Photodigitary

Flower Photography Workshop

Just a short blog here. If you are interested in flowers right now, and maybe even tired of winter a bit, you might find my workshop at the Light Photographic Workshops of interest. The Magic of Flowers will look at the bold blooms of flowers along the Pacific Coast by Morro Bay, California, and we’ll be photographing flowers from close-ups to landscapes (March 29-April 2).

And here’s a flower tip to consider. Get down low and close with a wide-angle lens for a different look at flowers. This gives a look at the flower in a big landscape, so obviously you need to have a good looking landscape around the flower. It is important to get in really close to the flower, probably as close as your lens will focus. You can also use an achromatic close-up lens (such as the Canon 500D which will work with any brand lens with the right filter rings) to get closer.

Posted in Digital camera techniques, Workshops and Classes, nature photography | No Comments »

NANPA

I am in Reno, Nevada, right now at the NANPA Annual Summit. NANPA is the North American Nature Photography Association. And this blog is a plug for this organization. I have been a member for many years now, starting in my capacity as editor of Outdoor Photographer magazine. I have also been on the NANPA Foundation Board which handles non-profit fundraising for certain education projects, including education grants, refuge blind building and Summit programs for college and high school youth.

NANPA is a wonderful organization. You can learn more about it at NANPA.org. If you are interested in nature photography at all, I would suggest you check it out. The organization has been a terrific experience for me personally. I have gained a lot of friends who share the same ideals and interests that I have, friends from across the country. I love going to the Summit if for nothing else, meeting new people and rekindling friendships.

The Summit is much more, too. It brings in a lot of great speakers, some of the top nature photographers in the world. At this summit, folks like Phil Borges, George Lepp, Staffan Widstrand, Joel Sartore, Piotr Nasrecki are all giving keynote speeches. In addition, there are multiple breakout sessions every day on all sorts of topics from video for nature photographers (which I am doing with Ian Shive) to using nature photography to cure nature deficit disorder to making the journey from amateur to pro to the art of butterfly photography and much more. There is also a trade show where you can see and handle all sorts of gear appropriate to nature photography.

NANPA is also worth supporting for the things it does for nature photography, including promoting ethical practices in the field, offering insurance for photographers, sponsoring a major nature photography competition, sponsoring regional nature photography programs and so on.

Check it out and keep it in mind if you want to develop as a nature photographer.

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Photographing Projects Near You

When I was editor of Outdoor Photographer magazine, it amazed me how often folks would write in with suggestions for articles about places far away from their homes. And as I have done classes at BetterPhoto.com, I am still surprised at how often people say that they don’t live in areas where there are good opportunities for nature photography. I have also found that in workshops, a lot of people want to know where is the best place to go.

I know this may seem a little flip, but it is the truth: my favorite place to photograph is wherever I am. I have been to locations in nearly every state and a few foreign locations, too. I have yet to find any place where there is not some sort of interesting and good opportunities for nature photography. The photo at the top of this entry is from Castro Crest in the Santa Monica Mountains. This is less than an hour away from me. Now lest you think I am in some amazing location, I live in the Los Angeles area and nearly half of the time to get to this location is through LA freeways. In addition, this location is within 10 miles of millions of people. Yet whenever I have been to this spot, I have never seen another photographer other than friends who came with me.

I suppose that the old saying, “The grass is greener on the other side of the fence”, didn’t become popular because people always appreciated where they were. A dear friend of mine has some wonderful opportunities to photograph stunning scenes of nature near his house, yet he is always searching for another place to photograph far away from home. Now there are wonderful places that are worth the travel. I am glad I get to go to a lot of interesting places around the country. But I can’t do that all the time. Yet nature and photography are too important to me to wait until my next “big trip.”

I have found so many locations around LA that I enjoy visiting for nature photography. But one thing that has become very important to me is a personal project — photographing the chaparral of Southern California, especially in the Santa Monica Mountains (which, it seems, is not well known anywhere, even in LA — “Santa Monica has mountains” — no, they don’t, but there are mountains to the north and west that have this name). I have mentioned a bit about this before. The chaparral is a wonderful ecosystem once you get to know it. It is a very important part of the natural history of Southern California, covering nearly 15% of the non-built land. It is not so dramatic as Yosemite, it doesn’t have the big trees of Sequoia, it has no bold waterfalls or big rivers. But it is close (it is throughout Southern California), interesting and worth getting to know. Admittedly, the Santa Monica Mountains do have mountains (up to about 3,000 feet), but without tall trees and not a lot of water, these soft-green mountains are often ignored by folks.

Everywhere there are areas like this, areas that you can “adopt” as your own. As you really get to know that area, you will learn more about your camera technique, you will discover cool things about the nature of your region, you can photograph throughout the year, and you can even build up a body of significant work that you cannot get in any other way. For me, the chaparral project started as a way to better know and understand a natural system in my state. Now it has truly become a love affair. That is a big deal, actually, because I grew up in the East and Midwest where thick forests were the native ecosystems that I loved most. Not that I will ever forget the forests, but I do love the chaparral now, too. As Stephen Stills wrote in a song popularized by the Rolling Stones, “And if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with.”

Here are more chaparral photos.

Posted in Nature, Workshops and Classes, landscape photography, nature photography | 1 Comment »

2010 Workshops and Classes

I get a lot of questions about where I might be in the coming year, so this long blog includes all of my programs so far. This list is on my website, www.robsheppardphoto.com, which has become more of my reference site.

February 13, 2010
Digital Black-and-White Photography
We will be exploring working with black-and-white as well as how to best convert color to black-and-white.
Paul’s Photo
Los Angeles (Torrence), CA

February 17-19, 2010
Video for Photographers
This is a breakout session during the NANPA annual conference.
NANPA Summit
Reno, NV

March 20, 2010
Extended Range Photography
We will be exploring how to get more range of tones and details from scenes. This will include HDR as well as special processing techniques such as double-processing RAW.
Paul’s Photo
Los Angeles (Torrance), CA

March 29-April 2, 2010
The Magic of Flowers — From Landscapes to Close-Ups
Macro and close-ups with California’s native flowers
Light Photographic Workshops
Los Osos, CA

April 10, 2010
Magic of Digital Landscape Photography
I have a new book coming out this spring, the Magic of Digital Landscape Photography. This program will complement the book and offer tips and suggestions for better landscape photography.
Paul’s Photo
Los Angeles (Torrance), CA

April 22-25, 2010
Florida Birding and Foto Fest
St. Augustine puts together a wonderful event of lots of workshops and classes related to nature photography as well as bird watching.
St. Augustine, FL

June 23-27, 2010
Eastern Sierras Mountain Wildflowers
The Eastern Sierras have spectacular wildflowers in June. This winter should be good as the area is getting lots of snow.
Great American Photography Workshops
Bishop or Mammoth Lakes, CA

September 8-12, 2010
The Nature of Cape Cod (after the tourists are gone)
Cape Cod is a wonderful landscape location. In the summer, it is overrun with tourists. This is a great time to be there.
Great American Photography Workshops
Cape Cod, MA

November 17-21, 2010
Exploring Chincoteague Island (with Jim Clark)
Great American Photography Workshops
Chincoteague Island, VA

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Upcoming Podcasts

There are a couple of podcasts coming up next month that you might be interested in. First, I’m going to be doing a live show this Tuesday, February 2nd at 8:00 p.m. EST with Juan Pons, Rick Sammon and Dave Warner. We will talk about lighting, flash photography, studio lighting and all things photography and answer your questions via telephone at 646-721-9811 or Twitter (by using hashtag #LF35-photog). You can also email your questions to editor@lensflare35.com ahead of time. If you just want to listen while we’re live, then go to www.blogtalkradio.com/lensflarelive and click on the Play button, which will only show up when the show is actually on the air.

If you can’t make the live time period, the show will be archived and available for play as a standard podcast from the dpexperience website at www.dpexperience.com later. I have also completed a podcast on the myths of digital imaging with Juan Pons that will also be available on dpexperience.com (DPE) early next month. Check out DPE for regular blogs from a whole bunch of fine photographers, including me.

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What are the rules, anyway?

This past fall, I had a great group of photographers with me on a GAPW workshop in the Eastern Sierras (I will have one on the wildflowers of the Eastern Sierras next June). One morning we went to Mono Lake a little before dawn. Some of the group went right down to the water, some did not. I hung out with some photographing tufas not down by the water. The sun came up and there was beautiful light on the tufa formations. Then I decided to walk down to the lake and see how the rest of the group was doing.

On my way there, a whole mess of people were leaving, heading back to their cars. One person says, “You’re too late. The light is all gone. The good photos are over.”

Now let’s think about this for a moment. The light was still low and creating some wonderful shadows, and creating some excellent textured light on the tufa. The man who spoke, who seemed to reflect the whole group, was that there was only one possible way of photographing at Mono Lake and the tufas. I heard later from one of my students that there were a whole horde of folks all lined up facing the same direction, the sun rose, they finished shooting and all left.

I found this rather sad (as did my group who merrily continued shooting). Yes, light and color are affected by sunrise and conditions do change. And yes, it is possible to get to a light that is unattractive on a landscape. However, the latter had not happened. What seemed to be happening is that these folks were photographing according to some unwritten rules about how to photograph Mono Lake. Which is probably one reason why I found a lot of Mono Lake photography pretty, but also without a lot of originality. How often do we need to see the same sort of pre-dawn colored tufa? Or their silhouettes against the sunrise?

Whenever you do anything of a creative nature, whether that is photography, writing or somethings else, there are no absolute rules to guide you. Sure, there are things you must know about the craft of photography, etc. You need to know how to get a sharp photo, for example, or how to expose properly. But beyond that, “rules” tend to be more ideas that someone else wants you to do either because they have a limited sense of right or wrong or they are scared they are wrong if no one else follows what they are doing.

This can be very restrictive to a photographer’s growth, a photographer at any level, from beginner to expert. It is very true that as you try new things, you can feel a bit insecure about them. So when someone comes by with the “rules”, it is easy to quit doing what is true and right for you, just because it seems to be “against the rules.”

The photo above is not the typical shot of Mono Lake and I like it because of that. Before I ever visited Mono Lake, I thought that the tufa were so common that you saw them all over. Wrong! They are only in a few select areas. This photo shows Mono Lake and some tufa in early light, light that shows the lake and the setting well, and shows largely an open lake (which is truer to the location than many shots of only the tufa). To make the lake look stronger in the composition, I had to make the tufa look less dominant. Because they are tall, they cut through the lake and into the sky from normal camera heights. I put my camera on my tripod, set the self-timer, pressed the shutter and hoisted the camera on the tripod high over my head. I had to do a few shots to get it right. And to do this, you often need to shoot manually. But it does give a different view of the lake and its tufa, giving a perspective of what the place is really like. I like the strong, early light after sunrise here.

Posted in Digital Photo Techniques, Digital camera techniques, Uncategorized, Workshops and Classes, landscape photography, nature photography | Comments Off

GNPA Conference

I am starting to set up workshops and other programs for 2010 and I will post them on my website when they are more or less complete. However, I wanted to mention an interesting conference near Atlanta in January.

The Georgia Nature Photographers Association is a newer group of very enthusiastic nature photographers. Their annual conference will be at the Callaway Gardens January 29-31, 2010. I will be one of the speakers there, along with Nancy Rotenberg (who has a wonderful approach to nature photography). For more information, go to www.gnpa.org.

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Solid low angle shots

With digital photography stimulating a lot of photographers to get out and take pictures, I have been doing some classes to encourage photographers to find new ways of seeing, including my class, Impact in Your Photographs: The Wow Factor at BetterPhoto.com. One of the things I encourage is to look for different angles. I had a fantastic workshop years ago with Will Hopkins who was the last art director at the old LOOK magazine. He said something that has always stuck with me: “The only people who see the world consistently from eye-level and at moderate distance are photographers.”

One way to immediately make your photos stand out from everyone else’s is to try shooting from different angles that are lower and higher than that “eye-level” that is so easy to fall back on. This goes for all sorts of subjects. Go to any photographer’s field event where people are shooting landscapes and notice how nearly all to all of the photographers have their cameras on a tripod at eye-level or close to it. Look at photos of children and notice how so many are shot from the photographer’s eye-level rather than the child’s. And this can go on and on for all sorts of subjects.

I love doing low-angle shots in nature. It gives a totally different perspective than expected. One challenge is how to stabilize the camera. I have used bean bags, which work well, but not for long exposures. I have removed the center column from my tripod to allow it to get closer to the ground, but the legs splay and often show up in wide-angle shots.

I have started using the Vacu-Pod in an interesting way suggested by its developer, Michael Corlew, using its suction on something like a metal plate to allow you to get a solid base for a tripod head and camera. I actually am using a small, 5×7-inch clipboard that I can clip to my bag, then attach the Vacu-Pod. This gives a very solid, low-angle support that you can use on mud (such as the photo seen above), sand (which keeps your camera away from damaging sand) and so forth. I have found I can take as long an exposure as needed with this, plus you can really lock the camera down for such things as HDR (done with the photo seen above). The Vacu-Pod itself is very lightweight and can be carried fairly easily. I put a cord through the hole in the center to make it easy to carry on the outside of my camera bag. You can learn more about this product at www.vacu-pod.com.

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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.

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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 »