Camera settings hold us back

Perhaps more than any other form of art, photography is treated as a technical pursuit. That’s not to say that other forms of art can’t be highly technical — they are! — but most people can appreciate a painting without asking about the specific brands of paint used, the wrist action used to apply it, and so on.

The same cannot be said for a photograph. There’s often an expectation that photographers publish their settings with their images. If the f-stops and ISOs don’t fit with the presentation, the expectation is that the photographer will supply them if asked. If the photographer won’t indulge, it’s assumed he or she is hiding something.

Nature can be close to home

An incredibly destructive flood — the kind you might see once in 500 years — tore through Yellowstone National Park a few weeks ago, cutting off access to a wildlife hotspot popular with photographers. The park worked quickly to reopen other areas, but it’s not clear how long it will take to repair or replace roads that reach the Lamar Valley.

So what’s a wildlife photographer to do?

The curse of the modern photocopier

Wildlife photographers sometimes look for conflict to add drama to their images, but more and more it seems like they’re getting caught up in conflict themselves. Wildlife hotspots are now becoming flashpoints for heated battles between people out for a few Instagram likes and those who believe the photographers are like paparazzi who are doing the animals harm.

One such hotspot is on San Juan Island in Washington state where a few years ago I photographed a bald eagle flying with a red fox and a rabbit. The park was a well-known fox habitat before I captured those photos, and the number of photographers showing up has only grown since.

In search of the Salt River wild horses

If there is an animal that’s synonymous with the American West, it might very well be the horse. But in our minds, the horse usually isn’t alone. It’s typically paired with a cowboy.

Along the Salt River outside Phoenix, Arizona, if you look hard, you might just spot a horse. It’s likely not alone either. If you look even closer, you’ll likely see many more. The horses here have no owners. They’ve been on their own for hundreds of years, making their own lives along the riverbanks. And somehow they’ve thrived, despite countless attempts to get rid of them.

The art of misery

Would you like this picture more if you knew I was in pain when I made it? That my fingers ached after I removed one of my gloves in the sub-freezing temperatures in order to work faster in the fleeting light? That a half hour earlier I injured my back while trying to speed through waist-deep snow with my heavy camera bag?

It is a somewhat serious question. Anybody can take photos and most people always have a camera with them. The number of pictures taken in any given day is approaching the population of Earth. So, what separates the dedicated artists from anyone with a smartphone? The amount of suffering is becoming that measuring stick.

Happy birthday, Yellowstone

The idea of the national park is 150 years old today. On March 1, 1872, President Ulysses S. Grant signed an act setting aside Yellowstone as a public park. It wasn’t the plan, but it ended up being the first of many. Over the century and a half that followed, the United States added another 62 parks and hundreds more federally-protected scenic areas, monuments, seashores and rivers.

The concept of the national park has been called “America’s best idea,” but as Yellowstone has shown, the idea itself has evolved dramatically over the years.

The coyote and the river otters

Yellowstone National Park is home to nearly 400 species of animals. If you’re a wildlife photographer, the hope is that you will get to capture species interacting with each other.

A bald eagle swooping down to catch a fish is a somewhat common sight. Spend enough time there and you’re also likely to see a fox leap to pounce on a vole. The big hope, of course, is to see one of the park’s famous wolf packs hunt a bison or an elk, but that activity usually occurs miles out of sight.

On my latest trip to Yellowstone, however, I got to see a wildlife encounter that at first glance seemed downright strange: a standoff between a coyote and river otters. And it took place on ice covering the Yellowstone River.