Well, maybe not quite a trucker, but that’s how I feel right now. I’ve responded to several e-mails this morning relating how being a freelance photographer is sometimes similar to driving an 18-wheeler down the highway. In some ways, I’ve always envied long-haul truckers because of the immense amount of country they get to see. In the past seven days, I have been from Lubbock, Texas, to South Padre Island, Texas, and back, and as soon as I got back, I shoved out on the trip mapped out below. I still have a couple days left on this 1,000+ mile trip, but fortunately, I get to travel through and shoot in some of my favorite spots in the state.

This is the third trip like this I’ve taken across the state this summer, and I know it gets old to hear it, but Texas is big, and I haven’t covered half of it. I keep a large paper map of the state in my office, and I highlight all the roads I’ve traveled in the past three years. I’m starting to make some laps around the state, but there’s still more to go!

Road weary as anyone might get doing this, you’re always bound to find several images of interest in between stops, such as this group of prickly pear cacti up against the Texas t-posts between Seymour and Olney. Or the simple, dominating sky structures over late summer baled hay fields near Goldthwaite, seen below. One good thing about being on the road (and blogging about it at least), is that I don’t feel bad when I look at another traveler working on spreadsheets for another company and I’m editing photographs and talking to you!

Building in the time for travel and planning somewhat in advance (although this trip came together about three days before I lit out) allows you to take a little more time for photography such as this. I’m not shooting anything remotely related to natural history on this trip officially, but between locations, I’ve found some nice shots to at least share in this post, and I’ve been able to test out a couple of lenses I requested to review.

Traveling by vehicle is a good way to experience some of the smaller aspects of any land. You get a sense of how folks around those areas live, especially in rural areas. The next time you’re out on the road, it might be to your benefit to take the LONG way, just to see something different. I know several photographers that do this, and yet, I know several more that will try to get to their destination via the fastest route, bypassing a great deal of interesting imagery. Of course, depending on what type of photographer the individual is might attenuate traveling like this, but every now and then, it might be worth it…

A tip for the traveler? You’re always going to pass by images that you see are worth stopping for. You’ll get down the road a ways and start thinking to yourself, “Why didn’t I just stop?” Well, why didn’t you? This always happens, but as long as it doesn’t happen to you every time you see something, you’re sure to walk in to your motel/hotel room or campsite that night with an image or two.

That, and don’t worry about the bugs on your windows and mirrors. They’re victims of the road as well…

Rolando Gomez from Lens Diaries wrote at the beginning of this month about the significance Rembrandt lighting for portraits, from the classics all the way up to today’s digitally rendered photographs. His post reminded me of my recent trip to the Denver Art Museum and its collection of impressionist art from the likes of Picasso and Monet (I didn’t see any van Gogh in the museum). I would like to echo Mr. Gomez in saying that paying close attention to how other art forms, classic forms of visual creation in particular, can lead to a very acute eye for form, light, and character in the photographic world.

Take for example the two images provided in this post. West Texas skies are often compared to paintings from a day gone by, and while I have talked to artists that are inspired by the skies, others can relate the skies themselves to other works. The two images included here reminded me of those impressionist-era paintings I saw in Denver. The camera cannot physically provide the rise and pits of the brush strokes you see in this type of painting, however, the colors and the texture provided by depth and contrast are likened to the tangibility offered through the earlier artists’ creations.

Then again, the camera was never designed (at least at conception) to produce the type of three-dimensional feel that Monet did with his harsh strokes and extremely visible globs of paint on the canvases. What the camera does do, however, is allow us to capture those environments and experiences that often remind us of such artistic feel. The broad-brush clouds and the faint grasslands and the pastel-like colors both images reckon toward a 19th-century oil painting in said style. You can even imagine the distant town in the first image as small dots of white raised from the visual plane.

Recognizing and embracing historical art and art styles raises your awareness of similar occurrences in your own work. While a camera can’t quite offer what early impressionists did in the way of actual, physical touch, there are certain things that impressionism did not do in an equally artistically limiting way that our modern-day digital cameras bring to the table. However, there is a visual foundation that transcends all forms of art, and this foundation, whatever it is, is left up to the creator to find and draw from.

It’s getting to be that doldrum part of the summer, when in West Texas, the photography seems to be getting more sparse in terms of vegetation, and the days drag on. It’s like an old Ford/Wayne western placed in a dried up town with nothing but a jailhouse and the quintessential hotel. Alright, alright, so it’s not that extreme. It’s actually been a nice summer so far, but you can tell the heat is coming on and the photographic days are just creeping along.

The shot above is from a few years back, during the Spring actually. The Chorro Vista campsite in the Big Bend Ranch State Park is found on one of the longest stretches of unmaintained high-clearance road in to the Fresno Canyon area, just south of the Arroyo de los Mexicanos. At the time this photograph was taken, it was one of the newest roads in the park, and in Big Bend, when they say unmaintained and high-clearance, they mean bring two spares and plenty of what they refer to as “desert pin-striping.” The ocatilla and desert yucca are abundant, and the campsite offers some of the best vistas in the park looking toward the Chisos mountain range. Just below the campsite is another jewel of a find in Madrid Falls, the second highest waterfall in the state. It’s pouring straight out of the Chihuahuan desert.

I haven’t been back to this site in a couple years, but I feel an itching to get back that way. The Texas Big Bend is a special sight, and it’s worth every drop of gas getting you out there!

Here are a few formats for the calendar you’re welcome to download:

Large: 2400 X 1600

Laptop: 1440 X 960

iPad: 1024 X 768

iPhone 4: 960 X 640

It’s been a busy week, full of shooting, writing, designing, and some great discussions with other photographers, near and afar! I was going through some old images tonight looking for some submit-worthy photographs to go with an assignment, and I came across this image from the Big Bend Ranch State Park near Lajitas, Texas. I drove back in down some fairly fresh cut roads the afternoon before this morning and car-camped until an hour before sunrise.

There is nothing better than waking up before the dawn and hearing nothing, while being able to barely see across this vast expanse of rugged land, decorated with desert vegetation and craggy peaks. Twilight (no, not the movie) is an interesting time to shoot as well, and it’s a good practice to do so if you are interested in understanding the dynamic range capabilities of your camera (sorry, enough of the nerd talk, let’s just soak it in). You sense the stillness at this time of day, regardless of where you are. I continually tell my students that it’s worth waking up at least one morning out of the year before the sunrises. Your life will be better. Wake up more often, go take a few images, and you might just have struck the fountain of youth!

If you happen to be camped out on a mountaintop straddling the Texas-Mexico border, even better!

OK, so at the risk of wearing you thin on the subject in the photographs, I’m going to chronologically detail an evening shoot that serves as the epitome of unique natural light conditions where I live (yes, I wrote the EPITOME, I think it’s the Johnny Winter I’m listening to right now that’s riled me up on my description). In a previous post, I wrote that a few weeks ago I finished a huge trip off with an evening run into the farmland of West Texas. I have never seen the light and atmospheric conditions come together for what I saw later that night in a wheat field 20 miles north of Lubbock (which is for those of you not familiar, one of the most agriculturally intensive areas in the world…and the flattest).

What I want to do is display the chosen images in the temporal order they were taken in, just so you can wrap your mind around what I saw as time progressed. At the same time, I want to note a few tips along the way in explaining how these shots (or rather the light) developed:

Tip #1: Some Light Takes Time. Think about the first image in this post. I went out chasing a thunderstorm that night, and what usually happens when you’re in the middle of a storm (I mean, right in the middle)? You see a drastic drop in light intensity. That doesn’t necessarily mean the light is gone, or what the light creates. It just means you don’t necessarily have the type of light that creates dramatic shadows that a ton of landscape photographers talk about (we’re getting there). Sometimes, looking harder and envisioning what the conditions present you lobs a nice image in your archive. In this case, the clouds were bulging downward, and when the sky was given enough time to expose, I noticed the bluish veins of light running around in the sky. There’s your light in this type of situation. A subtle offering, but nonetheless there. When the sun is still above the clouds, the light it throws can oftentimes offer you a ton of color!

Tip #2: Wait the Light Out. After I was done with the first shot, I actually just jumped back in the FJammer (that’s what my wife calls my wheels), and drove a half mile up the road. It started to rain and lightning, and we all know how well the latter mixes with flatland and tripods. I was actually ready to pack it in, convinced that the rain was going to set in for a while. I decided to hang out a little while though, noticing a break between the western clouds and the horizon. If West Texas gives you anything, it’s darn good visibility for such things! After about 20 minutes, the rain was starting to let up, and the horizon looked to stay clear of clouds, with the edge of the storm seemingly just 100 yards off the ground. Waiting to see if the sun peeked below the clouds happened to be the best thing I could have done that evening. As it was drifting down, the light started changing dramatically. I drove back down to the field across the road from the original, grabbed two cameras (one with a 17-35mm f/2.8 L, the other with a 24-105mm f/4L), and got in a location before the light hit. The shot above is the start of the transition. What came next BLEW my mind, and I hope it does yours!

Tip #3: When the Light is Right, Shoot, Shoot, Shoot! The sun made its debut. Enough said. As photographers, “professional” or “amateur,” we’re programmed to recognize good light! I can’t tell you how many times I’ve annoyed people in the car during the morning or evening saying, “That’s nice…look at that light!” This evening didn’t even compare, it was phenomenal! The late evening light combined with the massiveness of the thunderstorm and the golden wheat stopped me in my tracks at first. I was suddenly standing in a field on fire with tangible photons! What do you do when you’re given this gift? SHOOT! I tend to be long-winded, but that’s all I need to write for this tip. You know what to do!

Tip #4: Don’t Forget About Technique and Aesthetics. We’ve all been there, and I see many-a-photography student be overcome by such awe at the light that they forget to move. Now, I know what you’re thinking: “This guy is just showing us shots of wheat, he didn’t move much! Practice what you preach brother!” See the next tip for the answer to this statement. In all seriousness though, don’t get bogged down on just one type of shot. Remember to shift up and down, shoot vertically if it works in the situation, get in close, use shadows to your advantage, pay attention to the sky, the contrast, your EXPOSURE, your DEPTH OF FIELD, and you SHUTTER SPEED (ah, we’ll throw ISO in there too). In a situation like this, make sure everything comes together! Remember how all these things can come together to visually create a story of that moment. Tell it as diversely as you can!

Tip #5: Know How Much Time You Have. When the sun dipped below this huge thunderstorm, I had about 15 minutes worth of great light. This is how much time you have when the sun reaches this point every day, but every day doesn’t look like this! In 15 minutes, I ran from one wheat field to the next (across the road), trying to do as much as I could with the subject I was given during that time period. There was no time to jump in the car and find another spot. This was it, and if you’re aware of the time, then you can get a lot done. My rule of thumb is that if I can hold my hand out horizontally to the horizon, and the sun is above my hand, I have roughly 45 minutes of shooting before sunset. This is kind of hokey, but I also check the weather online to see when the sun actually sets as well. Give yourself the most time possible to shoot.

Tip #6: Reflect a Moment…Then Capture It. Take a little bit of the time you’re given in Tip #5, and squeeze just a bit of appreciation for what’s unfolding before you in there. It doesn’t take much, but it helps. The shot above Tip #5 isn’t necessarily the best shot from the night (who’s kidding, it has a freakin’ shadow in it, mine). However, this was my moment of recognition for what was going on. Besides showing how close the sun was to the horizon (look at the shadow length), it also proved that I was standing in the middle of this. I can’t tell you how excited and and a little spooked at the light and atmospheric conditions I was standing in. To the East, a black wall of thunderstorm, to the North, the same plus nearby lightning, and to the West, a reminder that it will all pass over. If you’re just there to push a button to say you collected the shot and move on, then you’re not doing yourself any good as a photographer. We talk a lot about vision, especially among the photographers I keep up with, and appreciation for what one’s photographing/capturing is one of the keys to embracing your vision. All you need is a moment, then you can get back to the dirty work!

Tip #7: Repeat Tip #4. Once you recollect yourself, take on what you’ve been given. Expose correctly.

Move around. Find something a little different (looking North by the way).

Experiment. How else could I show what was going on with this wheat and still express what conditions it existed? Slow the shutter down, throw some motion in there, look at the movement in the patterns!

Tip #8: Notice the Changes in the Light. Stay keenly aware of how the light changes, and how it in turn changes everything else. Light creates color, and in 15 minutes, the colors in such a scene can change dramatically! Train your eyes to notice subtlety in light shifts, and visualize how those occurrences can help your recreation of the environment. You don’t have much time, but an active eye notices these changes, and adjusts to their happening.

Tip #9: See It All Through. No doubt you saw the pieces of rainbow in the other shots, and you may have seen the above shot in an earlier post. Why no earlier shot of the rainbow? Two reasons: 1. I couldn’t get wide enough where I was to avoid power lines and road. The wheat took precedence at the time. 2. It just wasn’t that intense. Rainbow shots are relatively common (I don’t mean to offend). This one pales even in the face of my friend Wyman Meinzer’s famous shot of the lighting bolt in the middle of the rainbow (he can summon weather, though).

Back to my point. Notice those things going on around you that may produce. You might be focused on shooting the wheat that’s in front of you (metaphorically speaking), but in the back of your mind, you have intentions of shooting that rainbow. So, you keep an eye on it, think about a location that’s a quarter mile up the road that gives you clearance of any uninvited extraneous subject matter, and once the sun sets, and you lose light on the wheat, you make your move. Hopefully the sun does exactly what it should do if there is a clear break under the clouds: light the sky up! You stay at this until it’s all gone. Seriously. Note the changes in light, adjust with them, and see it through to the end.

Alright, if you made it this far, congratulations! You have spent more time reading a blog post than most people do. And not once did you read about camera settings or gear brands (alright, maybe a note of gear used, but just a note). The point of the post, in keeping with the Field Lighting Series mission, is to give you insight on how to SEE light and the changes it produces, as well as the time it takes (or doesn’t take) for those changes to ensue. This is not rocket science, but there is a bit of science to how light naturally works, and knowing how it happens, and what to do when it explodes in your face, naturally or artificially, allows you a more enjoyable, prosperous photographic experience.

If you have any moments like that described in how these images were captured, please link them in the comments below. I would love to see your instances of light awe!

Happy Independence Day for all of those living within the United States, and happy any other day elsewise! Like many other photographers this month, I’m releasing a few holiday-inspired desktop calendars. Both come in large and small, which you can find below:

Have a great one, and be safe! Download the files at will, and share if you like! I’m headed out on the road for a week, so hopefully I’ll make it at least once to the site. Until then…

Top image: 1440 X 960, 1920 X 1280

Bottom image: 1440 X 960, 1920 X 1280

Photographers that spend a good amount of their time on the road will see the significance in this post, particularly those photographers who see themselves periodically popping in the travel photography sector of the industry. When I travel to a shoot, I tend to stake out the towns/areas/ecosystems I’ll be driving through for potential photo opportunities. It’s kind of like routing a band on tour, so they can make the most out of every potential stop. I mentioned in my last post about my recent long trek from West Texas to all over the Hill Country (Austin-area for you out-of-staters), and in that 1,000+ mile road trip, I HAD to make three stops for shoots, none of which actually included people, just locales. But HAVING to make those stops meant I was going to be traveling through some pretty cool country, right? Right!

I’m not going to share my entire road trip in this one post (because in my eyes, it was a really productive excursion across the “friendly state”), but I am going to share a travel tip that may interest some of you in your own travels. When I travel to a shoot that I know I don’t have to necessarily photograph any person(s), I opt not for a hotel room, but a campground. Alright, some of you just went, “Nope. Not doing that.” That’s fine, but as a traveling photographer, let me anecdotally take you through this.

My first stop was Waco, Texas, and I was going to be getting there late. I was determined, however, to camp out. Why?

1. I’m a travel photographer when I’m on the road, but I’m not necessarily one that wants to shoot the inside of a hotel room. I’d rather find a camp next to a river, knowing there is potential in the images that I might get of said location for others to use (i.e. magazines, adverts, prints, etc.).

2. It’s more affordable. Camp sites can run anywhere from $10.00 to $25.00, but if you don’t mind setting a tent up, or blowing a mattress up to go in the back of your vehicle, it beats paying at least $50.00+ for a motel/hotel room. Sure, some outfits will reimburse you, but this may take weeks, if not months. When you have a business to take care of, why not be frugal and make it count!

3. Camping is cool, and all the cool kids are doing it! Seriously, have you ever camped on the side of a calm river? It’s nice…humid, but nice.

I can think of a lot more reasons, but back to my story. I called ahead the afternoon I left, and the campgrounds I stayed at on the Brazos River (yes, the very one that John Graves wrote this iconic text about) had an open spot. Be sure to call ahead, and check. I usually like to stay at a state park, but many RV parks offer camping as well. Luckily, as I mentioned, this one happened to be on the river. AND, when I got there, at 10:30 p.m., the owner himself took me to a spot right next to the river. Nobody else around, just peace, quiet, the river, and a pair of raccoons that decided to argue a bit before I went to sleep. I set my tent up, and then I headed over to the water with camera, tripod, flashlight, and shutter release, and grabbed a few shots.

I knew I was going to get there late, and I knew I was going to have to leave before the sun rose the next morning, but that shouldn’t stop anyone from taking photographs at night on the river. Often times, this is when it becomes the most interesting. I came away with a few shots I was happy with that night, and early that morning, and then I was gone, all within a period of about six hours.

Night:

Morning:

I understand this isn’t the most ideal way for many photographers to travel, and then again, it’s a great way for those with inclinations of nature/outdoors travel photographic focus. I simply enjoy being out next to something more natural than the sounds of cars driving down the highway every now and then. So, think about your next road trip/photo expose across uncharted territory, and at the same time, think about publications that may be looking for imagery from those areas you will travel through. Find a state park or camp ground close to your destination, and enjoy the day/night and take a few meaningful shots along the way.

By the way, plenty of campgrounds and state parks have shower facilities…

I can’t emphasize enough paying attention to light! It is, after all, what we photographers work with. I drove in from a 1,000+ mile trip full of photoshoots this past weekend, and ended up coming home to a massive thunderstorm. So, I stopped off at the house to drop a few things off, and then hit the road again. I’ll post some more images later centered around another natural light Field Lighting post, but I thought I would share a takeaway from yesterday evening. Believe me when I say it, but I have never seen light like this since I’ve been shooting, and this is the unique type of light in Texas you hear people like Wyman Meinzer and Earl Nottingham talk about sparingly. To say the least, it was bizarre!

Time is of the essence this week, but I will have a few more to look at along the way! Take care!

Here’s one for the folks that appreciate a small dose of plant photography! Photographers often make little to do about photographing the smaller aspects in light of discussing the larger landscapes, and most of the time (online) you usually see, “photograph flowers in the shade or after a rainstorm,” like I did with my last post. To justify: overcast, diffused light is fantastic for plant photography, and you can’t do without it if you are going to spend any extended amount of time doing this kind of work. However, we can’t overlook the stronger light in this area as well, especially backlight!

If we think backlight is great on human subjects (just go check out any glamour photograph shot back in the nineties), why would we not think it looks awesome on anything else! Keeping an eye out for naturally occurring backlight is a must when shooting landscapes and natural history images! Backlighting provides a certain type of tangibility that is hard to get otherwise, and it offers the smaller elements of a story a unique look and context. Remember, the little things count! Some plants are fairly translucent and offer a great, glowing field of green veins to put a macro lens up next to, while other have a layer of stringy fuzz (no, I’m not a horticulturalist, I do not know what they are called) that blaze when the light hits them just right!

So what do you do to get this type of light? Simple: wake up early! Alright, or inversely, seek that naturally warm light in the evening. Because of atmospheric debris and distance of the Earth to the sun, and because photographers pray every night for great light, early morning and late evening light is just that: awesome light! There’s no exception to backlighting, plants or mammals. You could even create your own backlight, much like I’ve talked about in my posts on high-speed sync flash flower photography.

You’re probably not that far from photographing backlight either! All of the shots in this post (excluding the video) were made within 300 feet from my home. The shot at the beginning of the post (a translucent canon) was taken right off my porch, and the thistles above were just down the fence line in another pasture. Look outside your window, and you probably have something there that glows during the golden hours!

Field Lighting Tip: Backlight. www.jerodfoster.com from Jerod Foster on Vimeo.

Just to drive this concept home, I put together a few clips that emphasize the significance backlighting plays in this type of photography, especially compared to side and front lighting.

I know you’re thinking, “Where’s the people shots?” I like to spread the Field Lighting series over a few areas, but we’ll get back to them soon enough! I’ve been on quite a few shoots lately, and when I get some images ready (and when I’m allowed), I’ll have some people to introduce to you and some stories to tell!

Enjoy!

I thought I would share this colorful thistle while I work on a new Field Lighting post. Thistles are a mix of beauty and danger combined in the same plant, and when they are in full bloom, they take center stage with their vibrancy. If you can find a calm, overcast morning to throw on a macro lens or extension tubes, it’s worth taking advantage of them. If there’s even the slightest breeze, shooting becomes frustrating, especially if you are creating images of a thistle that stands two to three feet tall!

Enjoy!