Travel Photography Tips, Tricks and Hacks

Published by Clipping Path India at August 7, 2017

1. Proper Planning

Before getting out for travel photography, you need to do a proper planning. It covers the selection of the places you like to go. If you want to go with a team then you should discuss with the team members, but when you are alone, you have to do the work by yourself. At the time of making plans, select suitable places, time, and atmosphere for photography.

2. Well Preparation

A good preparation is very necessary for travelling. As you are a photographer and during the whole tour you like to take a lot of professional images, your preparation will differ from the average travelers. You have to take a lot of things with you to stay safe and sound during the tour.

3. Research in depth

For travelling to a distant place, a traveler should do a little bit research. He should know about the place or country, the nature of the people, their culture, food habit, and more. He also should know about the beautiful natural places, heritages, distance from town to country areas, and such a many things for forming a clear idea. For this, you can know from the mouth of the experienced visitors or you can also Google. Such type of information is very important that can smooth your whole tour.

4. Enough Funding

Money is called the second God. It is the most necessary thing that can make your travel photography smooth. To go to travel to a distant place, you should have enough money. You have to buy many extra things and tools for making the journey successful. So, think before you step. You have to carry master cards with enough balance.

5. Make a wish list

As a travel photographer, you must have a wish list. You will write down there about what you like to do going out of your room. Without making a list, you may forget many important issues. You may skip many places that could bring your great images. So, make a wish list and avoid such a risk of forgetting important issues.

6. Take a travel guide/book

To get help for moving one place to another place, you can take a travel guide who will take you unknown places where you can get spectacular photos. You can also take a travel book, but human guide is better than that of.

7. Contact for residence

In this case, if you have kin & kith in the place where you travel, no doubt, you are lucky. You can get a homely environment. But, you go to a far distance, then contact to a suitable hotel. It should not be too far from your target photography places, because time is a factor.

8. Be bold & human liker

When you out of your home for photography purposes, you have to be pretty much bold to face any tough situation in some places. You also have to be careful and tricky. You should be kind hearted to the local people to grab necessary cooperation. You should try to understand their behavior, culture, thoughts and ethics, norms, etc. You can communicate with the leader if you are with any ethnic groups.

Travel Photography Packing List

A travel photographer should have many important things with him when he travels. All the things are necessary for staying sound and fit during the tour and also will help him to capture outstanding images.

1. Large & light Bags

A traveler must have a big bag that can hold many useful things together for travelling. It must be light, but strong to carry heavy load. It must have multiple pockets so that you can decorate things respectively. The photographer also can carry a small bag for roaming from the hotel to the places where he would take photographs.

2. Rain coat/umbrella

If you go to any tropical area, you need to carry a rain coat or umbrella. It is an important issue to keep you and your photography gear dry. Because, if you get wet, you may feel sick. And in case of your camera and other gears, water will be harmful.

3. Sleeping bag

To get your desired night photograph, you may need to hold night at any cold places. It may be frozen lake side, forest, beach, polar area, etc. So, you should have a sleeping bag so that you can use for slipping at a cold night. The bag must fit with your size and protect from rain and fog.

4. Plastic fins for swimming

If you wanna get under water photograph and for this if you want to dive under water, you need plastic fins that help the diver to swim. So, you can carry this little thing with you.

5. Rechargeable Light/lamp

Then, you need a lamp for lighting at night if you hold outside for capturing night photography. You can carry a power bank for recharge your lamp or smart phone.

6. Choose the right camera & lens

You can take camera that you have with. You can take two lenses. One is the general prime lens and another is the zoom lens. The lenses of your camera must be of high quality. Now, the question is that how should be the lenses? So, let’s have a look-

The weight of the lens should be light. If you carry a heavy load in your camera bag, it may be tiresome for you. So, the things you are carrying should be as light as possible.
Your lens should be versatile. You have to be a little bit creative to choose the lens. Take such a lens that can be used in versatile works. Before buying any lens, concentrate on the zoom in and out feature, speed, ISO, aperture, etc.
The speed of your lens must be high. The shutter speed also will be of such a level so that you can take images when you are traveling by any transport. The lens should be capable to capture images at any time e.g. Night, sunny day light, evening, etc.
Try to invest more on buying your lens as much as you can. Try to buy APS-c or full frame lens. Remember the most suitable lens, the better image you can capture

7. Tripod

During travelling, you can carry a tripod if your hands are very shaky. Besides, while roaming through the forest, mud, ice, water, etc. carrying a tripod can be very convenient. If you need to wait to capture a photo of any certain thing like birds feeding, snake, sunset, hunting, etc. a suitable long or short tripod can help you much.

8. Match Box/Lighter

It is very urgent to keep a lighter or firebox during travelling to a remote place for the sake of photography. You may have to stay any place where you have to wait for a long time to get stunning photograph e.g. nature photo, then you need this thing. Sometimes, due to severe cold or lack of light, you may need fire and light to stay warm or dry, the little thing can be very beneficial for you.

9. Hotpot/cup/water bottle

You can keep these things with you during going out of the civilized area to take nature image. These will help you much during the whole time to stay fit and sound. Water bottle is a must thing. You have to carry it.

10. Water purifier

It is not compulsory to keep with yourself. You may not need to carry it always unless you are out of civilized area. If you go to the forest or polar area where there is a scarcity of pure water, you can take water purifier chemical or machine in case if you cannot carry enough drinking water.

11. Medicine

In all kinds of travelling, the travelers should carry medicine with themselves. As a photographer, you also need to carry a little fast-aid box. Whenever you will go to an unknown place, many physical problems, you may face. So, to get rid of such type of issues, you have to take primary preparation.

12. Laptop/external hard disk/internet

The travel photographers should use a laptop or external hard disk to save his images. Accidentally, your existing memory card may damage, in such a case, there is a chance to loss all the great photos. So, to avoid such a problem you can keep your daily works in another memory card. You can carry a modem to get an internet connection to communicate with the other people.

13. Smart phone/ headphone

For maintaining communication with the other people, you need a smart phone. To remove boring situation, you can use a headphone to listen song. When you are waiting for capturing any unique photo, you can hear a song and thus pass the time.

14. Dry foods

When you are outside and stay in a remote place and where the necessary food is not available, you can keep dry food with you. Such a food will help you to stay fit and sound. You can keep tea or coffee also

15. Use GPS/ Google earth

For a travel photographer, the use of GPS and Google earth can be very useful. If he goes to any unknown area, then these technologies can direct him right to return to the pavilion. If he wants to go any distant place, he can use GPS for going there without any guide.

16. Shoes, rope, and clips for mounting

If you are a little bit adventurous and like to take the images of mountains, you need to climb. For this, you may need rope, belt, clips, shoes, etc. So, try to keep these things with you so that you can take the beautiful hill track photos.

17. Notebook

Try to keep a notebook always. Write down the thing happen to you every day where you are visiting. Most of the photographers are writers also. So, you can also write your experiences with the places, write photography tips & ticks to direct the new photographers, write adventurous stories, etc. A notebook can help you to remember the days gone past when you are alone.

Know Proper Travel Photography Rules

To get the high end photos during travelling, you should have known proper photography rules. There are lots of photography tips & tricks that can help you to get the professional images. Have a look at the below mentioned tips and tricks-

1. Wake up early

A travel photographer should not waste his time. He should concentrate on his job. So, it is necessary to go to bed as early as possible and to wake up early also. You should go out to at the very morning to take the morning natural images. If you like to get the image of a sunrise, you must wake up before rising the sun, because the soft, warm, and fresh morning light is pretty much better for photography. To capture the image of the foggy morning, you should leave bed early. Besides, the weather of the morning is very fresh. Take a bit exercise that can help you to stay fit and sound.

2. Fill the frame/ cropping

Always try to capture the image with full frame that means don’t let your photo be captured from a far distance. If it needs, zoom the image and then capture. If you feel it needs to crop, do it also. Do all the possible things to make your image clear and high resolution.

3. Don’t cut off limbs/important parts

Often it is heard that the amateur photographer cannot understand the important part of a photograph. They capture images of the less important things. Sometimes, they cannot take the image with full limbs in case of human imagery. They unwillingly cut the important limbs due to their lack of skill. Again, in the case of nature image, they cannot understand the important parts of the image and they cut those parts. As a result, the image loses the value as they should have. So, try to understand the main part of an image and capture the image with it.

4. Understand the rule of third

Rule of third let your eyes move around the frame. For using this rule, imagine four lines across the frame. The two lines will be horizontally and the other two are vertically that in combined makes nine even square grid. According to the rule of third, always try to place the main object at the connection point of the lines from the right-below. As a result, your eyes get a scope to move around the whole frame and it is eye soothing also. Except the portrait images, the great images follow the rule of third.

5. Know Your exact focus

In photography, the focus is related to the sharpness. The image which is completely clear that means it is in-focus and the image which is blurry that means it is out of focus. Sometimes, we see one object is clear in the foreground and the other objects in the background is blurry. That indicates the clear object is in the focus and the background objects are out of focus. It is something like our mind. What we think in a moment that is in focus and in that time what we left that is out of focus. In our confused mind, we cannot keep anything in focus. Our success is mostly depends on our main focus.

6. Watch the background

It means that the background of your image should be proportionate according to the main object. In case of a single portrait photography, the background should be simple and single color is better. But, in the case of nature image or something like this, you have to be careful to select the background. If there is a contrasting live background, then you need to blur the background to focus the main objects. Actually, the selection of background depends on the beauty of the image. If it looks better with the background, ok, you can capture the image and if it looks bad, avoid the backdrop.

7. Subject Selection

In terms of subject selection, it is said take the images what subject you like. Here, give importance in your own liking. What you love, take the image of that. But, yet if you are confused, the research and look at the current trends of photography. You will get the solution.

8. Reduce Camera Shake

Sometimes great images loss the greatness due to the camera shaking. But, you can reduce up to 0% camera shake by yourself. For this, hold your camera with both of your hands. Keep the camera close to your body as much as possible. If your hands are too much shaky, then use a tripod or monopod to keep your camera. If you don’t get those, you can use a tree or wall to stabilize the camera and thus you can get the great images as you desire.

Travel photography is always fun. If you are a little bit tricky, you will be benefitted much. You can get amusement from both sides by travelling and by capturing stunning photographs. Alongside the travelling, you can have the great images that can increase your name & fame.

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