On the Road

Here are some of the questions I asked myself on the way to taking some of the photos you see accompanying this column:
• How am I going to find a father and son trekking through snow?
• How long is this fog going to last?
• Police tape? What’s police tape doing here?
• Is this rain ever going to stop?

A recent shoot offered a spectacular setting, cooperative subjects, wonderful lighting, great colors, a number of advantageous positions from which to shoot—and a challenge for a travel photographer used to roaming cities and countryside in search of images.

The photography essayist, critic, and historian A.D. Coleman once said that the biggest mistake photographers make was “thinking that what they’re experiencing is what they’re capturing in the photograph.”

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.

You might say that images from distant, exotic locations are the stock and trade of a professional travel photographer, and certainly in my case you’d be mostly right. Those images pay off commercially and artistically, and when I can make them in places I’ve never before visited, they provide the added satisfaction of exploration and discovery.

If I were taking a photography-based word-association test, and the word coming my way was "tripod," my response would be "absolutely essential."

It’s often a case of hurry up and wait. I’ll hurry to a location—often it’s a beach, while it’s still dark, and with a flashlight to guide me I’ll check out where the rocks and tide are. Then I decide on the location for the camera and select the lens that will best tell the story.