Hey Ya'll! Hope you're having a great week! Me? Pretty well. It's springtime and hopefully you're out on a Photography trip. I love taking trips and doing travel photography. When you're there you love taking photo's of what you see. You get so excited during capture but when you get home and you look at your photo's they look kind of "blah" and not interesting? They never seem to show what you experienced while you were there taking photo's. You think maybe it's the gear or my technique or something because these photo's just look boring. In this blog I'm going to give you some tips on how to make your travel photography photo's not look boring. This blog might slip into a few blogs so hold on. LOL

So you're on vacation and you go to a popular place and there are people everywhere. How do you get an interesting photo? Here are a few tips. 2025 Sunrise Jockeys Ridge First of all is the timing. Try not to go when everyone else is going. Let's look at National parks for an example. If you get up and go early there won't be as many people. A lot of folks that are on vacation won't roll out of the hotel until after 9 or 10 but if you get there at sunrise or a little after you will be surprised on how you have the place to yourself. Timing is everything when going to popular spots and if you don't want a lot of people in your shot go when they aren't there. Don't shoot with a wide lens. Lets say your taking a photo of a famous building if you use a wide angle lens and there are people in front of you it will make them look very big and take away from the shot you're trying to get. Use a longer lens and backup the people will be smaller and your building will look bigger. Another option is don't fight the crowd. They are part of the experience of the place so try to include them in an interesting manner. A crowded New York street is suppose to have lots of people so show them in your shot. Try using a slower shutter speed and have the people kind of blur while your subject stays still this will show the hustle and bustle of the scene and can make a great photo.

Fire Truck Blur So lets say you're out taking photo's of lets say San Francisco you want to get a good cable car shot you take one and it just looks boring. Almost like any type of photography to make it interesting try using Layers. Look for a good background to put behind your subject . Move around and get the best one you can get then there is the foreground . Try to put something in the foreground maybe people, flowers almost anything will work and make your shot more interesting. Try framing your shot in trees or through a window of some kind. All of these things will make a boring shot look a whole lot better. Once again I say don't use a wide angle lens unless you have an interesting background. If you are shooting outside you will have a lot of sky make sure it's interesting before you put so much in your photo. Remember most good photo's have foreground, subject and a background.

Now when you're traveling you try to control everything but one thing you can't control is the weather.  Seems like whenever I travel with Robert Sheldon Church Ruin Reflection my photography wingman it always rains. You have to learn to go with it . If you get outside and take some photo's in the rain you will find some interesting shots that a lot of people won't. First of all if it's an overcast day don't use a wide angle lens. You'll end up with a big white sky that nobody wants to see. So use a little bit longer focal length to crop out most of the sky. Secondly look for things that you can only find in rainy conditions. Like umbrellas. If you're in a big city and people are walking to and from the subway they will have some umbrellas use that in your composition maybe even have some long shutter shots to spice it up a bit. And of course in the rain there are puddles to get reflection in. Get your camera as close to the puddle and shoot. Night time is great for this with lights of buildings really reflect well. Make sure you protect your camera. If it's weather proofed that's great but if it isn't don't let that hold you back. A plastic bag will work wonders and if you use common sense you will be able to use your camera with no problems. I use a shower cap to help protect my camera body and lens if the lens isn't too big and it works great. Just use common sense when shooting in the rain.

Well it looks like I have typed enough for one blog so I will continue this topic next week. So until then " Get outside and Shoot!"

Hey if you want to check out my photography go to my instagram account Max Stansell Photography there are over 2000 posts there. Here is the link

 Max Stansell Photography Instagram Link