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Your Camera's Manual	Tripods
Notepad	Cable Release
Spare Batteries	Large Plastic Bag
Additional Memory Cards	Leaving the Camera in the Car
Formating Memory Cards	Lens Pen
Bird Field Guide	Cleaning Digital Sensor
Camera's User Guide	Missed Photo Opportunities?
More Photo Tips?

In this section of Nature Photography Tips I am going to start with a number of general tips that will relate to any type of photography and would best be described as "good habits" to get into doing or "bad habits" that you make sure to avoid. These tips apply to both digital and film photography.

For those of you who are interested in specific subjects, we have recently included a section on photographing birds in flight. To learn more about this subject, follow this link...Bird Field Guide.

Want to learn about what we consider one of the most important photography tips that will help you to get to really know your digital camera? Camera's User Guide

Important Photography Tips

Your Camera's Manual

Where ever and whenever you go some place with your camera, always carry the camera’s manual with you. Especially with the new digital cameras because there are so many options and parameters, it is difficult to remember or know what each one is for. I know and agree with you, these manuals are not the most user friendly books to deal with, but it is better to have it with you so you can look up something rather than guess what you should be selecting.

Read the manual. Read thru it once from cover to cover to see all that is in the manual; do not try to remember everything in that first reading. Once you have gone thru it the 1st time, then use it as a reference tool because there are a number of parameters you need to turn on or set to a specific value for each different photography scenario.

There are a number of parameter settings that are standard. It is a good idea to record all these settings on a sheet of paper. Do not mark in the manual what setting you used because you may well find you will need to change it later. The reason for this sheet of paper is that it serves as a quick overview of all your settings. Much faster than trying to remember where you set it within the menu of the camera and it is also mush faster than trying to find it in the manual.

The other reason for having the separate sheet of paper is that at some point further on in the manual you will come upon another parameter that you will need to set and as you read about it, the instructions will tell you this parameter is directly related to some previous parameter that you have already set. So you would put those 2 or 3 parameters together on your sheet of paper. This way if you change one of them at a later date you will see and remember that “oh yes, these other 2 parameters are related, so perhaps I need to be careful here.”

Once you have recorded all the parameters you have set, then insert, staple (or do whatever it takes to keep that sheet of paper with your manual. As you are likely to also have a computer, then why not enter the contents into Word or Excel, this way you will have an electronic copy and can reprint it if you ever decide to loose it.

Notepad

Carry a small notebook/pad with you to record comments/actions etc about each image you are taking. It becomes very useful later as you review each image to know what you did and then you can make note of what you should have done. Then before you go out the next time, review the list of things you should have done to help jog your memory so as to make sure you will do it right this time.

In the photography classes I teach, some students ask "why do I need this, the camera records all the information?" That is partially true, but it does not tell you where the sun was relative to the horizon, nor what road you were on, nor does it tell you about some of the potential shots you could have or should have taken only this time using your polarizing filter.

It is also a lot easier and faster to go thru those notes than it is to scan thru a file of images looking for some specific shots in the hope they will remind you of the things you should remember to do the next time you are out. And if you are someone who does not go out very often to take pictures, then a notebook is a great place to store your photography tips.

Spare Batteries

Always carry a spare set of batteries. The number of times I have heard of people out taking pictures and their batteries have died is all too frequent. This photography tip is especially important in the winter and you must also make sure you keep the batteries warm. So keep them in an inside pocket of the clothes you are wearing.

Additional Memory Cards

Always carry at least one spare Memory card with you. This is another annoying problem I hear of quite often where people have run out of available memory space so they have to take the time to figure out what images they should delete before continuing. Using that small LCD screen on the back of your camera is not the best source for determining which is the best image to delete. You can easily delete the wrong image.

The other reason for carrying an extra card is in case something happens to the card you are using. If you remove the card and accidentally drop it, it may not survive that 3 foot drop test, or it may land in a puddle of water.

Additional Photography Tips

Although these next photography tips are classified as "useful" if you are going to take photography seriously, then these photography tips would be just as important as those above.

Tripods

If you have a tripod, mount the camera on the tripod and leave it there. This way you are more likely to carry the tripod with you when you go out to take photographs. If you do not have one and you are serious about photography, then invest in one. Especially if you want to take blur free pictures.

Cable Release

If you have a cable release, always take it with you and make use of it. This is the 2nd item required to eliminate camera shake and blurred images. Another very important nature photography tip.

Large Plastic Bag

For cameras with interchangeable lenses, carry a large plastic bag. Insert the camera into this bag and then change the lens. This will protect the camera’s image sensor from picking up dust particles.

Leaving the Camera in the Car

Do not ever leave the camera inside the glove compartment or trunk of your car. If you must leave it in the car, then buy a small lunch box type of cooler, place the camera in the cooler and then place the cooler in the trunk.

Formating Memory Cards

Memory cards, after you have printed, transferred to a CD or computer then Format the card in your camera before going out to take more images. Do not simply just delete the images. This not only cleans the card of the previous images, it also searches and marks any possible bad sectors on the card so that it will not record an image into that bad space.

Lens Pen

Go to a good camera store to buy a “Lens Pen”. In fact you may want to buy more than one of these, because they can be easily misplaced. Use both ends of this pen frequently to clean your camera lens & viewfinder. Do not ever use this pen to clean the sensor inside the digital camera.

Cleaning the Digital Sensor

For cleaning the digital sensor inside the camera I urge you to visit this website. (Opens New Window)

Bird Field Guide

As part of my teaching photography here in the Eastern Townships area, many of the students love nature and have a passion for nature photography. We are fortunate to have a large number of birds that pass thru and live throughout our countryside. I often receive questions about photographing birds in flight. This led me to conduct some research on the subject and have put together a kind of bird field guide on this subject. To learn more...Click Here

Your Camera's User Guide

This is perhaps one of the best beginning photography tips we can give you. We all know you hate to read manuals (us included) but in teaching our photography class each year this is the biggest problem we face. Our students have not read the manual, or those who did read it, did not understand it.

So, we found a way to help you by creating a list of the most important features of the digital camera. We ask you to find that feature on your camera, then find the instructions for that feature in the user guide or manual and then test that feature by taking a series of shots so that you will see the effect of using that setting.

We have put this list into a questionnaire that we hope you will find useful. Take a look...

Missed Photo Opportunities?

How often have you missed a photo opportunity at a location you know is more than capable of producing great photos?

Was it because you were not prepared and by that I mean you had not done your homework?

Or, was it because you did not think of it at the right time of day? As an example you were 30 minutes too late and missed a great sunset?

How do you deal with these types of situations? To learn more about this valuable Photography Tip...

More Photo Tips?

If you have any questions regarding any of these photography tips please do not hesitate to Contact Us.

If you have additional tips, or if you have any comments related to these tips and examples using your specific camera model that you would like to share with us, Become a Contributor.

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