Photography Workshop | Jason Savage Photography

Fall Photography Montana

November 7, 2019 by Jason Savage 2 Comments

I’ve finally wrapped up a few of my fall trips here in Big Sky Country for September and October. Talk about a weird fall! Our September had some beautiful weather and fall colors were slowly coming in until we had a crazy arctic blast from the north putting things in a deep freeze throughout October. Unfortunately this took a lot of the fall color with it. We had a record breaking snowstorm the week after my September Glacier National Park trip that dropped up to four feet of snow in some areas of the state. Crazy!

So it’s been an interesting fall here in Montana to say the least. Despite the lack of color, we still managed to get some great stuff. One tree that was immune to the early freeze was the Larch and these were going full force during my Seeley-Swan Valley trip. Really breathtaking up there this year and even more so with some fresh snow.

All in all it’s been a great fall, now shifting gears and looking forward to some upcoming winter trips! Here’s a few from the last couple months in Montana.

Fall Montana — Salmon Lake, Montana. Sony a7rIV 24-70mm 2.8GM f11 1/5 ISO100

Glacier National Park, MT. Sony a7rIII 16-35mm 2.8GM f16 1″ ISO100

Stevensville Montana — Bitterroot Valley, MT. Sony a7rIV 100-400mm 4.5-5.6GM f11 1/20 ISO100

Bitterroot Valley Montana — Daly Mansion, MT. Sony a7rIV 100-400mm 4.5-5.6GM f8 1/160 ISO1600

2019 Montana Weekend Workshops

October 23, 2018 by Jason Savage Leave a Comment

2019 Montana Fall Weekend Workshops are now listed!

We had probably one of the best fall seasons I’ve seen in all the years I’ve been photographing Montana. Colors were really popping in the western part of the state and we had some great opportunities on our trips.

Both of my Fall Weekend Workshops are located in western Montana, so if you want to visit Montana and don’t have the extra time to commit to a longer workshop, these trips are a great way to get a taste of the Montana landscape in fall.

Here are a few images from this year’s trips.

Montana Fall Colors — Daly Mansion, Hamilton. Sony a7rIII 100-400mm f11 1/6 ISO100

Bitterroot Valley — Bitterroot Aspens, Montana. Sony a7rIII 24-70mm f2.8 GM, f16 1/6 ISO100

Seeley Lake, Montana. Sony a7rIII 24-70mm 2.8GM, f8 1/400 ISO800

Larch Reflections — Salmon Lake, Montana. Sony a7rIII 24-70mm 2.8 GM, f11 1/6 ISO 100

Kayaking Montana — Kayaking Seeley Lake, Montana. Sony a9 100-400mm, f11 1/250 ISO3200

Fall Kayaking — Seeley Lake, Montana. Sony a9 100-400mm, f8 1/1000 ISO1600

Rocky Mountain Front Montana

June 28, 2017 by Jason Savage 1 Comment

Spring in Montana — Sawtooth Ridge and Arrowleaf Balsamroot. Canon 5Dsr 16-35mm f4L IS f16 1/6 ISO400

As I’m catching up on some much overdue editing here, I thought I would share a few images from this year’s Rocky Mountain Front Photography Workshop in Montana. We timed it just right this year with spectacular wildflowers and perfect weather. Spring in Montana is pretty hard to beat, especially in the foothills of the Rocky Mountain Front, enjoy!

Montana Sunset — Rocky Mountain Sunset. Canon 5Dsr 100-400mm f4.5-5.6L IS II f8 1/500 ISO800

Arrowleaf Balsamroot Montana — Montana Wildflowers. Canon 5Dsr 16-35mm f4L II f16 0.5″ ISO100

Fence Art — Montana Love. Canon 5Dsr 24-105mm f4L IS II f5.6 1/30 ISO1600

Columbia River Gorge Workshop

November 2, 2014 by Jason Savage Leave a Comment

Oregon Photography Workshop — Portland Japanese Garden

Just returned from a great trip out to the west coast doing some more scouting for an upcoming workshop in the Columbia River Gorge I will be doing this next spring. A wet day in Portland made for some great photography at the Portland Japanese Gardens working with some beautiful fall colors and Japanese maple trees. The Garden offers a special annual photographer’s membership that is definitely worth getting if you are going to be visiting on multiple occasions and want to take advantage of photographers only hours each morning. There are many other benefits that come with it as well. www.japanesegarden.com

Afterwards, I made my way to the Gorge for some waterfall photography and exploring the surrounding areas. I bundled up my cameras and gear in their rain jackets and photographed some great end of fall locations and classic gorge scenes.

Columbia River Gorge Workshop — Latourell Falls, Columbia River Gorge

The Columbia River Gorge is not only spectacular in itself, but offers a ton of locations not too far away giving the area a lot of options to explore for photographers, including the pacific albus tree farms located east of the gorge.

I’m so looking forward to my west coast workshops this next year including both the Columbia River Gorge in April and Olympic National Park in May, for more info and to reserve your spot, please visit the workshops page.

More Photos Rocky Mountain Front Workshop

June 19, 2013 by Jason Savage 1 Comment

RMF Workshop Gallery – Images by Jason Savage
Here’s some more images from our June Rocky Mountain Front Workshop

Fall Photography Workshop

October 30, 2011 by Jason Savage Leave a Comment

Rainy Lake, Montana
Rainy Lake.Canon 5dmkII, 100-400mm. F8.0 1/20 ISO100

Here are a few shots from the Seeley-Swan Valley workshop in Montana last week. We had a ton of rain, matter of fact it really didn’t let up much the whole weekend, but we still managed to find some great stuff and the valley was at it’s peak for fall colors. The Larch trees this time of year are spectacular and line the whole valley. We’ve had such a late fall this year that it’s been a great season for photography.

Beaver Creek, Montana
Beaver Creek. Canon 5dmkII, 100-400mm. f13 2sec ISO100

One thing I was reminded of this last week and it’s certainly something I’m reminded of over and over, is that heading out into some of the worst weather can lead to some great, and sometimes amazing images. Usually when it’s dumping rain or when a blizzard is raging the tendency is to hang up the camera and wait for a better day. But those bad weather days I find lend themselves to usually more interesting or unusual images when you can be patient. Patient being the key as inclement weather and changing conditions sometimes take a while to give you those right moments where a bit of light might be peaking through the clouds or a rainbow may develop for a few short moments. Those are some of the little surprises we were grateful to have this weekend and we ended up walking away with some beautiful fall images despite the conditions.

So next time the wind is howling or it’s dumping buckets try heading out and seeing what you can find, you might be surprised.Thanks to everyone for making it such a great workshop this year!

Salmon Lake, Montana
Salmon Lake. Canon 5dmkII, 16-35mm2.8mkII. f11 1/20 ISO100

Horses, Montana
Horses.Canon 5dmkII, 100-400mm. f6.7 1/500 ISO1600

Jason Savage Montana Photo Workshop

Glacier National Park & New Website

September 23, 2011 by Jason Savage 1 Comment

So I was intending to fix a few things with my wordpress blog and somehow ended up designing and redoing my entire website. Funny how that happens! I had been intending to update my galleries and site to make them more iPad and iPhone friendly, just not during one of my busiest months of the year. I have been in-between doing a couple different photography workshops in Glacier as well as starting up my teaching at the University for the fall semester, so it’s been a tad chaotic with little time to complete everything. So bear with me as I should have things finished on the site by next week with some more photography galleries and an updated version of the 2011-2012 photography workshops.

On a side note, Glacier National Park has been looking very nice for the early fall, although it seems like it might be a little behind with fall colors, but after this week things should be turning quite a bit. The weather has been fantastic as is the usual in September and we have captured some great shots on the workshops. I will try to post some more images this weekend, but for now here’s a couple from earlier this week.

Glacier Photo Workshop — Lake McDonald Lodge. Canon 5dmkII 200mm 2.8LII ISO100 f11 0.3sec

2010 Montana Fall Photography

October 11, 2010 by Jason Savage Leave a Comment

It’s good to be sitting down at the computer and spending a few moments reflecting on the Fall we’ve been having. The last few months have been a wee bit chaotic with trying to sell our house, being on the road, raising our little ones, and everything else in between. But, I’ve never had it so good, so I suppose I should be grateful and stop my whining!

This Fall has been good, but kind of strange. It’s been in the seventies and eighties for most of September through October, and blue skies most days. It’s definitely not typical and very warm for this time of year. However the colors still look great and they are going strong all over the state. With the warm weather it has made for some challenging photography ,and there have been a couple days I came home empty handed without even taking my camera out of my bag.

When it’s warm, dry, and clear blue skies, the leaves are just dry and crunchy looking and there’s none of that beautiful contrast and saturation we get with a day of moisture. Right now we have a small low pressure system moving through the state and has greatly helped things out.

If you are wanting to go out and photograph some fall colors, this week’s the time to do it, as in the next couple weeks a lot of trees will have dumped their leaves.

I will be traveling up north to Seeley Lake for a Fall Photography Workshop Oct. 22-24 to explore some of the amazing Larch around the Seeley-Swan Valley just as the trees are starting to peak. There is still room left on the workshop if anyone is interested. It runs from Friday evening through Sunday afternoon. You can check my site for more info www.jasonsavagephotography.com

Should have some great images to post soon after.

Good luck to all those who venture out in the next couple weeks!

Rocky Mountain Front Workshop

June 16, 2009 by Jason Savage Leave a Comment

Was out this last weekend conducting a photography workshop up on the Rocky Mountain Front. Summer is definitely here and the scenery up there is awesome. Arrow-Leaved Balsamroots are out in full force and the landscape is plenty green. The creeks are running good but not too high and both the waterfalls we made it to, Cataract Falls and Double Falls were looking good.

During our workshop we were discussing how this paticular area of Montana sees little in the way of visitation compared to other parts of the state such as the National Parks and other popular destinations, yet it contains some of the richest wildlife and landscape around.

If you haven’t been up and around the Rocky Mountain Front, it’s definitely worth putting on your list for upcoming places to see.

Historic Helena Photography Workshop

June 1, 2009 by Jason Savage Leave a Comment

Downtown Helena was buzzing this weekend with it’s first annual History Fair which featured historic re-enactments,period actors and live demonstrations from Dutch Oven Cooking to Native American Drummers.

Coincidentally this year’s festival happened to fall on the same day as the Historic Helena Photography Workshop I was teaching, so we decided to include it in our schedule. Not a bad time, and I suspect it was a hit as downtown was packed.

Here’s a few pics from the workshop.