Many landscape photographers complain that their local area for photography is uninteresting. While travel for landscape photography can be invigorating, your local area has untapped potential waiting to be discovered. Have you taken the time to explore your local area to find interesting scenes?
In this video, Nigel Danson shares images from his book, all of which were taken in his local area. Danson goes well beyond the often-heard practice locally—the mantra that many photographers discuss. While there is value in learning your camera settings and techniques locally to be prepared for travel, a photographer is overlooking the potential for high-quality images in their local area.
Danson discusses how photographing locally presents the opportunity to revisit a place more frequently. The more you visit a location, the greater the odds of you being lucky. The weather conditions will vary, and you may experience familiar scenes in new, interesting light, or in the rain or fog, or even the snow. All of these conditions can help transform a familiar scene into a powerful image.
Danson ends the video with viewer submissions regarding an uninteresting area where they live. Using Google Earth as a tool to explore, Danson highlights several areas in their area with fresh eyes that he feels are worth exploring.
I always encourage photographers to practice locally, but usually with a lean toward it being to better learn the fundamentals of landscape photography. I appreciated that one can still capture interesting landscapes in your area with just a bit of patience and a fresh eye.
There was just an article on here about saving your money from GAS and use it to travel, instead, to get out of your local area for a fresh view. Now, this article says that you don't need to travel, just look over local area differently.
I can't landscape where I live, but I'm in a target rich environment for architecture. I could stay within 5km (3 miles) of my house and never run out of places to photograph.
The picture below was simply a case of turning around after having photographed the same scene a few minutes before.
I think it just demonstrates the point of balance, right? Like if you think you HAVE to travel to take good pictures, then you'll be frustrated if you can't travel. And if you think you never need to leave your area, you might miss out on some fresh energy or a different perspective that you can bring back home to change your approach at home.
Architecture can open up some great opportunities as well! And keeping an eye on all directions in any environment can be good advice whether local or traveling!
Thanks for the thoughts!
I'm not againt traveling. I disagree with the opinion that you have to travel. Don't stagnate at home while waiting to travel. There is plenty to shoot at home. I'm fortunate to live in Taiwan, at the moment.
Jeffrey Tadlock asked,
"Have you taken the time to explore your local area to find interesting scenes?"
Oh my yes! Well, not so much interesting scenes, because I am into wildlife far more than landscapes, But I have spent an insane amount of time exploring the photographic wildlife possibilities here in my county ever since I moved here in 2006. I have so many thousands of images of hundreds of different species here in my home county .... but there are still so many local critters that I have not yet photographed well.
I could literally spend 10 entire lifetimes photographing the wildlife here in my area and still not accomplish everything that I want to accomplish, and never run out of new and fresh ways of capturing the local fauna.
BUT ......
Here in my area, I will never be able to get pleasing photos of mature Whitetail Deer bucks, so I need to travel far for them.
I will not be able to photograph HUGE Bighorn Sheep rams, because they just don't grow huge horns here, so I need to travel to Montana for them.
I will not be able to photograph Eiders or other sea ducks, because they do not live here and they do not even pass through during spring or fall migration, so I need to travel to the WA coast, Alaska, or New Jersey for them.
I will never be able to photograph any of the eastern warblers here, because they do not live in this part of the United States. So I have to travel to Pennsylvania, Illinois, New Jersey, or Ohio for them,
Hey - I mentioned Ohio ....... I read your bio and I see that you live in Ohio - how cool is that?!
I love Ohio, and have traveled there several times within the past few years, specifically to photograph wildlife.
I went to southern Ohio in May of 2022 to photograph warblers. We concentrated on the area in and around Lake Hope State Park. Wonderful habitats and I hope to return again, preferably in May.
In October of 2023 I went to 3 of the Cleveland metroparks to photograph Whitetail Deer. The logistics of this worked out great because the habitats are easy to access and there are very reasonable lodgings and food nearby.
In October of 2024 I again went to Cleveland Metroparks, and also to a Toledo area metropark, to photograph Whitetail Deer.
In March of 2025, just a few months ago, I went to the Magee Marsh in northwestern Ohio to do birding and bird photography. Another goal of this visit was to scout the area out to become familiar with it, in preparation for future visits when the migrating warblers come through the area. I willl certainly be returning to this area in future years, during the month of May.
Just last month I went birding in Brown's Lake Bog State Preserve and Funk Bottoms Wildlife Area. While I had my camera with me, the primary purpose was not to take photos, but rather to scout for future photo opportunities. Why? Because the best time to photograph the bird species there is from early April thru early June. I was there in late June, and all the birds had already mated and nested. So I was scouting to find what opportunities would be worth coming back for, at the right time of year, and I found that Funk Bottoms will give me some wonderful opportunities to photograph Prothonatary Warblers and Red-headed Woodpeckers, but that a kayak or canoe will be required to access the nest trees, which are in standing timber.
There is certainly a lot more in Ohio that I have not yet explored and photographed, and I may never get the chance to, because I live over 2,000 miles away and there's only so much time I can be on the road. But it just goes to show that there is a great benefit to traveling far from home for photography, just as there is a great benefit to making the most of one's local opportunities.
By the way, just because something is far from home does not mean that one can not re-visit it often. I mean, if I am able to go to Ohio in 2022 then there wasn't really any reason I couldn't go again in 2023, and 2024, and 2025. I've spent November in Colorado in 7 of the last 8 years, and become almost as familiar with wildlife opportunities in the Denver area as I am with the ones here where I live. Just jump in the car and go!
Get a Rand McNally book of state maps. Open to the Montana page. Along the center seem, from top to bottom, find the center. You'll see a small town called Harlowton along the Musselshell River. Either east or west, along the river bottom, you'll find your monster Whitetail. Just get land owner permission.
Ray's Western Wear store next to the rest area should have someone behind the sporting goods counter that can help you with where to go.
Happy Hunting.
PS: Elk and Muley deer are to the north and west.
Hey Rich
Thanks for the tip! I have actually spent over a year in Montana photographing Whitetails. Every November from 2008 thru 2016, and then November of 2021. Plus a bunch of shorter trips in September and October and a few in December.
I appreciate the tip about Harlowtown. Are the Whitetails there habituated to humans? If they are very used to humans being close to them, and never get hunted, then it could prove to be a great new place for me. But if they are hunted at all, then it isn't going to work.
I pretty much need deer that live in parks or refuges or tourist attractions, so that they have lost their fear of humans, and will stand there while I walk up to them and all around them, finding the best angle to shoot from. Deer that get hunted, or that have not become ultra-comfortable with humans, just don't allow one to shoot the way one needs to shoot to get those picture perfect images. If deer see A LOT of people all around them all the time, but those people never try to harm them, then that is pretty much the situation that yields good images of mature bucks.
National parks and national wildlife refuges are the go-to places, with the occasional state park, provided there are a lot of people there and that they never get culled to manage the population. Some private land can also work, especially if it is a neighborhood setting where hunting is completely forbidden and especially if some of the neighborhood residents feed the deer. Other than those kind of venues, it is practically impossible to get a mature buck to stand in the open while one walks up to it and starts taking photos.
It would be awesome if the private land you suggest near Harlowtown presents a situation with fairly tame deer, as I have described. In fact, that is just the kind of situation I scour the country for, and am willing to drive thousands of miles to shoot at once I have found such a place with suitably tame deer.
EDIT:
I am looking at Harlowtown on Google Maps now. I see that right in town there are the Chief Josep Park and the Harlowton City Park. If they have ok habitat within those parks, and the deer there never get shot at by humans, those could be some good areas. I also see the Jawbone Creek Country Club on the north side of town, and if the deer there never get hunted, that could be promising as well.
By the way, with all of its twists and turns, as well as oxbows, the Musselshell River looks like it would be a really great river for a canoe trip.
Harlowtown is only about 40 minutes north of I-90, and I travel that portion of I-90 often. In fact, I was just there two weeks ago, to the day. If the next time I drive through there it is daytime, I will take a detour up there and look around at the habitat and talk to the locals to see just how tame the deer are there.
Sorry, even the deer in town are skittish. My old hunting blind, I'm willing to give it up because I'm in a wheelchair, now. Just after dusk and before dark, I've walked into the field and gotten close enough to touch Whitetail, but they'll run once they notice you. From the blind, you can get shots from ground level as they walk by. Some within reach of a selfie stick.
With skittish animals, there are 3 things to remember: shadowx, scent and movement.
I will give you an old Blackfoot trick for getting even the more skittish tame wildlife to pay less attention to you. Buy an old wardrobe or school locker where you can hang your photography outfit. Make sure the top is sealed. Nothing drastic, you just need to trap smoke. Hang your clothes inside and burn a couple of green mosquito repellant coils inside. Get your clothes smelling of the coils. Turn your clothes inside out and do it a second time.
Animals are used to smelling smoke in the wild and it covers the human scent. I mentioned the doe walking into my blind above. When I hunt, I burn mosquito coils in the blind. My last archery Whitetail, was only a few feet from me, I wasn't even camouflaged. Just no scent, slow movement, and in the shadows. He never noticed me.
During the rut, if you're willing to take the time. You can walk up to rutting bucks battling, if you're very slow about it. Walk treelines, if possible. Not too close, though. You don't need to crawl, just move slowly. A few silent shutter shots should be possible.
PS: Don't use the lavender scented coils.
All very true/ Good read and video.
Thank you - glad you enjoyed the post!