Now that the New Year is upon us, I thought I’d offer some general tips for better living. Embrace these principles as New Year’s Resolutions if you like, and feel to share these pearls of wisdom with others. Enjoy! 1. Educate yourself. It won’t actually make you smarter, but it can make you sound smarter, which is enough to impress most people. 2. Always smile in the face of adversity. Unless, of course, smiling just pisses [...]
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As 2010 draws to a close, I thought I’d share with you my personal favorite images that I made this past year. I’ve struggled to narrow the list to only five. Actually, it wasn’t much of a struggle at all—we tend to be our own worst critics, and I’m certainly no exception. Many images that I make, although appealing to me at first, fail to hold my interest over time. A [...]
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That’s right, you read the title correctly—I’m hoping that by this time in June 2011 I’ll be on my way to the North Pole! Quark Expeditions is running a “Blog Your Way to the North Pole” contest. One lucky winner will get a free trip on a Russian nuclear-powered icebreaker to the top of the world. With your help, I’m hoping that person will be me! Now, before you question the ethics of soliciting votes to [...]
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Looking for the perfect gift for you favorite photo buddy? Here’s an idea, in three easy steps: (1) buy a small portable flash drive; (2) purchase several of my ebooks online; (3) download the ebooks onto the flash drive and your gift is ready to go! Looking for something more traditional? Order one of my print books listed below from Amazon, they’ll even gift-wrap it for you! The Ultimate Guide to Digital [...]
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My latest eBook, 10 Easy Ways to Improve Your Wildlife Photos, is now available for purchase—just in time for the holidays! Who doesn’t love to photograph wildlife? The wonderful diversity of life on Planet Earth is a beautiful thing to behold, and even better to capture in photographs. But wildlife photography can be more challenging than you think. Strong composition, good light, and the patience to master the moment are a [...]
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He may not be a turkey, but he sure looks tasty! I bet he’d go great with some gravy and cranberry sauce. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
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I guess some of you might be wondering what it is I hope to accomplish with this daily photoblog. Arguably, I have bitten off quite more than I can chew: keeping up with a day-by-day posting schedule is challenging, to say the least. So why all the effort? Good question! I’m not entirely sure I have a good answer in response. The truth is, things are mostly in the experimental phase right now. I basically [...]
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I have an article in October’s PopPhoto magazine (as well as online) on Animal Scenics. Also, my image of spawning horseshoe crabs below is featured on their subscription cover—or so I’ve been told, I haven’t seen it so I could be wrong! (Aparently PopPhoto does two covers for each issue, one for subscription copies and one for newsstand copies, so my image won’t appear on the newsstand version). This is my fourth article [...]
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This one is short and sweet. Don’t worry too much about creating photographs that are beautiful and inspiring. Don’t worry too much about getting oohs and aahs. Don’t worry too much about ensuring that your work is original or creative. Don’t worry too much about whether your photos are “art” or not. Don’t worry too much about whether your photos will sell or if people will like them or if A-list celebrities will hang them on the walls of their [...]
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I’ve written a short and to-the-point eBook called 10 Easy Ways to Improve Your Landscape Compositions. It’s the first in a new series of books that are more consice than my first two books Chasing the Light and Five Landscape Challenges. The books in this new series are pithy, under 40 pages, and at a lower price point of only $5. Wait, you say, aren’t Chasing the Light and Five Landscape Challenges [...]
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Okay, I know that autumn is just around the corner, but I’ve finally gotten around to some desperately needed “spring cleaning” of my website. Here’s a summary of the updates: Image Galleries: I’ve consolidated my image galleries, getting rid of a few of them, adding some new ones, and rearranging images into the remaining galleries. I’ve tried to make the themes of the galleries a bit more coherent, to weed out some weaker [...]
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My newest eBook, Five Landscape Challenges, is now available! Five Landscape Challenges is the first in a new series. Each book in the series focuses on five different common landscape scenes, providing detailed “recipes” showing you how to get each shot right, every time, discussing the best equipment, light, and compositions. This first book focuses on the following five scenes: Slot Canyons Spring Waterfalls Sand Dunes Woodland Flowers Geothermal Wonders Five Landscape Challenges is a downloadable PDF [...]
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I shouldn’t be writing this blog post. I should be starting my first day of backpacking on the Wonderland Trail, a 90-mile path that circles Mt. Rainier in Washington state. But, to quote the famous Burns poem, “the best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men gang aft agley” (the Scots have a remarkable way of torturing the English language—revenge for centuries of cultural repression, I suppose). Loose translation: shit happens. So, instead of [...]
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Some places haunt your dreams and stalk your living memories. I’ve spent a lot of time photographing the desert Southwest in the past few years, so much so that some people erroneously conclude that I live in Arizona (nope—Virginia). I’ve made hundreds of images, but truth be told I’m just beginning to scratch the surface. Every time I go I say to myself, “I’m sick of photographing the desert, this will be my last [...]
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