In many ways, our modern society conditions us to find excitement and joy only at the pinnacle of experience. With nature photography, this looks like the epic sunset, the perfect swath of autumn color, or being in the presence of especially dramatic scenery. While I still seek out such experiences, I try to balance them with finding equal satisfaction and happiness with more common everyday experiences out in nature. A recent example: feeling full of joy and excitement when I saw a thriving four o-clock wildflower and its glowing magenta petals, with white-lined sphinx moths actively feeding on its nectar, in late October while on a casual evening walk in the Utah desert.
A few days ago, upon the recommendation of fellow photographer Dario Perizzolo, I listened to an episode of the Hidden Brain podcast, “How Your Beliefs Shape Your Reality.” Near the end, the psychologist being interviewed, Jer Clifton, suggested a simple mental exercise to help cultivate curiosity and promote this kind of connection with the natural world. Pick up a leaf from a tree and contemplate its beauty: the shape, the colors, the intricacy of the veins. If this leaf was rare, it would be considered a work of art but because it is so commonplace, it doesn’t command any special attention—or any attention at all.
Read MoreOver the weekend, I participated in the Out of Chicago (OOC) LIVE online conference as one of the instructors. This is the third online conference OOC has offered during the pandemic and they all have been such inspirational weekends. (Although the live conference is over, you can still purchase the recordings through April 16 and then access the sessions for the next year.) The organizers always pull together a great mix of inspiration, motivational storytelling, and practical education. I am usually on the side of practical education since that is what comes most naturally to me but last weekend, I had the chance to speak in one of the full conference keynote spots and give an “inspirational” talk. It felt like a big stretch and I was super-nervous leading up to my session but once it was over, I felt like I could do more on the “inspiring” side with some practice.
I chose “shifting your mindset” as the topic of my talk, with a focus on thinking about how you show up and the positive and negative ramifications of the ideas you bring along with you. The role of expectations in nature photography is one of the three areas I talked about, with the encouragement to set aside expectations and show up with an open mind. Generally, I think of expectations as blinders that you put on before you ever get out of the car, often leading to being laser-focused on a preconceived idea that may or may not materialize. By putting the expectations mindset aside, you can instead show up with an openness to serendipity and the opportunities that are in front of you at the moment instead of the conditions or compositions you hoped for that may never materialize.
Read MoreOver the last few months, I have recorded six free webinars for nature photographers in partnership with photography friends (David Kingham, Jennifer Renwick, John Barlcay, Cole Thompson, Alister Benn, Alex Noriega, and TJ Thorne). This post collects all of these recordings in a single place for easy access and viewing. You can access the recordings through the links to our YouTube channel or find the embedded videos below.
Offering these webinars has been a highlight during a difficult time and it was so nice to connect with photographers across the globe through these sessions. After taking a break from offering webinars to finish my 11 Composition Lessons ebook, I will be starting these sessions up again soon in some to-be-determined format. If you have a topic in mind that you would like to see covered in a future webinar, please let me know.
Read MoreWith composition, we are able to take the elements of nature that we connect with the most and arrange them in a manner that communicates our visual preferences and the stories we want to tell about our subjects. In this way, composition serves as an intensely personal window into how we see the natural world and choose to present it through our photography. In writing my most recent ebook, 11 Composition Lessons for Photographing Nature’s Small Scenes, I spent a lot of time thinking about the themes in my composition habits and find that these five ideas are most essential:
#1: Abstraction: See Beyond the Literal Qualities of Your Subject
#2: Simplification: Compose Around a Core Concept
#3: Exclusion: Elevate Your Subject by Eliminating Context
#4: Structure: Seek Out Scaffolding for Your Composition
#5: Details: Pay Attention to the Small Stuff
These ideas are the versatile, practical composition concepts that I return to again and again. Instead of relying on rigid rules (like the rule of thirds) that do not necessarily align with every photographer’s goals for personal expression or every scene we will come across, these ideas are instead tools for the toolbox that we can apply in a wide variety of scenarios to a broad range of subjects.
Read MoreWhen I talk about my photography, I often try to emphasize the importance of minimizing expectations and being open to what the landscape has to offer during your visit - be present for the opportunities that exist, not the opportunities you wish existed. I emphasize this lesson both because I think it can be vitally important to creating expressive photographs but also because it is a lesson that I need to learn over and over again. Below, I share how this played out during a photography trip to Vancouver Island, British Columbia and some practical advice if you find yourself in a similar situation.
Before I took up photography, a 2007 article in Sunset Magazine about Port Hardy, one of the area’s northernmost towns, sparked my interest in visiting Vancouver Island. The photos that accompanied the essay were haunting – almost monochrome because such a thick fog enveloped the massive monolithic seastacks, leaving just a faint hint of the dense vegetation that characterizes this landscape visible. I had never seen such a landscape in person and almost couldn’t believe it exists.
Read MoreCanon just announced its newest mirrorless camera, the R5, causing the usual online buzz among photographers. One band of naysayers has me perplexed - nature photographers who use digital equipment but say things like “Never mirrorless!” in response to such announcements. Even though mirrorless cameras have been out for years and are used by many photographers, these negative attitudes persist. Given my own recent experience with a mirrorless camera, my response is “Why not mirrorless?” As I share below, some features specific to mirrorless cameras help remove barriers to creative expression and have enabled me to create photographs that I previously would have passed up due to technological limitations of my equipment.
I certainly do not think that the newest and best technology is necessary to create meaningful, inspiring, and technically sound photographs. And, for people with limited financial resources, spending money on experiences and time in the field is almost always going to be a better investment than buying a new camera. A camera is a tool and a skilled photographer will be able to create with a range of equipment. However, if new technology helps expand opportunities for creative expression, why not have an open mind?
Read MoreWhen thinking about nature photography, many people instantly think of postcard-style scenes: grand landscapes under colorful skies. From my perspective, however, nature photography can be a much more expansive pursuit when considering the opportunities available with smaller scenes, including abstract renditions of natural subjects. In this article, I share some tips on learning to create abstract photographs along a continuum, from photos with abstract concepts that amplify an obvious subject to fully abstract photographs in which the scale and subject are difficult to discern.
Read More
