Posts | Dan Bailey's Adventure Photography Blog

Dan’s 3 Tips to Ensure Great Photographs

_DSC6350 — Alpenglow on the Chugach Mountains, Anchorage, Alaska

The other day, my ultra runner friend Beat, who usually takes a compact camera with him out on races, asked me to give him one tip for getting better photos. “Just one?” I asked?

I had to think for a minute, and not wanting to be pinned down to a single one, I actually came up with three tips that I think are crucial to ensuring great images.

No matter what camera you use, DSLR, micro four thirds, point and shoot or iPhone, and no matter what kinds of subjects you’re shooting- people, landscapes, sports, action, adventure or travel, here are my 3 tips to ensure great photos.

1. Be there.

In order to make great images, you have to put yourself out there into the world, into the places that excite you and ignite your passions. My friend Beat has no trouble with this one, because he’s often out there in the elements for 24-48 hours at a time, sometimes longer. I know it sounds simple, but hey, it’s my number one tip.

2. Have your camera accessible.

My all important tip, right there with number 1. In order to shoot great photos, you NEED to have your camera right there with you at all times, and make it accessible. I usually keep mine in a waist pouch, where I can get it out and up to my eye within seconds. If it’s not there, it’s in the quick access pouch of my Lowepro Photo Sport 200 pack, clipped to my Peak Designs Capture camera clip, or it’s already around my neck, with one arm through the strap if I don’t want it to bounce around. Want to take great photos- then keep your camera handy.

3. Take LOTS of photos.

Pros know this one. In the process of going after that one great image, they shoot tons of frames and weed out the bad ones when they get home. The reason for this is simple. Moments, expressions, light, action, creativity, and body positions are all fleeting. The slightest variation in any of these things can make or break the shot, and if you only shoot a few frames of your subject, you’re very likely to miss that one exceptional, dynamic, fantastic, wonderful moment.

Besides, with digital photography, once you pay for your memory cards, pixels are free, and hard drive space is pretty much the cheapest part of the entire photography equation.

3 1/2. Have a Definable Subject.

You already knew this, but I decided to throw it in anyway. Never hurts to hear it again. Having a definable subject in your photo is what’s going to catch your viewer’s interest. Playing it against some other element in the frame and relating it to that secondary subject is what’s going to keep their attention and draw further interest into your image.

So, there it is, Beat, and the rest of you. Take my three and a half tips and go create some great photographs. Or, throw it all out the window and come up with your own tips. If you think of a good one, post it below.

January 10, 2012

Dan’s 3 Tips to Ensure Great Photographs

Creative Tips, Fast With Light, Featured Images

Going Cold With Light: Using the Photoflex TritonFlash Outside in Winter.

It’s no secret, I occasionally go fast with light. Sometimes I even go cold with light. Lately, I’ve been doing both with the Photoflex TritonFlash. It’s a lithium ion batter powered strobe system that packs a great deal of light into a relatively small and very portable package.

How portable is it? The flash head, removable swivel clamp, battery/power pack, and the included Octodome NXT softbox easily fit inside my Lowepro Photo Sport 200 backpack. That’s in addition to the D700, three lenses and PocketWizards that I also cram in there. Strap a small light stand to the outside of the pack, and I have a complete outdoor studio right on my back.

The main advantage of using a strobe like the TritonFlash are that it recycles WAY faster than a single speedlight, especially in the cold. Batteries lose charge when temperatures drop, and AA batteries inside a flash like the SB-900 will get pretty sluggish when you get below around 20 degrees. Conversely, if you’re shooting a large number of frames in a short amount of time, the TritonFlash won’t overheat like regular shoe-mount flashes are prone to do sometimes.

It was about 6 degrees when I shot this portrait of my photographer friend Jim Kohl, and the lithium battery on the TritonFlash kept up with me way through the shoot. I keep it inside a small insulated pouch to keep it as warm as possible, but even in that kind of cold, it didn’t even slow down.

The lighting quality for the shot came from the Octodome NXT softbox, which comes included with the TritonFlash kit. If you’re a regular reader, than you know that the Octodome NXT is one of my favorite light shaping tools of late, because it’s durable and because for an 18″ softbox, it puts out surprisingly nice light. Also, it packs up pretty small and fits into a most backpacks or camera bags.

The dramatic light color came from underexposing the background by about two stops and bumping up the saturation and vibrancy a bit in Lightroom. There is no filtration, I didn’t use any kind of gels and I didn’t do anything to the white balance. Shot at 4:21 PM here in Anchorage, the overcast light really is that dark and really that blue.

I used manual exposure, 1/50 sec at f/4.5 with a 24mm lens and set the TritonFlash to give me proper exposure on my subject. Please note that you certainly wouldn’t need a big light to make this kind of shot, you could easily create a photo like this using a single flash and just about any small to medium sized light modifier.

The Triton gave me faster recycle times and more shots per charge (it will fire up to 750 shot on a full charge) but ultimately, its still just pushing some light through a softbox. Like any photo, what matters is not so much the gear, but how you use it and how you choose, position, frame and exposure for your subjects.

You can read about more details from this shoot here on the Photoflex LiteBlog. Learn how I dealt with excessive light from the flash bouncing off of snow, and see more photos, including a shot of me on my Alaska snow bike that Jim took after the shoot.

January 9, 2012

Going Cold With Light: Using the Photoflex TritonFlash Outside in Winter.

eBooks, Reviews and Recommendations

Rabari- Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe eBook, by Mitchell Kanashkevich

Often when we see a great image, we want to know how it was made. I mean exactly how it was made. Not just the concepts and ideas, but the specific setups, execution and outtakes that led up that one powerful photograph.

Light Stalking, the brilliant and content rich photography website has recently released a remarkable new eBook called Rabari- Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe that does exactly this. It’s the first volume in their Insider Series to Travel Documentary Photography.

Written by award winning travel photographer Mitchell Kanashkevich, this practical and informative ebook gets you inside the head of an accomplished shooter who’s work has been published on the covers of the world’s leading magazines.

Rabari is based around a series of 10 stunning travel images and portraits, every single one of which has either won awards or been published in magazines, and how their were made. Starting with background information for each shot, Mitchell outlines out his specific objectives and goals for how to best capture each subject, he goes on to explain how light, moment and composition came together for each shot.

He also details the challenges that he faced with each subject, and how he dealt with them. Finally, Mitchell goes through the specific post processing steps that he used to bring the final image.

As a teaching tool, I think that Rabari succeeds on a number of levels. First of all, it’s based entirely around a body of work from a single trip. This alone gives it a really practical feel. It’s not just 10 of his best images chosen from the archive, it’s 10 incredibly striking images from just one location. Understanding this gives you the idea that a strong method can really help increase your success rate with imagery, no matter if you’re shooting around the world or around your neighborhood.

Also, the extensive amount of information and technical details that Mitchell presents in Rabari gives you practical guidance that you can apply to your own imagery. For example, all of the images were shot with natural light and a single collapsable reflector, and his lighting diagrams show you exactly how and where he placed his subjects and the reflector to create the most dramatic light on each person. Mitchell definitely goes Fast With Light. In fact, the entire series was shot with very minimal gear, all of which he lists in the book.

Perhaps the most helpful aspect of this eBook, is that for each photo, Mitchell presents a series of outtakes, i.e., the “bad ones” that led up to the final shot. This shows you that making a great image is a process. Even the best photographers shoot lots of not-so-great photos before clicking that one winner shot. It’s interesting to view this progression and see how he “worked” his scenes on the way towards capturing the defining image for each subject.

For photographers who are interested in travel and/or portrait photography, Rabari- Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe is an excellent workshop in a book. It’s not every day that you get a chance to go behind the scenes with an active working pro photographer, let alone one as accomplished as Mitchel Kanashkevich.

In terms of content, this eBook might seem a little redundant, since the same format is used for each example, but in some ways, that’s what makes it such a successful teaching tool. It trades gloss for rock solid, bare bones information that is easily absorbed and that can be applied to your own style.

Also, since it’s all based around a single theme, it can help show you how to conceptualize, execute and create a strong body of work, whether you’re shooting for your 365 project or creating a professional portfolio.

Rabari- Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe presents a unique take on the process of going from imagined vision to compelling photographs and I applaud the crew at Light Stalking for their effort in creating what promises to be a really great series.

Subscribe:If you liked this review, consider signing up for my newsletter, which is filled with even more tips, reviews and professional insight.

January 5, 2012

Rabari- Encounters With The Nomadic Tribe eBook, by Mitchell Kanashkevich

Publications

Recent Publication: 2012 Patagonia Mountain Catalog

Starting the year off right with another recent publication: This image appears as the parting shot in the 2012 Patagonia Mountain Catalog, which hit your mailbox this week.

The short caption is “Shut down by fog, Eric Parsons throws the ropes on the Lost Marsupial route of The Throne. Little Switzerland, Pika Glacier, Alaska.”

Now for the long caption…

It all started when Eric called me one day from Alaska and said “We won!”

“We won what?” I asked, as I sat in my office back in Colorado, scanning slides.

“The ADN video contest! I submitted my Chugach Energy Drink video and used your song and it won first place! Let’s take the money and go to Little Switzerland!”

Of course, with little hesitation, I said, “OK,” packed my rock climbing gear, and my rain gear, and bought a plane ticket to Anchorage.

My song, “Sawblade,” is a Jeff Beck-ish thing that I had written and recorded a few years earlier- (you know, putting that music and recording degree to use.)

Anyway, Eric stuck it in with some video footage, entered it in the contest and won a complete surround sound home theater kit, complete with big screen TV, all of which he promptly dumped on Craigslist for enough cash to buy food and air taxi flights into the Pika Glacier, smack dab in the middle of the Alaska Range.

Of course, that doesn’t count the obligatory four days that we spent waiting out the weather in Talkeetna. We killed our boredom by walking every street in the tiny town, reading decade old issues of Rock and Ice in the TAT bunk house, bothering everyone at the Talkeetna Air Taxi office, attempting to play basketball on the tarmac near million dollar bush planes and generally acting like fools, as is clearly documented in this video.

Actually, a highlight of our stay was watching retired Alaska bush pilot legend Doug Geeting play fingerstyle guitar and sing on the patio stage while we filled up on pizza at the Mountain High Pizza Pie restaurant. Quite a treat! Check out his music here, especially his awesome Michael Hedges style piece The Alaska Mile.

When the skies finally cleared, we were forced to leave TAT and fly in to the Pika, where we immediately set up camp and climbed the classic 5.8 route on the Middle Troll. We topped out at 1:00AM in the endless Alaska summer daylight, and afgter rapping the route, sleeping until mid afternoon the next day, we set our sights on the Lost Marsupial Route on The Throne.

Unfortunately, the weather had other ideas, and halfway up the route on our first attempt, it closed in again. We grumbled, sighed, waited, and finally rappelled in the clouds and rain back to the glacier with slightly bruised spirits and entirely wet gear.

Summoning our courage, we prayed to the mountain gods, came back the next day and completed the route, claiming victory on the summit under clear blue skies. Only that photo is not nearly as exciting as this one above, which I shot with my Nikon D200 as we retreated on our failed first attempt the previous day.

See, sometimes great stuff comes from failure. At least that’s what I tell myself.

Don’t take my word for it, though, here’s what REALLY happened on our trip.

See more photos and read the full report of our Pika Glacier rock climbing adventure here.

January 4, 2012

Recent Publication: 2012 Patagonia Mountain Catalog

Personal and Pro Insight

10 Blog Highlights for 2011

As we stand here on the leading edge of 2012, ready to launch ourselves into another 12 awesome and exciting months of outdoor photography, I take one final look back at 2011 with 10 blog highlights from the past year.

In no particular order, here are 10 articles that I enjoyed writing or sharing, in the case of guest posts, or that I feel well represent the vision of my blog in 2011. If you remember these posts when they came up the first time, I’d love to hear your thoughts; let me know what you got out of them, or if there are any other posts that you really liked reading.

Finally, Happy New Year. I look forward to your comments, input and readership throughout the coming year.

1. Comparing Nikon Speedlights: The SB-700 vs. The SB-900.

This one actually ranked as one of my most read posts of the entire year. I feel it’s a very helpful comparison between two modern Nikon flashes and very indicative of the kinds of reviews that I do.

2. The Best 5 Business and Marketing Books for Photographers.

I do quite a few book reviews and comparisons throughout the year and since many of you are emerging photographers, I felt that this one was a valuable post to run.

3. The Benefits of Negative Thinking, Guest Post by Anne McKinnell.

Speaking of emerging photographers, Anne McKinnell, who’s written a handful of guest posts on this site wrote this great piece almost one year ago. It spoke with so much truth and insight, that it prompted me to write a long post about my own path and passions with photography.

4. Video Review- Lowepro Photo Sport 200 AW Camera Pack.

This post ran just a few weeks ago. Not only did I have way too much fun and kill way too much time making this video, it received some great props by Lowepro, who ran it on their blog and called me the Indiana Jones of the outdoor adventure photography world. Don’t forget to watch the blooper reel a the end!

5. 3 Great Photography Posts I Found This Morning.

I love sharing great content, and with this post, I passed along a hilarious link about photo critiques, an awesome lightning photo and an introspective post by Chase Jarvis.

6. Lens Review: Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L IS USM.

Another guest post by outdoor and nature photographer Michael Russell. Also, my first review of Canon gear. As a lifelong Nikon shooter, I don’t do many Canon related articles, However, I realize that many of you are indeed Canon shooters, so it only makes sense to either start doing my research, or get others to do it for me!

7. Should You Sign (Or Stay) With Getty Images?

A few months ago, stock photo giant Getty Images bought the Photolibrary agency, and so, like many other photographers, I was faced with the choice of signing on with Getty or jumping ship. Here’s a rundown of the questions I posed shooters, including myself, to ask before making a decision.

8. Get The Most Out of Your 50mm Lens.

One of my most popular posts of the year, this one inspired photographers everywhere to fall back in love with their 50mm lenses. Do you still love yours?

9. Feature Interview with Landscape Photographer Ian Plant.

As I said, this list is in no particular order. This one was definitely one of my favorites. Ian is an amazing landscape photographer, and a great guy, so it was a real pleasure to interview him and share some of his first hand insight.

10. Biking on the Knik Glacier, Alaska.

No tips, no reviews, no introspective insight, just some fun images of glacier mountain biking.

January 3, 2012

10 Blog Highlights for 2011

Books, eBooks, Personal and Pro Insight, Reviews and Recommendations, Uncategorized

10 Great Photography Books and eBooks

I like books. I immerse myself in them, learn, explore and then emerge taller, so to speak, more enlightened and full of new knowledge and insight. You do too.

As photographers, we’re always searching out new books to give us information and inspiration to spark our photography or our photo careers. Here are 10 books and eBooks that I’ve recently discovered and that have made a difference for me.

After you read this list, leave a comment and let me know what photo-related books you found particularly helpful or inspiring during the past few months.

1. People pictures: 30 Exercises for Creating Authentic Portraits, by Chris Orwig

I’ve got the Kindle version of this book on my iPad and I’ve been working through the exercises. Author Chris Orwig has come at this from a really fresh perspective.

The content of this book is structured as a 30 lesson workshop, complete with self assignments and enough creative ideas to get your creative people photography skills loose and active. With so many books out there, this one is definitely one of my favorites of the year. I love the cover. Really compelling shot. Read my review of this book that I wrote last month.

There’s even a brand new a companion DVD to this book called People Pictures: Creating Authentic Photographs with Chris Orwig. I haven’t seen it. If you have, let me know if it’s worth watching.

2. The Inspired Eye 3, By David duChemin

The full title on this Craft and Vision eBook is called The Inspired Eye 3: Notes on Creativity For Photographers. I may be a sucker for anything related to creativity, but David duChemin lays it out like noone else can. Between the quality of his imagery and his introspective writing on vision, I liken him Galen Rowell.

I didn’t read the other two volumes in this series, so I can’t speak for them, but TIE3 is an awesome collection of thoughts on things like imagination, sketching, risk, talent, action, play, and other aspects of what makes and blocks our creative process in our brains and outputs. Of all the awesome Craft and Vision eBooks they put out this year, this was my favorite. You can get the full bundle of all three TIE titles and save three bucks here.

3. 11 Ways to Improve Your Photography, by Craft and Vision Authors

The other Craft and Vision eBook that I really loved this year, this is a free compilation of brand new articles on photography technique, methods and creativity by a number of their regular authors.

Not only is it 67 horizontal spreads of inspiring and educational content and imagery, it’s free. No reason not to pick this one up, it should be on everyone’s computer, iPhone, iPad or whatever device you use to read PDF eBooks.

Download it here. You can also get the entire 2011 C&V collection for 30% off if you order before the end of the year.

4. The Moment It Clicks, by Joe McNally

I picked this one up towards the end of the year, so I haven’t finished it yet, but I totally dig it so far. The Moment It Clicks. Classic Joe McNally throwing tips, techniques, little trade secrets that he’s learned over the many years of his career, put together with sentences that only he’d come up with. What’s not to love?

In addition, it’s got Joe’s Lighting Tips. Joe’s Camera Bag. Joe’s Lighting Gear. And a free PDF chapter if you register your book at Peachpit.com.

If the words don’t inspire you in this book, his fantastic imagery will. If it doesn’t, then you probably don’t have a pulse, or are on way too much Zoloft.

5. Kevin Kubota’s Lighting Notebook

The full title is Kevin Kubota’s Lighting Notebook: 101 Lighting Styles and Setups for Digital Photographers. Another book I picked up just before the holidays, so I’m not finished reading it yet, but it’s already made an impact.

The books starts out talking about lighting, emotion, feel and history in art, touches on gear and then breaks into the real meat- 101 different sample lighting setups that detail the gear, approach and technique used for each one. They’re also listed by the overall cost of gear used, types of light, (natural, flash or mixed) and number of assistants used. Or, clamps, if you prefer.

Kevin is a brilliant wedding and portrait photographer, but light is light and you can learn a great deal from studying these setups, and then applying them to your own style and subject matter. This one could be called Going Big With Light. Definitely worth a look if you use any kind of flash in your photography, or if you shoot people.

6. Photography Blog Success by Zach Prez

It’s no secret. I blog. In fact, I blog alot. Not quite sure how that happened, but the fact is that for as much time as I spend blogging, I want to make sure my time is well spent. I’ve read a couple of really good blogging eBooks, and Photography Blog Success by Zach Prez is as good as they come.

It’s just under 60 pages of really solid tips and advice for how to make your blog a success, and how to get it found, seen and read. A lot of the info in here is pretty straightforwards and stuff you could get somewhere else, but I like that fact that it’s all here in one place. That’s worth something. I’m open to good resources when I find them, and I’d by lying if I said that this book didn’t have some impact on my blogging this year.

7. Photographing The 4th Dimension- Time, by Jim Goldstein

Jim Goldstein’s first title, Photographing the 4^th Dimension – Time: Slow Shutter & Video Techniques for High Impact Photography is a pretty cool eBook, probably because it’s different in approach from many other books out there.

He starts with the basics, explaining the actual part that light plays in photography and how you control it. He then goes into human perception, detailing how our eyes and brain perceive the world and how you can effectively use the camera as a time machine.

His method chapters include making basic long exposures, light painting, composites, star trails, sequences, strobe effects, maximizing motion with still, and of course, time lapse. He also touches on cinemagraphics, or video effects for still photography.

The book is filled with loads of practical information, charts, tables, gear recommendations and awesome photographs. He’s also included a “Field Checklist” that you can print out, fold up and stick in your camera bag, for handy reference on location.

It’s been awhile since I’ve done much time lapse and long shutter speed photography , but reading this makes me want to get back into it.

8. Fast Track Photographer, By Dane Sanders

Ok, I know I keep coming back to this one. I didn’t discover it or even read if for the first time in 2011, but I kept coming back to it. I keep working through it and brainstorming from the notes that I made from this book, which I carry around every day in my pack.

In fact, when I ran into Dane at PhotoPlus Expo this fall, I showed him my little “brainstorm” notes and explained what they were and how much they’d helped me. He was floored. Thanks again Dane, you rock. Your book rocks. Still a favorite. Even after another year.

9. My Moleskine Notebook

Blank page notebooks inspire me. They make me imagine what I’ll fill them with. Mine goes with me everywhere. Keeps my thoughts, my business ideas, my creative ideas, my future blog post ideas, my eBook ideas and just about every other photography related note that pops into my head.

I carry it in my pack, right along with my Fast Track notes, and make very good use of it. I’ve said it before, Creative Ideas Don’t Live at Your Desk. If you’ve got a little notebook, you can grab and hold onto them when you’re out and about. Everyone should have an idea notebook. Doesn’t have to be red. Doesn’t have to be a Moleskine. Any kind will do.

10. Seth Godin’s Blog

Ok, so it’s not really a book, but it’s kind of like a book, one or two paragraphs at a time. This is Seth’s Blog is filled with brilliant and insightful tips and tidbits that have to do with business, marketing, strategy and new world economy ideas.

The dude is smart. Really smart. The stuff he says rings so true, you read it, look around and then click away, inspired. Not because he’s some kind of photographic genius, though. On the contrary, his blog posts are boring looking. Each one is just a few lines of text, but what’s written in that text has some serious real world relevance. Check it out for yourself.

Out of all the things on the web, this is the only blog I subscribe to and read every day.

December 29, 2011

10 Great Photography Books and eBooks

Personal and Pro Insight, Press, Interviews and Info

My Top 10 Photography Highlights of 2011

Following up from yesterdays post, My 10 Favorite Photos of 2011, I continue to look back at 2011 with fondness and excitement for what the year brought me besides money, fortune and fame, or at least a little bit of all three.

Here are my Top 10 Photography Highlights from the past year, in somewhat chronological order. I’m sure that as soon as I finish writing this, I’ll remember a few more…

1. Trail Runner Magazine, January 2011 Issue

I kicked off the year with a great publication, the TOC page and an inside feature in the January issue of Trail Runner Magazine.

I’ve known the guys at Trail Runner for years, having worked with some of them back in their Climbing Magazine days, but this was my first time being published in Trail Runner, and it was a great way to begin 2011.

Stay tuned for another Trail Runner kick-off for 2012…

2. Making The Image

In February I released my second eBook, Making The Image, a 50 page conceptual guidebook that is geared towards helping photographers create stronger images. Making The Image brought forth nearly two decades of creative and visual ideas that have been integral elements of my own style into a highly focused, and concise manual. Accessible to photographers of all levels, Making The Image sold very well out of the gate and continues to find new audiences each month.

However, as every area of my photography, the driving force behind this eBook was creating, not just selling, and I’m extremely proud of the effort and content that I put into this volume. It has certainly set the tone for my writing, which has only continued to grow in the past couple of years.

3. The Flash Bus

In March of 2011, I caught The Flash Bus lighting workshop in Denver. Not only was it well worth my time and money, I won some lighting ear, met new friends and of course, leaned a s**t load of awesome flash techniques from two lighting masters, Joe McNally and David Hobby.

I’d already started ramping up my own lighting use at the beginning of 2011, and so the stuff I learned during the intensive all day workshop only stoked the fires of my own creative photography ideas and carried me to new lands of illumination.

If you didn’t get a chance to catch The Flash Bus, you can grab the DVD or downloadable content here.

4. B&H Insights Blog

Earlier this year I was asked by the folks at B&H photo to contribute to the B&H Insights blog. Read by tens of thousands of readers, this only served to increase my online and writing exposure, and it also helped further build a great relationship with the great group of people who work in the B&H social media department.

5. Feature Article on The PocketWizard Blog

A longtime PocketWizard user, I was thrilled to be featured on the PocketWizard blog this year. Following the same week as a feature on sports-shooting giant Dave Black, writer Ron Egaz interviewed me and put together what a think is a really great profile on me and my style. You can read the full article, Dan Bailey’s Big Adventures.

6. Cessna N3102N

As you probably know, I bought my first airplane this year, a 1947 Cessna 120. Aside from fulfilling a life long dream and now having more fun than is legally allowed in many countries, having my own plane of course opens up great possibilities for adventure and photography in Alaska.

From backcountry strips, beach landings, glacier fly-bys, and aerial photography, the little Cessna has already provided me with some awesome opportunities, as is illustrated in this photo below:

7. Pearl Award For Photography in Mariner Magazine

This year, one of my favorite clients, Holland America’s Mariner Magazine won a number of prestigious Pearl Awards, including “Best Use of Photography” for the issue that featured my Denali National Park cover story.

This year, I traveled to Skagway, Alaska on assignment for Mariner and look forward to working with them on more projects in the future.

8. Going Fast With Light

On October 19 of this year, I released my third eBook, Going Fast With Light, a defining guidebook towards using off-camera flash in active and outdoor photography styles.

Having spent much of 2011 experimenting, refining my own style of outdoor strobist type photography, and distilling it all into a style of “light and fast flash,” I wrote Going Fast With Light to show you that “Good light doesn’t have to slow you down.”

Not only has the book sold incredibly well, it has been well received and promoted by companies such as B&H Photo, Lumiquest and PocketWizard and Photoflex, and it has opened up a number of new professional doors. Stay tuned…!

9. PDN PhotoPlus Expo

At the end of October, I attended the 2011 PDN PhotoPlus Expo. As the on-site correspondent for The Photoletariat, I perused the show floor for the coolest new photo gear, which I blogged about in my show-coverage every day. I also met a number of my Twitter photographer friends, like Jack Hollingsworth, Ken Kaminesky, Photo_John Shafer and Dane Sanders, and caught some really informative photography seminars.

10. Nikon Covers

Nikon has been a client of mine for a very long time, but this was the first year I’d made the cover of one of their marketing publications. In October, I had photos on the front and back cover of the Fall 2011 DSLR Comparison Guide, and they’re slated to run again in the Winter 2012 Guide.

Special Mention: You, my readers.

Seriously, without you, this blog, my Facebook Page and my Twitter feed, would be just jumbled bits of unread text and code. You guys make this blog and my social media sites what they are, and you drive me to keep creating the content that fills week after week of posts, article and photography.

So, thank you very much for reading, and look forward to 2012 with me, and with your own photography.

Also, I’d love to hear your feedback. Let me know what you like, what you don’t like or what you’d like to see more or less of on these pages in the coming year.

Finally, leave a comment and share your biggest photography highlight of 2011!

December 28, 2011

My Top 10 Photography Highlights of 2011

Featured Images, Personal and Pro Insight

My 10 Favorite Photos of 2011

As we close out 2011 and say farewell to what has been a very exciting and awesome year for photography, I thought I’d list my 10 favorite photos of the year. If you’d like to do the same, be sure and submit your gallery to Jim Goldstein’s Best Photos of 2011 list.

Anyway, as usual, I had a difficult time narrowing down my best shots. Besides, with ‘best’ being such a subjective term, I went instead for my favorite images of the year. Stay tuned for more “Best of 2011” blog posts this week. Hats off and sincere thanks to readers who actually remember each of these shots from their original posts earlier in the year.

I began 2011 with some new photographic ideas, many of which revolved around expanding the scope of my off-camera lighting skills and techniques. I’d been experimenting with flash for years, but after ending 2010 with some new equipment and a strong vision for where I wanted to take my lighting style, I looked for ways to experiment.

This photo of mechanic Tim Reinbold building up a Fatback snow bike wheel at Speedway Cycles in Anchorage became an instant favorite. I love the dramatic blast of warm light through the bike frames of the back wall, which I created with a gelled SB-900 Speedlight. I was so pleased with this image because it set the tone for what was to come for me later in 2011 with my Going Fast With Light eBook. (Read about this photo shoot here.)

Remember, this one from The Snow Bike and The Super Clamp? I had a great time coming up with this idea on a cold afternoon in January. It might have even been Super Bowl Sunday, but hey, fresh snow and afternoon light called.

I think the reason I had so much fun with this one, was because I just turned myself loose with a vague notion of what the kind of shot I’d wanted to achieve, and then set about trying to make it happen. Creative catharsis. Photographic freedom. Shooting for myself and by myself, which is something that we don’t always make time for.

As excited as I was about this shot, I was even more excited when Alaska Magazine chose this shot for a two-page section opener in their August 2011 issue. This was a great reminder that often times our more freeform creative work often ends up being our best work.

In March of 2011, we rode our bikes out to the Knik Glacier. Aside from being an incredibly cool adventure, it was an awesome photo opportunity As we pedaled down the frozen, snow covered Knik River, up over the moraine, down on to the frozen lagoon and around house sized blocks of ice, I shot hundreds of photos and filled up card after card.

This one turned out to be my favorite, probably because of the sunstar and the fact that it tells the story of just how big these frozen icebergs are. In my mind, it gives a feel for just how intimately we circled among them as we spent the day in this otherworldly frozen landscape.

In Alaska, you know it’s summer when the skis come off and the bush wheels and floats go on. For the second year in a row, I went out to the Valdez Air Show and Bush Pilot Fly-in and went crazy with the camera. Unlike the year before, though, when I mostly just shot planes, this time I packed a few flashes and a Lumiquest Softbox III.

My creative ideas for photographing the 2011 Valdez Fly-in revolved around shooting bush pilot portraits and capturing not just planes, but personalities and the people behind Alaska aviation.

Although I really like many of the photos that I shot at the 2011 event, this one seems to be my favorite. It’s more of a candid shot that shows the close interaction that this pilot has with his plane. I also love the lighting, which was done with a single CTO gelled SB-800 that’s sitting on the ground about 25 feet away.

I’ve been shooting trail running for years, and every time I go out, I hope to create an image like this. I’ve worked at it many times, and I’ve nearly been kicked, run over and stepped on, in my quest to capture the perfect shot, believe me.

However, this year, I finally nailed it. Shot in my favorite spot on the Campbell trails in Far North Bicentennial Park in Anchorage, Alaska. To me, this shot has it all: framing, color, background, subject, tones, sharpness. This is the one. Wonder what I’ll try to do next time?

In late June, I traveled down to Skagway, Alaska to shoot another assignment for Holland America’s Mariner Magazine. The job focused on the White Pass & Yukon Railroad that follows the historic Klondike Gold Rush route from Skagawy to Whitehorse.

One of the really cool things about this train is that there are a couple of great hiking spots along the way. You can just jump off the train, tromp around for a few hours, and then get back on the return train as it heads back to Skagawy.

Always up for a hiking adventure, I got off at the Laughton Glacier trailhead and hiked literally as far as I could up the trail, onto the moraine and all the way to the end of the rocks before I would have needed crampons, ice axe and a rope. With a light daypack, I moved fast and light, savoring the rugged terrain as it turned from forest, to rocks to pebbles over ice, where rivulets of melting ice trickle down and spill into cracks like this one.

2011 will go down in history as the year when I bought my very first airplane. In May, I purchased N3102N, a 1947 Cessna 120, and spent wonderful summer months learning the ins and outs of flying a taildragger and exploring some backcountry strips around this part of Alaska.

To me, this shot illustrates what my summer was all about. It’s my plane and my sweetie during a 4th of July picnic on the Kink River gravel bars. Shot with my D700 and 80-200mm f/2.8 lens.

Ah, Summer hiking in Alaska. During what started out as a sunny afternoon run/hike up Wolverine Peak here in the Chugach Mountains, I shot this photo as we popped up onto the ridge and suddenly went from short sleeves to puffy jackets.

My friend Eric Parsons and I have enjoyed countless adventures over the years. (Do a search on this blog for Eric Parsons and see what comes up.) Well, now Eric has a new adventure partner, his little boy Finn.

Not one to slow down, Eric takes Finn on all sorts of exciting hiking and cross country skiing excursions. One summer day, I went with them and had a great time documenting my good friend, um… not slowing down. Let’s just say that he’s not one of those over-protective parents. I love the interaction between Finn and Eric here, and will look back at our hike as one of my highlights of the year.

Another aviation shot. One day, my friend Chet and I flew across to the other side of the Kink Arm and landed on the grassy flats. We couldn’t have asked for a better day to fly and goof off… er, I mean work. Sunshine, warm temperatures, a slight headwind to make short takeoffs and landings easier, and wonderful serenity in a place where you can only reach by flying.

I shot this as we prepared to leave and head back to town. Chet gave me a couple of low flyovers in his Maule. I put the D700 on high speed continuous and let the shutter rip as he flew by. This one’s my favorite. It even made it into the 2012 Alaska Airmen’s Calendar.

In August of 2011, I traveled to Barrow, Alaska on assignment. It was the farthest north that I’d ever been and my first glimpse of the Arctic Ocean. Summer officially “closed” when I was there; Barrow saw its first sunset in 84 days, and as the long day came to a close, I waked the beach with my camera and shot this around 1:30 AM.

Although it was hard to choose, this shot of a driftwood whaling boat frame on the shores of the Chuckchi Sea is my favorite from the series. Read more about my trip to Barrow and how I swam in the Arctic Ocean in my photo essay, Notes on a Starless Summer in Barrow, Alaska on Matador Network.

You stick a camera in front of your subject, pop the flash off to the side and click the shutter. Sometimes it’s just that easy. Only that isn’t how I got this shot. This one was made purely by accident. While zooming in to dust spot this image in Lightroom, I happened to see this exact crop show up on the second monitor. It wasn’t what I’d planned, it came about purely by chance.

Being totally blown away by what was staring back at me, I switched to the crop tool and replicated the exact framing and saved the image. Sometimes all is takes is a crop. I love it!

December 27, 2011

My 10 Favorite Photos of 2011

Personal and Pro Insight

Happy Holidays!!!

AK-HOL-01017 — Snowzilla, the resident 25' snowman in my neighborhood in Anchorage, Alaska.

Seeing as how it’s almost time to tear into all those wrapped goodies under the tree, in the hopes that Santa brought me an advance model Nikon D800, this will be my last post until next week.

I’ll be back to close out the year with highlights of my favorite photos, gear and other photography related favorites from 2011.

Until then, I’d like to wish you all a very merry Christmas, happy Winter Solstice, and very happy holidays. Enjoy the snow if you’ve got it, enjoy the last few days of your 365 photo project if you did one, and of course, enjoy the time spent with your family and friends this season.

Thanks so much for reading.

Peace,

Dan Bailey

December 22, 2011

Press, Interviews and Info

Winter Photography Tips – Today on MasteringPhoto.com

Just in time for the Winter Solstice, which comes to Anchorage, Alaska at 8:30PM this evening, check out my Cold Winter Photography Tips post today on the MasteringPhoto Blog.

Powered by Focal Press, the publisher of a number of excellent photography and digital imaging books, MasteringPhoto features tips, articles, tutorials, interviews and resources from bestselling authors and industry experts that are geared towards photographers of all levels.

This is my first time writing for Focal Press. I’m excited to be affiliated with such an excellent and reputable publisher of photographer related resources. I hope to contribute more in 2012.