Nature Photography Workshops Tours
Here’s an image from last year’s Rocky Mountain Front workshop near Augusta, Montana. This is one of my absolute favorite places to wander in Montana and come early June things really come alive with blooms of wildflowers dotting the foothills and spring rains bringing much needed moisture to the landscape. If you visit, you will find out why we are working so hard to preserve this amazing wilderness area.
Canon 5D markIII 16-35mm 2.8L II f16 1/6 ISO200
It’s nice to see that spring has finally arrived! As on cue hundreds of yellow-headed blackbirds showed up last night near Helena, putting on an awesome show. It was great to finally see some color out there against our dull, brown, April landscapes we’ve had here in Montana. I’ll be out photographing sandhill cranes over the next couple weeks and hopefully I’ll have some more new Spring arrivals to share with you.
Canon 1DX 500mm f4L IS, 1.4X f6.7 1/1500 ISO6400
Finally home for a weekend here and enjoying every minute of it. Spring has arrived and looking forward to some great bird photography coming up and some new workshops. Happy Easter!
Just returned from an amazing trip up to northern Montana for our first ever Greater Sage-Grouse workshop. Thanks to Dennis Jorgensen at the World Wildlife Fund Northern Great Plains Office and friend and photographer Eric Rock for making this happen. We are looking at putting together another trip for Spring of 2015 and will have details soon.
What an amazing experience to spend each morning immersed in the Sage-Grouse’s habitat photographing an incredible bird in northern Montana’s beautiful, immense prairie. We had great dramatic spring weather and cool mornings adding nice elements to the images we were able to capture each day out on the Lek. We also saw our first long-billed curlew of the year and many other bird species around the area.
I am definitely looking forward to making this an annual workshop here in Montana and it will be a great way to continue to bring awareness and support to the Greater Sage-Grouse.
Canon 1DX 500mmf4L IS, 2X f8 1/15 ISO6400
Be sure to be on the lookout for Tundra Swans! Many are arriving during this year’s spring migration in Montana.
Thousands of Snow Geese take flight this morning at Freezeout Lake near Fairfield, Montana. I really liked the sense of motion in this image. I took hundreds of shots early this morning of the geese rising up from the fields hoping to convey a sense of motion in all the chaos.
When panning with wildlife, birds can sometimes be a little trickier when trying to predict what the correct shutter speed should be to give it that right look and feel. With the birds erratic flight I will usually alternate between two or three different shutter speeds, usually one of them will work. For this image 1/20 of second seemed to be fine, but I still had to shoot multiple frames just to get one that would work. I also had my lens resting on a beanbag to help track and stabilize.
Canon 1DX 500mm f4L IS 2Xtc f38 1/20 ISO100
I thought this was a fitting photo for today showing our transition from winter to spring here in Montana. I took this on one of my last days in Yellowstone earlier this week.
Not only was this my first bluebird spotting of the year, but there were hundreds more in a flock with this little guy. It was cold, windy, and snowing, but absolutely wonderful watching hundreds of bluebirds land all around me on sagebrush and ground. The hardest part was choosing where to point my lens!
Canon 1DX 500mm f4L IS, 1.4X f8 1/500 ISO1600
On my way out of Yellowstone this week, I spotted this perfect winter scene in the Paradise Valley. This may be it for winter landscapes this year as spring is quickly taking over . I think just about everyone in Montana is ready for the change and looking forward to some green!
Canon 1DX and 24-70mm 2.8L II f11 1/500 ISO400, polarizing filter
May 7-11 I will be teaching my Olympic National Park photography workshop based out of Forks, Washington. There’s still some space available, so if you’re thinking rainforests, alpine wildflowers, and ocean sea stacks in spring, be sure to register before March 1 to receive your 10% discount for early registration. Visit my Workshops page for full details and to register.
Here’s another shot from this weekend on the Rocky Mountain Front. This was taken on the Sun River Wildlife Management Area with some stunning fields of Arrow-leaved Balsamroot.