An up from under look at getting low to show off the beauty of mushrooms.
Looking up to mushrooms
A lot of words about being minimal
Winter is a great time to develop your eye for the minimalist image. Tips, strategies and processing ideas to get you started.
Experiments in photographing moving water
Do you always use long exposure for moving water photos? Sometimes a faster shutter speed is a better approach.
So you got a wicked long lens
Are all the animals hiding from you and your long zoom? Practice for the day that polar bear looms large!
Techniques for using a diffuser with macro photography
Examples of how a diffuser can improve your close up and macro photography.
Two near disasters and coping with direct sun
Exploring a section of the Ice Age trail in (gasp!) full sunlight! Tips and techniques to get the best images even in direct sun. Plus an old habit saves my gear!
The Shadow Knows
The winter sun never gets very high in the sky, but that means there are shadows everywhere for the observant photographer.
The Art of the Trail Shot – techniques to create your best hiking photos
Keep these 6 easy ideas in mind to make the most of your hiking trail photos.
Uniquely Popular
Photographing a popular place? Some thoughts on discovering what's distinctive about your time there and finding a new angle on an old scene.
Pulpit Falls and the great light race
In the last couple of posts I talked about learning a hard lesson about light. That is not to fight it, but to work with it to make the best of my time and my photographs. Letting go of that perfect image you have in your head is hard. We go out trying to get... Continue Reading →
Tips for better trail photos
Trails, paths, and walkways are all irresistible subjects for the outdoor photographer. Who hasn't stopped and shot, trying to convey in an image what it was like to be walking in that spot? I know I succumb maybe more than I should, but I have gotten better at judging if a section of trail is... Continue Reading →
Tools of the Task
Lots of people have done a 'what's in my camera bag' type post and have dragged every last bit of kit out of each and every nook and cranny of their bags. Kind of interesting, but out of all that stuff I'd like to know what a person really uses to create her images. I... Continue Reading →
The Color Purple and the Digital Camera
By now most of you have caught on that this isn't a technical photography blog, but that I'm not above putting out a little know-how if I think it could be useful. With wildflower season approaching, I think you flower shooters will like this one - purple flowers looking blue and how to fix it!... Continue Reading →
The Legendary Olympus 90mm f2 macro lens
One of the internet search terms that often leads people to my site is for the Olympus 90mm f2 macro lens. I'm not exactly sure where they end up since I use that lens a lot and post many shots taken with it. Like this one. I found this little crawler on my backpack yesterday... Continue Reading →
What’s Your Major?
Recently I participated in a discussion that stemmed from a person wondering about the composition of a very famous photo by a very famous photographer; Henri Cartier-Bresson. Specifically the person wanted to understand why this image is composed so amazingly well. It got me to thinking about photography and the importance of concentration in the... Continue Reading →
Smoke On the Water
Often when I post photos of moving water looking all smooth, silky or smoky I get comments asking how I achieve that result. So I decided to write this post using my latest batch of images to illustrate things (and give you a couple of Lightroom tips in the bargain). Don't say I never gave... Continue Reading →
Photography Field Tips #1
One of the earliest lessons I learned in photography was to cultivate good field habits. That is to establish habits and routines that not only help you stay organized, but keep you from going crazy if you have a lot of gear. Accessories are the kiss of death sometimes and unless you have a way... Continue Reading →
Black and White Photography 201
The next step along the monochrome brick road is manipulating images once you've converted them and done the basics like cropping, white balance and sharpening. Sometimes the color palette we're presented with isn't as dynamic in monochrome as we want it to be. I mean that the gray values of the colors aren't separated, they're... Continue Reading →
Landscape Photography Light – Myths and Misunderstandings
How are a landscape photographer and a vampire alike? Neither goes outside at noon. Seriously, it makes you wonder doesn’t it? Blood-sucking fiend and Fun-sucking fiend, both taking the joy right out of life. I recently stopped following a landscape photographer’s blog because he just kept going on and on about only shooting at the... Continue Reading →
Black and White Photography 101
The other day someone asked what made a good black and white photograph. He went on to say that he only uses black and white processing when he’s trying to achieve an old photo look, but noticed when someone converted one of his color images to black and white it looked better because the distracting... Continue Reading →
Goals for 2011
For 2010 I had a few specific goals in mind for my photography. Here they are - 1. Be more methodical and deliberate; be a more thoughtful photographer 2. Organize digital files better 3. Purge digital files 1 - partial win. I did envision specific photographs ahead of time and go into the field to... Continue Reading →
Organization Resolution
Recently a thread about 2010 photography resolutions was resurrected on a board I post to on occasion. Scrolling through the replies I found mine. One of the 3 points on my list was to have better organization when it came to my picture files. While it wasn't a complete fail, it also wasn't a complete... Continue Reading →
