Henri Cartier-Bresson
If your first 10,000 photos are your worst, you want to get them out of the way as soon as possible so you can get to the good ones, right?! So take a lot of photographs!
Take a Lot of Photographs
Saving An Overexposed RAW File
Anoush, Point Betsie Lighthouse – Overexposed JPEG
On this photo shoot I made a dumb mistake. (It can happen to any of us.) My first few clicks of the shutter were overexposed. When I checked the first few images on the back of the camera I immediately saw the mistake. The overexposed images were shot at f/9, 1/100 second, and ISO 100. They were 1 2/3 stops over Basic Daylight Exposure (BDE). I changed my settings to f/11, 1/200 second, and ISO 100 which is equivalent to BDE. After that my images had good exposures. The first lesson from this mishap is: Don’t get so wrapped up in the energy of a photo shoot that you forget to stop periodically to check your images. To learn more about BDE, see the article linked below.
When Your GPS Leads You Astray!
Adobe Bridge window and Google Earth Pro window. Click the image for a larger version.
It started today when I was using Adobe Bridge to go through some sunset photos I had taken out my car window on a recent trip to Michigan. I wanted to know where I was at when I created these images. (I knew approximately where I was but not exactly.) Finding a photo location is usually a quick and simple procedure. My Canon 7D Mark II records the GPS coordinates of the images I take. I clicked on one of the sunset images in Adobe Bridge. Then I opened Google Earth Pro and placed it on top of the Adobe Bridge window.
How to See and Photograph the Perseid Meteor Shower Tonight
Perseid Meteor photographed from Rose Hill Cemetery west of Lamoni, Iowa. 4:55 am CDT, August 13, 2018. Cropped from the original image.
Tonight, August 11-12, is the predicted peak night of the Perseid Meteor Shower this year. But you can also look for the next few nights. This article will tell you what you need to know to see and photograph the most popular meteor shower of the year.
A Guide to One of My Favorite Colorado Photo Spots
Bear Lake, Longs Peak and the Keyboard of the Winds.
This is one of my favorite photo spots in Rocky Mountain National Park. Longs Peak and the Keyboard of the Winds are in the background, Bear Lake in the mid-ground, and aspen leaves and boulders in the foreground. Here’s how to get to that spot.
Fall Color Photography Guide to Marshall Pass and O’Haver Lake, Colorado
Marshall Pass is a beautiful fall color drive in southern Colorado, and still pretty much a secret. It does not turn up on most lists of the most beautiful fall color drives in Colorado. It is a beautiful drive with a lot of fall color photo opportunities.
Colorado Fall Color Photography and Travel Guide – 2024
Headed for Colorado this fall (or any other time of year)? Welcome to my complete Colorado fall color photography and travel guide with 133 photos, 18 maps, and over 100 pages of information (if you print it all out). I cover some of the best known fall color locations in Colorado, and most of these locations look great any other time of year. Spend anywhere from two days to two weeks exploring the beautiful Colorado Rockies at a gorgeous time of year.
Great Blue Heron: iPhone vs DSLR at 130 Yards
Great Blue Heron at Lake LaShane
I was driving along a country road at one of my favorite local lakes and spotted a Great Blue Heron straight north of me near the shoreline. I got the crazy idea to do comparison photos between my DSLR and my iPhone. The heron was too far away to get a high quality image with either camera, but I decided to do it anyway. I also wanted to check on the quality of the iPhone’s built in digital zoom versus cropping the original image and resizing it later in the computer.
20 Years Ago This Evening
Dancer, Graceland University, Lamoni Iowa
20 years ago this evening I was photographing this dancer at an evening worship service at a church camp. I tried to capture just the right moments in her dance. I was particularly pleased with this image. I sent it to the media office of the church that sponsored the camp.
“Where exactly was I when I took those photos?”
Ludington Dunes in the moonlight. Click the image for a larger version.
My primary camera, a DSLR, does not record the GPS location of my photos. Why does it matter? Some photo editors will not publish a photo unless you provide accurate GPS coordinates of the image location. Of course I knew I was approximately a couple of hundred yards up the beach from the parking lot, but not precisely where I was. Plus I am curious. Some of my photos are taken in less obvious locations and I like to know where I was when I clicked the shutter.
Burgess Corners Michigan: Grocery Store and Filling Station
Burgess Corners Grocery Store and Filling Station
When I do photography workshops in Northern Michigan, this quaint, early 1920s grocery store and filling station is one of the stops on our field trips.
Anoush on the Beach at Sunset
Anoush, Lake Michigan at sunset
It was a beautiful day at a Lake Michigan beach at sunset and the colors just kept getting better as you will see in the next image.
Anoush in Flowers
Anoush in flowers, Burgess Corners, Michigan.
I usually do portraits with a DSLR, but every once in a while I do a portrait with my iPhone just to see how it does. In this case, my phone did a pretty good job. We stopped at Burgess Corners Michigan because there is a 1920s era grocery store and gas station on the corner. (I will post gas station photos later.) After taking some photos at the gas station we decided to take advantage of the flowers on the other side of the highway.
Anoush: The Green Towel
Anoush Anou, Manistique River.
This is the latest in the “green towel” series. This towel lives in my car for whenever I am doing water portraits. It is also in my car for the times I need to dry off after I have to wade out into water to get the photo angle I want, or to dry off my tripod legs. There are more green towel photos here.
OSU’s Stone Lab Photo Workshop, July 22, 2011
Sunrise at OSU’s Gibraltar Island, Lake Erie, Ohio. July 22,2011, 6:26 am.
July 22, 2011 was a very special day. Jeremy Bruskotter and I were leading our very first weekend photography workshop for OSU’s Stone Laboratory. Home base for our workshop was Gibraltar Island, OSU’s island in Lake Erie. We did this weekend workshop once every summer for several years.
Anna’s Hummingbird
Anna’s Hummingbird
We were visiting family in the San Francisco Bay Area and I noticed hummingbirds feeding at the Lantana bushes near the back patio. They were fast and unpredictable, feeding at closer blooms but mostly at farther away blooms.
Tiana
Tiana, Don Edwards San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge
If you are out hiking and a beautiful woman asks you to take her picture, you should probably says yes! We should all be so lucky, right? Well, we didn’t really meet by chance. Tiana is a first class model and photographer living in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Great Places in the U.S. to Take Pictures
A while back I wrote about all of the people that like to go take pictures at the same spot where Ansel Adams created his image “Tetons and the Snake River”. I was curious about other places people like to take picture so I did a Google search for “famous us photo locations”. Google came back with “Most photographed places in the U.S.”
Why Take So Many Photos of One Event?
Most of the parade photos taken with the Canon 7D Mark III and a 70-300mm lens. Click the image to see a larger version.
Why do event and assignment photographers take so many images? I am asked that question on a regular basis. For this year’s 4th of July parade I captured 138 images. 135 of them were taken with a pair of DSLR cameras and 3 with my iPhone.
4th of July Parade, Lamoni Iowa
The color guard with the U.S. flag leading the 4th of July parade.
Each year for fun I photograph the 4th of July parade in Lamoni Iowa, and I send photos to the local newspaper. Here are some photos from this year’s parade, along with a few parade photography tips.
The Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776
Thomas Jefferson by Rembrandt Peale, 1800
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
From the Declaration of Independence, signed July 4, 1776. Written by Thomas Jefferson (1762-1826). 3rd US President (1801-09).
More images (including Thomas Jefferson’s original draft) and the complete text of the declaration are after the break.
Happy Independence Day!
How To Photograph Fireworks
The Strip, Las Vegas with Fireworks
You can point your camera at the sky in auto exposure and autofocus modes and fire away whenever you see a burst of fireworks, but for the best quality photos, it helps to know a few tricks of the trade. It’s easy when you know what to do.
Photo Location: Thorne Swift Nature Preserve in Northern Michigan
Thorne Swift Photo Collage. Click the collage for a larger version.
Thorne Swift Nature Preserve is one of my favorite photo locations in Michigan and it is well worth visiting from spring through fall. It is just 3 1/2 miles north of Harbor Springs in northern Michigan via M-119, the Tunnel of Trees, and Lower Shore Drive. Directions and maps are at the end of this article. It is one of the field trip options for my nature photography workshops in Northern Michigan.
National Camera Day!
Kodak 126 Instamatic Camera and Kodachrome 64 film cartridge.
I just learned today is National Camera Day. Who knew?
This Kodak 126 Instamatic cartridge camera was my first camera. It was a gift from my parents when I was in high school. I used print film cartridges for about 3 years. It was not until I was in college that I made the switch to slide film cartridges.
Visiting Classic Photo Locations
Google image search. Just a few of the hundreds of results.
Yesterday I wrote: “There are all kinds of photographers who like to plant their tripods where other photographers have taken famous pictures, like hundreds of photographers who have recreated Ansel Adams’ classic image of the Grand Tetons and Snake River.” I was confident that was not an exaggeration. But I decided to look.
The Infamous “Road To Roscoe”
The infamous Road to Roscoe. Photo by Dr. John Janovy, Jr. 2015.
It all started October 8, 2022 when John Janovy re-posted a photo of the infamous Road to Roscoe that he had taken in 2015. I was intrigued by the washboard nature of the road. Not only that, in just 4 days on a trip from Iowa to Colorado, I would be just a few miles from where John took this photo. I met Dr. Janovy when I was a student at the University of Nebraska and he was a parasitologist in the biology department. We both share an interest in photography and the natural world, we occasionally send messages to each other, and we are friends on Facebook.
Do NOT Get Taken in by the “Stealth Bird Drone” Scam!
We’ve been down this road before. A low quality product made in China is falsely advertised as a top of the line American made product. The Stealth Bird Drone sells for $99, but you can buy the same exact drone on Amazon for $23. Even at that, honest reviews say the flying is a bit erratic and the video quality of the camera is poor.
One Photographer and Eleven Outdoor/Travel Writers Pick the Best National Parks for Summer
Zion National Park, Utah
Summer is the most popular time to visit the national parks. With so many to choose from, where should you go? Which national parks will provide the best photographic opportunities in the summer?
The Best National Parks to Photograph in Summer
Pika, Rock Cut, Trail Ridge Road, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado
Which national parks are at their photographic best in the summer? Here are my favorite choices, grouped by state from west to east, plus one Canadian province.