By Jay Patel, on February 9th, 2012
 Click to Download This beautiful place is a tourist hot-spot in Iceland. A steep trail provides access to the mighty Skógafoss waterfall. The view gets better and better as you get closer to the fallsl. If you ever get a chance to visit Skógafoss, don’t forget your camera – and be sure to take some time to climb to the top of the falls. Click on the image above to download the image for your desktop background.
As always, these images are provided for personal use as computer wallpaper or backgrounds ONLY. Copyright belongs to the photographer, and photographs cannot be used, redistributed, or recreated in print or on the web or on any other medium without written permission from the photographer.
By Jay Patel, on February 8th, 2012
This multicolored heron was in perfect position holding very still to catch his food, when an wandering alligator disturbed its concentration and scared the fish away. I never did get to see him catch a fish.
The usual blue colors you see in this image are all natural… they are not caused by a polarizer or enhanced in photoshop. So why does the water look so blue? All the light reflecting on the water was bouncing away from me. Why? Because I took this shot early in the morning when the angle of the sun was low. So, the only thing I could see on the water was the reflection of the clear blue sky. Additionally, in order to expose the subject properly, the parts of the image that were in shade (along with the reflections on the water) were under exposed. This gave the water an even deeper hue.
By Varina Patel, on February 7th, 2012
Here’s a shot from Death Valley National Park. I love shooting by moonlight! The soft glow is incredible – and when you are in a place like this, it’s so hard to pack up and go home! Why not stay just a little bit longer and capture the moonlight on the sand? :) This is a composite shot. I took one shot for the foreground and sky, and a second shot – slightly zoomed in – to capture the moon with the proper exposure. I combined the two images in Photoshop to produce an image that looked as much like the reality of the scene as I remember it as possible.
By Jay Patel, on February 6th, 2012
Have you ever tried to make the reflections an entire image? This is exactly what Varina did in the image above.
This image of stork was taken in Everglades National Park during our 2011 workshop….Varina was looking for something creative that would set her shot apart from other animal shots.
Often times with reflecting images you get imperfections in the rippling water… like the bending beak in this shot. But these imperfections give the image a bit of character.
Compare this with Jay’s image of another stork (below). In Varina’s shot, the subject is isolated against the reflected blue sky in the water… and the upside-down bird with all its imperfections adds interest and grabs your attention. My shot below is just another bird portrait – full of distractions. And the head of the bird gets lost in all those grasses behind him.
So next time you go out in the field… look for reflections. Maybe you’ll capture something unique!
To learn more about composition and color check out our eBooks below:
 
By Varina Patel, on February 3rd, 2012
Here’s a shot from Nine Mile Pond in the Everglades. It’s a beautiful place to watch the sunrise – but on this morning, I wasn’t getting any good photos. Although the sunrise was pretty, it wasn’t very photogenic – and the water was a bit choppy. A couple of test shots failed to get me excited.
I wanted to transform the scene. So I pulled out my neutral density filter. The idea was to block some of the light coming into the lens with a grey filter – that would mean I could use a much longer shutter speed. The effect was exactly what I wanted. A 25-second shutter speed (f/8) blurred out the waves, giving the water a smooth, calm surface. The slowly moving clouds blurred just a bit – which left the sky looking dreamy. Most importantly, the reflected light on the water scattered with each wave, producing an opalescent glow.
Simple, in-camera techniques like this one can turn an ordinary scene into something just beyond the usual. Have you used a neutral density filter for a similar effect?
By Varina Patel, on February 2nd, 2012
What is the most important element in your photograph? Can you identify it, or is your eye pulled from one element to another? The next time you go out to shoot, take a moment to consider the scene carefully. 
Choose a single interesting element… a leaf, a water droplet, a rock, a tree… and see if you can find a way to make that element stand out in your photograph. There are so many ways to build an image around a single point of interest.
- Remove distracting elements from the frame by moving around to change your composition… or by moving them physically.
- Use a wide aperture to blur out distracting details in front of or behind your point of interest.
- Use color to make one object stand out.
- Use leading lines to direct the viewers attention toward your point of interest.
- Watch for patterns… an element that breaks the pattern will attract attention.
There may be many elements in the scene that interest you. Why not make several images – each showcasing one interesting object – rather than trying to include them all in a single frame?
To learn more about composition and color check out our eBooks below:
By Jay Patel, on February 1st, 2012
Life is beautiful! Here’s a touch of fresh new life to give you a little pleasure as you wait for Spring! I took this photograph in Great Smoky Mountain National Park.
I wanted the flower to stand out, so I blocked all the light except for a little beam that was falling directly on the flower. The light on the flower is completely natural, but there were other spots of light in the scene as well. I had to use my body and my camera bag to block the light that I didn’t want to include in the image. I wanted just one trillium flower in the frame. I chose the title to match the image…Glow of Life!
By Varina Patel, on January 31st, 2012
 This is a shot from Death Valley National Park in California. The salt flats are huge – 40 miles long and 5 miles wide – but it’s the tiniest details that grabbed my attention. The largest of these crystals is just three or four millimeters wide.
I was waiting for sunset near Badwater, but the clouds were gone, and there wasn’t much change of getting a gorgeous sunset. So, instead of searching for appealing foreground objects, I pulled out my macro lens and started looking for details. It didn’t take long for me to notice that in some places, the salt crystals were more spread out, so that I could see each one individually. I loved the graduated sizes spread out across the sand.
I set up my tripod nice and low to the ground, and then adjusted my lens so that the glass was parallel to the ground. When you are working with a macro lens – and when you get in this close – your depth of field is incredibly narrow. I wanted to get everything in focus, so I spent extra time making sure I had my camera set up just right.
I also needed to make sure to provide a clear point of interest for my viewer. When you are working with hundreds of similar objects, that can be pretty difficult! I chose my composition carefully so that a single larger crystal dominates – and smaller crystals fill the frame. Notice that the largest crystal is off center – and the others seem to get gradually smaller as you move through the image from the bottom left to the upper right. The placement of the crystals is random – but the composition is anything but. Despite the randomness of the natural objects, there is a clear, diagonal structure to this image. That was important to me, since a diagonal comp is usually more dynamic and interesting than a horizontal or vertical one.
Post-production was pretty easy. I wanted to make sure the patterns in the salt stood out, but it was equally important to make sure I didn’t lose any detail in the brightest white areas. A little bit of contrast and a careful white balance adjustment did the trick. I brightened the largest crystal just slightly to make sure it grabbed your attention. I also removed two small corners of crystals that punched their way into the image at the bottom. They were distracting, and I didn’t mind seeing them go.
By Jay, on January 30th, 2012
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By Jay Patel, on January 27th, 2012
Yellowstone Falls from Artist Point is a sight to behold, but at this particular moment the view was extraordinary. The sun broke through heavy clouds, bathing the falls with light, and leaving the rest of the valley cloaked in soft shadow.
This was a waiting game…I watched the clouds for over 3 hours on this cold and rainy day before the spotlight illuminated Yellowstone Falls. I chose to under expose the image to ensure that the bright highlights in the water were not blown out. Even with under exposure, the falls were so bright that I had to process a single RAW image twice, and than combine them using our iHDR workflow.
By the time I was ready to put away my camera, my gloves were wet and my fingers were cold and numb. But it was worth the result… I wouldn’t hesitate to do it again.
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