Wildlife Photography Guides
The first step to photographing wildlife is finding wildlife and one of the best ways to find wildlife is to look at wildlife location books. They will save you hours of frustration by sending you to the best locations to find wildlife.
Can a world class, National Geographic photographer lose his passion? Yes! How does he get it back?
Posted Nov. 6, 2017. Updated November 25, 2018.
“Pink Cosmos Double” by Tony Sweet
If you want to turn your images of flowers into true artistic expressions, this is the book for you. Fine Art Flower Photography, Creative Techniques and the Art of Observation by Tony Sweet takes you well beyond the typical flower photography guide.
Golden Brook. Photo © Tony Sweet
I’ve been reading two excellent nature photography books by Tony Sweet. They are published by Stackpole Books. They choose first class photographers who have written an excellent and ongoing series of photography books. I’ve been giving high praise to Stackpole’s photography books for years and I now have two more to add to the list.
Some of my favorite nature photography books.
Want to be a better nature photographer? Read anything by John Shaw, Galen Rowell, Art Wolfe, Freeman Patterson, Tim Fitzharris, George Lepp, Larry West, Arthur Morris, Allen Rokach, John Netherton, Leonard Lee Rue III, Brenda Tharp, Tony Sweet, and the Stackpole (publisher) nature series. Now for some of the “best of the best” books to look for. These are my favorites out of hundreds of photography books in my library.
Joseph Lange, How To Photograph Landscapes
Joseph Lange’s How to Photograph Landscapes is my favorite introduction to landscape photography. It was one of several books I was going to take with me on a ten day trip. I wanted to review it for an upcoming photography workshop. When I arrived at my destination it was missing.
Nature Photography Books
A good photography book can put you well ahead of the game, and three essential nature photography books (plus maybe a few others) can save you years of time learning things the hard way.
Three different exposure combinations at Brandywine Falls, all of them cropped from larger images. Click for a larger version.
Another photographer and I were shooting together yesterday at Brandywine Falls in Cuyahoga National Park. During the time we were there we saw dozens of people taking pictures of the waterfall. Most of them were in full auto-exposure mode, making no personal changes in their exposure settings whether they were photographing the waterfall, each other, or the leaves in the trees. I bet most of them had no idea that they had turned important artistic decisions over to a computer chip.
More photos are taken of people than any other photographic subject. Whether your thing is casual slice of life photos, or you want to do more formal portraits, here are some excellent books to help you take memorable and eye-catching photos.
When I picked this book up off the shelf, I couldn’t put it down, at least not until I put it down on the check out desk and bought it. There have been some very fine illustrated history of photography books that have come and gone, but this is far and away my favorite.
After you’ve mastered all of the basic, intermediate, and advanced exposure skills and techniques, what book should you read next?
Posted Nov. 2, 2017. Revised November 25, 2018.
Is composition something that can be taught, or is it innate? Probably a bit of both. It is hard to look at photographs by Frans Lanting, Art Wolfe, Galen Rowell, and Dewitt Jones without coming to the conclusion that they were born with some kind of innate sense of composition. On the the other hand, it is clear that photographers can improve dramatically with the right kind of guidance.
The Art of Photograph, Art Wolfe and Rob Sheppard.
Art Wolfe is a world class photographer, and it shows in The Art of the Photograph. There are a lot of books on photographic composition (I own several, and I’ve looked through a lot more in various libraries), but this is far and away the best introduction to photographic composition I have come across. If you aren’t an experienced professional photographer, this book is an absolute must read. (I am assuming professionals already know this stuff.)
Michael Fulks, the publisher of Apogee Photo Magazine, wrote at an excellent review of Digital Photography Exposure for Dummies and gave the text an A++, the magazine’s highest rating. The review follows.
Just a few of many Canon refurbished cameras and lenses from the Canon USA web site.
Do you want to buy a Canon DSLR and/or lenses on a budget? This article is for you.
Originally posted May 2, 2017. Revised and re-posted Nov. 1, 2017.
Digital Photography Exposure for Dummies
With 12 books, hundreds of magazine articles, over a dozen instructional videos, and numerous workshops to his credit, digital photography expert Tim Grey really knows his stuff. In one of his eNewsletters, Tim gives this excellent recommendation for Digital Photography Exposure for Dummies:
Many photographers say Light: Science and Magic is THE best book on photographic lighting – and I agree with them. If you intend to be seriously involved in photography, this book should be on your required reading list.
I’ve been recommending DPReview for years in my photography classes, workshops and online. It is one of the best camera review sites. One of the nice features is the ability to download full size JPEG test images of their “standard studio scene” for comparison purposes.
Is it a special deal, or is it a rip-off?
Is it a great deal? Or is it a rip-off? You are searching online for a good price and you come across a terrific deal. Are you about to get burned? There are ways you can tell.
Estimated Print Life from Wilhelm Imaging Research
Would you rather pay more money for a print that will fade in as little as 5 or 6 years, or would you prefer paying less a very high quality 8×10 print that will last up to 50 years? People pay more money for prints with a short life expectancy all the time. Why? Because they don’t have the right information, and they may have no idea that prints have such widely different life spans.
The lab you choose and the kind of file you send to your lab can make a big difference in the quality of print you get back. How do you pick a good online photo lab? How do you get the best results from your lab? What color space should you use for your digital files and how do you convert your files to the right color space? How big a print can you make from your digital files?
I get lots of photo questions and many of them begin with “What is the best . . . .” They usually come from photographers or someone shopping for a photographer.
Here is my list of “best of the best” of articles recommending the best photo gear, software, books, DVDs, calendars, online photo labs, and a whole lot more.
Originally posted Nov. 1, 2017. Most recent update: April 7, 2018.
This is a list of books that were the most helpful to me when I took a serious interest in photography, and I continue to refer to them. These books were written back when film was king, but that makes them all the more valuable to today’s digital photographers. Some digital photography books get so lost in technical information that the heart and soul of photography can get lost. The best film photography books are about light and shadow, subjects, form, texture, line and shape – all of which applies to digital photography.
Are you ready to take your nature and wildlife photography to the next level? Are you ready to learn the professional secrets that make the difference between good images and great images? Are you ready for a high intensity, action packed, total immersion photography weekend? Come to Park of the Pines on beautiful Lake Charlevoix June 8-10, 2018.
Tiny aspen leaves in a snow drop.
Snow was melting on aspen leaves, creating “snow drops”. The clouds were beginning to part and sunlight was shining on the leaves. I was looking for another great leaf at the same location as the prior post.
Melted snow on an aspen leaf.
Bob, my brother-in-law, and I were driving down the Peak to Peak Scenic Byway and stopped at the classic overlook between mile 38 and mile 39 between Nederland and Ward Colorado. This is a great location for both grand and intimate landscapes.
Elk, Horseshoe Park, Rocky Mountain National Park
Cars stopped in both directions as the big bull elk crossed the two lane paved road at the west end of Horseshoe Park. Their cars still sitting on the road, motors running, everyone was out of their cars and snapping photos with phones, small point and shoot cameras, and serious camera gear. It would have been hard not to get a great photo, even with a smart phone.
8-18X telephoto lens on an iPhone SE.
If you haven’t done so already, read this article first: Don’t get ripped off! Part Seven. Comparison Test One: Telephoto Phone Lens vs DLSR and Zoom Lens. It will explain the background and methodology behind this comparison test.
I purchased the 8-18X telephoto lens to check it out. Like the lens in Comparison Test One, it is another Chinese lens for smart phones. The ads for this lens say this lens is amazingly sharp. It is being sold for $59.99. That is an outrageous price of course. I found one on Amazon for less than $12. I knew when I bought it that it would not be worth $12. I had read other online reviews for this lens which point out how bad it is, but I wanted to see for myself.
Posted Sep. 22, 2017. Revised and expanded Dec. 12, 2017.
Photographers with red headlamps. Field Trip, Sprague Lake, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado
A red headlamp is an essential tool for night photography. Before you rush out and buy one, make sure it has the most essential feature (other than the red LED). Some inexpensive headlamps have this feature and some very expensive ones don’t, so cost is not the issue.
This stunning photo of the Horsehead Nebula in Orion was captured with a Canon 7D II. Copyright © Roger N. Clark. Click for a larger version.
I found two interesting articles extolling the virtues of the Canon 7D Mark II (7D2) for astrophotography and wildlife.