Super? Moon

This week’s full moon was a “supermoon”—or, as the media frequently proclaimed, “The biggest moon of 2025!” And while that is technically true, the size difference between a super and average moon is barely perceptible. So, as a public service, I’ve dusted off and updated a prior article explaining the supermoon phenomenon (any hyperbole)—and what better time to share it than just days after…

Stupid Things I’ve Done

Wearing the mantle “professional” saddles pro photographers with an image that isn’t necessarily justified. For example, consider the perception that we never make stupid mistakes. Well, I’m here to disabuse you of that notion, at least as far as this professional photographer is concerned. Stuff happens. No photographer, no matter how proficient, is immune to those little mental hiccups that dog our daily photography…

Grand Finale

For most of my full moon workshops, I try to schedule the moonrise main event for the workshop’s final sunset. Sometimes other factors prevent this (for example, in Yosemite I try to avoid weekends), but when the schedule works, a nice moonrise gives the group something exciting to anticipate throughout the workshop. This becomes especially important when some or all of the workshop’s hoped-for…

Surprise Sunset

Greetings from Iceland. Running a workshop that starts before the sun and often goes deep into the night doesn’t leave a lot of time for blogging. But I want to share this image from earlier this month in Yosemite, along with a few paragraphs about its capture. We all long for drama in our landscape images, and I try to time each of my…

Ten Reasons to Take Up Nature Photography

Recently I was talking to a friend on the cusp of retirement, and while she was looking forward to her impending freedom, she wasn’t sure what she was going to do with all her free time. I instantly blurted, “Nature photography!,” then started listing reasons. I surprised even myself with everything I came up with, and how quickly it came, which got me thinking…

One Night, Two Moons

I wrapped up this year’s workshop schedule at the beginning of this month and am now enjoying a much anticipated Holiday breather before my schedule ramps up again in January. This isn’t exactly a vacation, because the end of the year is when all my permit reporting and next year’s permit applications are due, and my 2025 workshop prep starts to ramp up, but…

More Than Skin Deep

Beauty In the eye of the beholder, more than skin deep… We’ve all heard the clichés implying that beauty is both subjective and personal, and like many (most?) clichés, they’re founded in truth. Landscape photography is the glorious pursuit of natural beauty, however we choose to define it. In my mind, the beauty of the subjects I pursue transcends the visual and is rooted…

Moon Swoon

Given an especially intense workshop schedule to start my year, the only Yosemite workshop I originally planned for February was my annual Horsetail Fall workshop. But in early 2023 I plotted the 2024 February full moon and saw that it would appear above Yosemite Valley, directly behind Half Dome (viewed from Tunnel View), at exactly sunset on Friday, February 23. Hmmm… Checking my 2024…

Searching for Serendipity

Dante’s Moon, Badwater, Death Valley Sony a7R V Sony 24-105 f/4 G ISO 100 f/11 1/30 second Miriam-Webster defines serendipity as, “Finding valuable or agreeable things not sought for.” Wikipedia calls it, “An unplanned fortunate discovery.” Though I can’t quibble with these definitions, I think photographers can create their own serendipity by keeping their eyes and mind open to unexpected opportunities. Sometimes Mother Nature bludgeons us with…

Playing the Odds

First and foremost, a good landscape image usually requires…, well…, a good landscape. But merely getting yourself to the good landscapes is only half the image success equation, because good landscape photography also requires good conditions: colorful sky, dramatic clouds, complementary light, a striking celestial object, or some other natural quality that elevates the scene to special. One way to include these ephemeral variables…