Thank you!
This is a long post please be patient. Thank You to my wife and our family and friends who put up with me constantly stopping on trips to take pictures or being woken up 4am by me leaving so I can make an early sunrise or coming in late from some astrophotography adventure.
As I have developed as a photographer, I have leveraged the knowledge of other photographers. This blog post is my attempt to thank the photographers that have helped me develop my photography. In May 2013 my wife and I attended a photo workshop focused on photographing hummingbirds offered by Gerlach Nature Photography at the Bull River Guest Ranch in British Columbia Canada. My technical understanding of photography took a huge leap forward and I learned so much from John and Barbara and despite my limited experience I came away with some of my favorite images. Robert Knight, Robert where to start you can start at Robert Knight Fine Art Photography. My first exposure to Robert was at his gallery in Carmel California where my wife and I bought one of his fine art images. From there I have attended 2 workshops and will be with him for a trip to Antarctica in January 2019. While I got a tremendous amount of technical learning from my first workshop from Gerlach Nature Photography from Robert it was about the Art of photography for me. A tip that Robert gave the attendees at his California Coast Safari workshop which I attended in 2014 has stuck with me since. “When you get to a new location leave your camera in the bag. First walk the area get connected with it and start looking for compositions. The minute you start looking through the view finder you are limiting what you see and the compositions you can make.” I have used this technique since and it has served me well. If you ever have the chance talk with Robert don’t pass it up. Another tip, Robert puts together some of the best groups if you can take one of his workshops.
As with all things time keeps moving forward and with it where I find inspiration and influence most recently for me that has been Instagram and YouTube. Really all it took was finding Thomas Heaton on Instagram which lead me to his YouTube channel. Thomas is a landscape photographer from the UK. I have watched nearly all his videos and my photography is better for it you can find his channel here. From there it has turned into a photography six degrees experience. From Thomas Heaton I discovered Brendan van Son and Greg Snell when they were all in Patagonia together the videos were excellent. Brendan is a travel photographer and digital nomad from Canada, Greg is also a travel photographer and excellent drone pilot/photographer. Brendan gives you the good and bad of traveling all the time and trying to stay inspired, Brendan is also the king of the long exposure selfie. If you want to know more about him check out his channel here. Whenever I get questions about using a drone as a photography tool I direct them to Greg Snell’s channel which can be found here. YouTube recommends videos for you based on what you have been watching and after one of Thomas Heaton’s video next popped up Jared Polin of “FroKnowsPhoto Dot Com” it was Jared responding to a video by Tony Northup discussing Jpeg vs. RAW. In one try I found two new influences. I like watching Jared’s videos they are fun and informative you can find his channel here, and he has great content on his website. I have purchased his go above and beyond auto videos which I would recommend to anyone. Jared has a tremendous amount of information about photography check him out. Tony Northup gets you to Chelsea Northup and you have a new experience with Tony and Chelsea to get a feel for them check out their live show on YouTube which is every Thursday at 5PM eastern. They are fun to watch, and they are both very good photographers and if you are a little nerdy then Tony’s videos on technical subjects will be right up your alley you can see their channel here. On Tony & Chelsea Live they have guests which has exposed me to many other photographers one of my favorites has been Kaiman Wong (Kai W on Youtube), Kai is just fun to watch he has an amazing energy and approach to his vlog you can see his channel here. This post could go on and on so here is a list of other photographers and links to their channels that I have helped me improve my photography.
Ben Horne – Large Format landscape photographer link here
Nigel Danson – Landscape photographer link here
Adam Karnacz – Adam from First Man Photography and the link is here
Brenda Petrella – Brenda is a landscape photographer from Vermont link here
Morten Hilmer – Morten is a wildlife photographer from Europe link here
And many more
Thank you all for all your great content and the time and energy it takes to keep producing high quality content for the photography community.
I will steal Thomas Heaton’s video sign off just for this post and say “Bye for now” Thank you Thomas.