Shooting on Location

What Shooting in Patagonia Teaches You About Landscape Photography Anywhere
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What Shooting in Patagonia Teaches You About Landscape Photography Anywhere

There’s a particular kind of frustration that comes from arriving at a beautiful location and walking away with nothing usable. You saw the light. You were standing right there. But something about the image just didn’t land. I’ve had that happen more times than I’d like to admit, usually because I skipped the slower, more deliberate steps that separate a good frame from a forgettable one. What helped me rethink some of those habits was watching a Patagonia field shoot by landscape photographer Thomas Heaton.

How to Read a Seascape Scene Before You Shoot: Lessons from Bombo Quarry
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How to Read a Seascape Scene Before You Shoot: Lessons from Bombo Quarry

There’s a particular kind of paralysis that hits me at dramatic coastal locations. Too many foreground options, water that won’t stay still, light that’s changing every thirty seconds. I either freeze up and shoot the “obvious” frame everyone else shoots, or I move too fast and miss the moment entirely. What I’ve needed, for a long time, is a reliable process for reading a scene before committing to a shot.

What Visiting a Canon Showroom Taught Me About Shooting With Intention
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What Visiting a Canon Showroom Taught Me About Shooting With Intention

There’s a version of me from a few years ago who would have shown up to a once-in-a-lifetime shooting location with a dead battery and no backup plan. Actually, that’s not past tense. I did that exact thing on a trip to Iceland, standing in front of Skógafoss with a camera that had exactly four frames left before it gave up on me entirely. The location doesn’t matter if you’re not ready to shoot it.