Category Archives: General

Today’s Quiz: What is The Location of This iPhone Photo?

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What is the location of this iPhone photo?

What is the location of this iPhone photo?

UPDATE, 1:05 pm: That didn’t take long. Rich is our winner today. He is a photographer in Colorado. I was facing generally north taking pictures of El Capitan (with a better camera than my iPhone). I was standing in El Capitan Meadow (just south of Northside Drive) in Yosemite Valley, Yosemite National Park, California.

Where was I when I took this photo? Today’s quiz is being run simultaneously on my photography blog and my Facebook photography page. The winner will be determined by the time stamp of the comments as I receive them on my Facebook photography page (you must be logged in to Facebook to see my photography page).

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How To Get GPS Coordinates Into Google Earth

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El Capitan in the moonlight. Camera and tripod. El Capitan Meadow, Yosemite National Park.

El Capitan in the moonlight along with a camera and tripod. El Capitan Meadow, Yosemite National Park, California.

GPS Data is increasingly important to photographers. It is the link between photos and photographic locations. It can be very helpful to drop GPS coordinates into a program like Google Earth to be able to tell exactly where a photo was taken. How do you do that?

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Nature Photography Workshops – 2016

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Evening field trip at Bear Lake. Photography workshop at Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado.

Moonlight on Bear Lake and Hallett Peak. Evening field trip. Photography workshop at Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. Click to see a much larger version.

I am excited to announce my nature photography workshops for 2016. These are action packed, fun filled workshops that are crammed full of practical photography tips and information that will supercharge your photography. Just ask anyone who has “survived” one of my workshops.

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“How To” Series: Using GPS

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Temple Image with GPS coordinates. Click for a larger version.

Temple Image with GPS coordinates. Click for a larger version.

The GPS system is increasingly important to photography. It will help you figure out where you took some of your more obscure photos and help you caption your photos.  More and more photo editors want GPS information for the photos they publish.  A GPS communicator could save your life. This series will help you learn the ins and outs of GPS, plus keep you and your family safe.

Originally posted Jan. 29, 2016. Updated Dec. 29, 2016. This whole series has been revised and re-posted here.

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Checking the GPS Location Accuracy of Your Camera, Part One

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Yellow Pin: GPS location provided by the camera. Red X: Actual photo location.

Yellow Pin: GPS coordinates provided by my iPhone. Red X: Actual photo location.

In my last article (on figuring out the name for Antora Peak) I noted the discrepancy between the GPS coordinates provided by my iPhone and the actual location where I took the photo (graphic above). They were off by about 20-30 feet. You can test the accuracy of the GPS information provided by your camera/smartphone. This article will show you how.

Posted Jan. 28, 2016. Updated Jan. 30, 2017.

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Using Google Earth to Find the Name of a Mountain (and How to Get GPS Info into Google Earth)

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"Mountain in Colorado"

“Mountain in Colorado”

What is the name of this mountain? Photo editors want to know. They like caption information. If you have a distinctive mountain in your photo, “Mountain in Colorado” won’t cut it with your friendly neighborhood photo editor. Here’s how to identify that mountain in Google Earth (and how to get GPS coordinates into Google Earth).

Posted Jan. 26, 2016. Updated Feb. 3, 2017.

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How to Find and Photograph Snowy Owls

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Snowy Owl Sightings, January 2016

Snowy Owl Sightings, January 2016

Winter is your opportunity to photograph Snowy Owls. When it is cold and snowy there are a lot of snowy owl sightings across the northern U.S. Don’t delay. If the winter turns warmer the owls will head farther north. On the other hand, if the winter turns colder they may move even farther south.

This is the first in an ongoing series of articles on Snowy Owl photography. Originally posted January 25, 2016. Revised and updated Dec. 24, 2017.

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“How To” Series: Winter Photography

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Last Light on El Capitan, Yosemite National Park

Last Light on El Capitan, Yosemite National Park

In addition to all of the usual photographic challenges, winter provides some extra complications, especially in terms of metering. So I began my series of articles on winter photography. I just finished revising and updating the series. I also revised some related articles and added new ones. They are all linked below. They will help you meet the unique challenges of winter photography. So read the articles, get out there, have fun, and create some stunning images!

This series is updated every year in January. The January 2017 update is here.

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Testing Your Camera’s Snow Exposure Latitude

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Cascade, Barry, and Coxe Glaciers

Cascade, Barry, and Coxe Glaciers, Prince William Sound, Alaska

Exposure compensation is one of the most important keys to good exposures, great images, and the best colors your digital camera is capable of producing. Knowing your camera’s snow exposure latitude is one of the keys to using exposure compensation in a winter scene. It is different for every camera model. You won’t find it in your camera’s manual but it is easy to determine with a simple test.

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Metering Nighttime Winter Scenes

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Twilight, Rocky Mountain National Park.

Twilight, Rocky Mountain National Park. Sirius, Canis Major, Orion, Taurus, the Hyades star cluster, and the Pleiades star cluster are all visible in the fading light. Click for a larger version.

You can photograph the night sky year around, but winter brings an added bonus: SNOW!  When you don’t have the benefit of moonlight, most of the year you get a black, silhouetted skyline. In winter you have the possibility of including the highly reflective snow. For many photographers winter is their favorite time of year to photograph the night sky.

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Metering Wildlife in the Snow, Part Two

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Cougar

Cougar

Most wildlife are medium to dark in tone, making them a challenge to meter properly in the bright, white tones of winter. If you trust your camera’s auto exposure modes, the odds are good you won’t get the best exposure. If you switch over to manual exposure and make the right decisions, you can get great exposures and better quality photos (more about that later).

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Metering Wildlife in the Snow, Part One

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Elk in the Snow, Rocky Mountain National Park

Elk in the Snow, Horseshoe Park, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado

Metering dark toned wildlife in the snow is a major exposure challenge. It is usually best to avoid large “burned out” areas (washed out, featureless white) in a nature or landscape photograph, but with properly exposed snow, the wildlife can be so dark as to lose all texture. On other hand, metering for the wildlife can burn out the snow. So what do you do?

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Metering Daytime Winter Scenes

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Mount Hunter from a Bush Plane. Denali National Park. Alaska.

Mount Hunter from a Bush Plane. Denali National Park. Alaska.

Metering for scenes with a lot of snow can be tricky since the bright snow fools the camera meter. I see a lot of winter photos with gray snow, which means the camera meter did exactly what it was designed to do and the camera owner didn’t know how to use exposure compensation. The solution is quite simple provided you know what to do.

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The Best Colors Come From the Best Exposures

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Gretag-Macbeth ColorChecker

Gretag-Macbeth ColorChecker

This has to be one of the best kept photographic secrets: The more accurate your exposures are, the better your colors will be. Why? If your exposures are off, the colors in your photograph will shift in different directions. You can correct the exposure in post processing, but you can’t correct the color shifts. Since the colors shift in different directions, if you try to correct one color (as you will see below), the other colors will get even worse.

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Dewitt Jones: Celebrate What’s Right with the World!

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CWR Website The Film from Shervin Communications on Vimeo.

Life (and great photography) is about inspiration as much as it is about information. Whatever it is that moves you to do things is just as important as knowing how to do it. If you aren’t inspired, all the information in the world won’t help you very much. But if you are sufficiently inspired, you will move heaven and earth to find the information you need. It is about vision! This 22 minute video is about finding the kind of vision that inspires your life and your photography.

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