Outdoor Photography How To

Early last year I started planning a month-long trip to Botswana and South Africa, part of which would be spent leading a photo safari. From the start I knew that my photography would include much more than wildlife. It’s my business, and my pleasure, to explore and experience beyond the obvious subjects suggested by a location. As a practical matter, I have to photograph much more of what a destination offers and deserves; as a personal matter, it’s often what’s best about my job.

One of the first techniques I learned in photography was to use long exposures at night to blur traffic lights. I liked it decades ago, and I still enjoy seeing artful streaks of light superimposed over an urban environment. You never know exactly what the resulting images will look like, and that’s part of the fun. When the background happens to striking, like the Walt Disney Theater in Los Angeles, California (#1), the combination of abstract lights and architecture makes a winning photograph.

There’s no better source for photography advice than an experienced National Geographic photographer, and in the eye-opening video below Jim Richardson shares his five favorite tips for travel and destination photography.

The September 25, 2016, issue of The New York Times Magazine was titled "The Voyages" Issue, and it featured an impressive collection of images. In the introduction to the issue, the writer Gideon Lewis-Kraus talks about the idea of the image as document or experience: this is what a place looks like as opposed to this is what it feels like to be there. He notes the cliché of “the traveler so busy with documentation that he misses out on some phantom called the ‘experience itself.’”

Nighttime is often the right time for making dramatic images, especially if you know how to utilize long exposures to your advantage. And if you need some inspiration to give this technique a try, feast your eyes on these gorgeous shots from a British travel photographer.

One of the many joys of photography is travelling to unfamiliar locations and capturing images of unique scenes you can’t find at home. But what if you arrive at a location amidst poor weather conditions, or at the wrong time of day with nothing but “bad light”?