was from their field trip (based on what had been told to me about their interest and what I had seen in photographs) and was told that they had tentatively shot a few of those but had not included them because an instructor told them not to use that type of shot.

It can be hard to find our own photographs then have others “reject” them in one way or another. I totally understand that. I have been there before. I can even remember starting to take one photo then thinking to myself, “Well, such-and-such won’t be interested in this”, then stopping and looking for another photo. I have really fought that idea in recent years.

Sure, sometimes you need to take photos for specific reasons, including pleasing someone else, such as working for a client. But I believe that as soon as you quit taking your own photos, you also do a disservice to yourself and that “client”, because you are no longer bringing your heart and your love to the work. You suffer and your photography suffers. In addition, I think it is sad because it means that you don’t bring that special view of the world you have (and I believe everyone has something special to see) to share with the world. I really believe that sharing of our unique views of the world is one of the very special and valuable parts of photography.

I have been reading a really excellent book, The Courage to Teach by Parker Palmer. He says something very much about this: “When I follow only the oughts, I may find myself doing work that is ethically laudable but not mine to do. A vocation that is not mine, no matter how externally valued, does violence to the self — in the precise sense that it violates my identity and integrity on behalf of some abstract norm.”

It can be hard to do your own work, especially when you are in an environment that does not support it. Whenever you do photography that is intensely your own, you risk not only your photos, but also your self becomes vulnerable.

Yet, I think this is important for any serious photographer to do exactly that, find and support your own images. Without that, photographs can even become superficially beautiful, but there is no heart or soul in the images. This is often true with advertising photos, but they are often supposed to be exactly that, superficially beautiful.

I have seen too much superficial “good” nature photography that looks just fine as “pretty picture on the wall” but does nothing more than act as decoration. I think you deserve more than that for your view of the world and nature deserves better than that, too.

Posted in Nature, nature photography | 1 Comment »

Nature Photography and Nature

How nature and the environment are portrayed has changed over the years. When I edited Outdoor Photographer magazine, I saw great photography that showed off the dramatic, big scenes. But in recent years, such photos begin to look the same because so many photographers are doing them. They have much less impact on readers.

In addition, today’s economy and harsh environmental realities have made people look again at what nature means to them. Still, most people don’t like to be hit over the head with messages about doom and gloom. They still want to see the beauty of nature and find a connection to it because it is an antidote to our times. But the “same-old” big landscape photos don’t do this.

There is no question that when all photos start looking the same, no matter how “pretty” they are, viewers get bored and stop looking at nature photography.People then can lose touch with our natural world because they start to think that everything is okay based on the pretty pictures on that wall calender.

How do we create images that will get attention for our subjects? In large part, this is an attitude that one takes when photographing by deliberately looking for photos that are not the usual, common, and typical nature photography. But that should not be only “what not to do” — it is also about looking for the unexpected, the surprising, the image that takes the viewer to unexplored visual places. We explore this to a degree in a class I do at BetterPhoto.com on Impact in Photography.

But this idea goes far beyond that, I hope. I believe our natural world faces serious challenges and deserves more than just another “pretty picture” from us as photographers. I am not suggesting that pretty pictures are not important or that we should all become raving environmentalists. I just want people to appreciate and understand nature as more than a place where calendar photos come from. I want people to experience my photographs and the photographs of other photographers as a way of connecting again to our natural world.

Posted in Nature, Photoshop techniques, Uncategorized, Workshops and Classes, landscape photography, nature photography | 3 Comments »

Early Ice

I have long loved early ice as a photographic subject. When I lived in Minnesota, I used to pay close attention to the weather as temperatures dropped to see if we would get good early ice. My parents lived next to a pond that was perfect as it was very accessible and got all sorts of ice patterns and stuff in the new ice. But sometimes we would get snow along with the freezing lakes and ponds — that made unattractive early ice. So did wind or rain.

I was recently doing a workshop in Moab, Utah, outside of Arches National Park, and on the last day, the temperature really dropped. It wasn’t quite freezing in Moab, but it was in the mountains as I headed west and south to go home. I stopped for the night in Cedar City, Utah, in order to photograph at Zion National Park. Temperatures were predicted to be very low. I had gloves, but not thick ones, so a quick stop at Walmart got me a nice pair of fleece gloves with leather-like finger tips (fleece gloves alone are hard to use with cameras — they don’t grip — I find work or hunting gloves have coverings on the finger tips that really help).

They were needed. It was in the 20s the next morning. And there was new ice on the Taylor Creek in the Kolob Canyon part of the park (this, by the way, is a great area to visit as it is not overrun by visitors like the southern part of the park). There were many great patterns of ice, plus a lot of leaves imbedded in the ice to work with, too. This is a great time for close-up and macro work, but expect to get your knees wet (as you kneel, your weight melts the ice). I was also glad to have Gore-Tex boots on to make wading the shallow stream easy so I could quickly get close to the ice. This type of ice does not last long as the day warms up, but it is a great subject to work with. 

Posted in Digital camera techniques, Nature, landscape photography, nature photography | 3 Comments »

Not the Usual Nature Photos

One of the challenges all nature photographers face today is that there are so many photographers taking pictures of nature! And a lot of good photographers, too. A lot of this imagery is excellent but looks a lot like the rest of the photos out there. That’s not necessarily bad, but it does mean that sometimes good nature photos get lost in the crowd.

One way of getting your photos to stand out is through the use of ideas and techniques that are not expected, giving photos that are not like everyone else’s. There is certainly a danger in doing that because not everyone will like your photos if you start bucking the commonly accepted ways of photographing nature. 

My friend, Bill Neill (the landscape columnist for Outdoor Photographer magazine), has long followed his own drummer in his work. Bill photographs in many areas, but he lives near Yosemite National Park, so he photographs there quite often. Very few of his photos look like everyone else’s shots of the park. He strives to go deeper than a quick shot of a beautiful scene, looking for images that connect people with nature in different ways.

That’s why a few years ago, he started adding movement to his photos of landscapes. He actually moved the camera during the exposure. He has created a striking body of work that has a spiritual quality, I believe, that goes beyond simple identification with a specific scene. He has now put these images together in an inexpensive e-book called, Impressions of Light. This is a stunning group of photos that I think can inspire anyone who loves photography and nature. Don’t expect to see the “usual” in nature photos, though — you can expect the extraordinary. This book is about light, color and how they play out in nature. You can find out more about Bill’s new book at www.williamneill.com/books/impressions.html. He even has special pricing until October 1.

Posted in Books, Nature, landscape photography, nature photography | Comments Off