Embracing Mother Nature's Atmosphere

Mother Nature is not always cooperative in providing beautiful sunrises, sunsets, and days with blue skies and white puffy clouds. Sometimes she sends us stormy and inclement conditions like rain, snow, and fog. While all of these things can provide challenging circumstances, they often create the most atmospheric and unique landscape imagery. So instead of hiding inside, grab the camera and embrace the atmosphere. 

Three atmospheric conditions to capture:

1) Fog & Low clouds

Fog can be challenging as it creates low visibility, difficulty driving and may obscure the beautiful views you find in the mountains or along the coast, for example. On the positive side, fog can create a sense of mystery, enhance atmosphere and provide a soft, dreamy mood. In obscuring some details, fog enhances the beauty of other details and creates a stunning contrast to finer and rougher textures, such as the hard rock of mountain tops or the needles of pine trees. Fog may isolate foreground objects like trees, flowers or animals from the background, simplifying the scene.

2) Snow & Frigid Temperatures

My guess is most won’t need a lot of encouragement to get out there on those beautiful winter days when big puffy snowflakes are falling. There is something truly magical about falling snow. Even in heavily falling snow, the views can be beautiful. The snow often comes with a drab white sky, but the foreground is enhanced by the atmosphere created with fresh snowflakes.

Many people shy away from the extremely frigid temperatures you that sometimes come after a beautiful snowfall. I encourage you to prepare for the cold with many layers and grab those hand and toe warmers because the icy temperatures often lead to unique ice formations and extra sparkly snow. 

3)  Rain

A hard drenching downpour is not going to provide you with the most enjoyable shooting conditions nor create the most pleasing images. However, rain in many situations can create opportunities for stunning imagery. Storms coming in or clearing up can create extremely dramatic skies.

In many places where you can see miles in every direction, the distant rain is stunning to capture. 

Rain comes down in the distance among the golden sunrise light off the coast of Turks & Caicos.

Even light rain as it splatters on the water of a lake or on puddles can create a beautiful story not typically captured.

And if you’re lucky, rain that is short lived may even reward you with a rainbow in the end! 

After watching the rain come in, my husband and I ran for cover. As it lightened, I looked back and knew we’d see a rainbow! So worth getting a little wet!

In most situations, beauty can still be found when Mother Nature throws us some precipitation and inclement weather mixed with just a small breakthrough of the sun can create the most astounding images! Do you have a dramatic weather image you love? I’ve love to see them!

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My online landscape photography workshop, The World Around You, is now open for registration! Sign up at Click Photo School. This will likely be the only run of 2020 as my fall is filled with retreats.

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Kristen Ryan is an award winning and published landscape and fine art photographer and educator residing in the Midwest suburbs of Chicago. All images are available for purchase in the Fine Art Store or by request. Kristen leads ladies landscape photography retreats in the Tetons, Chicago, and the Canadian Rockies, offers private mentoring and teaches an online landscape photography workshop, The World Around You.

My 5 Favorite Weather Apps for Landscape Photography Planning

Weather has such a strong impact on landscape photography and getting out in ideal conditions can really take your imagery to the next level. There are a number of helpful weather apps that are helpful in predicting when Mother Nature will provide those ideal conditions. While no app or forecast is foolproof or perfect, here are 5 of my favorite apps I use in planning my photography adventures.

1 ) Sun Surveyor 

I love Sun Surveyor because it gives so many different tidbits of information in one little app! Put in your location and date and Sun Surveyor tells you sunrise and sunset time, moonrise and moonset, golden hour, and blue hour. You can find out the phase of the moon and the time that the core of the milky way will be visible (if applicable). There is a map that will show the arc of the movement of the sun and moon across your location. The live view will also show you exactly where the sun, moon or milky way will be at any given time as you stand in your location. 

2) Photopills

Photopills is my go-to app for planning my Milky Way shoots. Using the Photopills planner, I can plan my Milky Way shooting wherever I may traveling too. I can set the pin at a location and see how the Milky Way will line up at all hours of the night. This eliminates the guesswork involved with astrophotography. The Night AR view allows me to see exactly how the Milky Way will line up at a particular time as I stand in a location. I have planned many Milky Way shooting sessions for my retreats months in advance by using Photopills. 

3) Astrospheric

Astrospheric is another awesome weather app that shows cloud cover by the hour and includes a radar that shows the clouds moving over your location. You can watch the radar or click on a particular hour to see the cloud cover prediction and location of the clouds. Great for predicting those clear nights for astrophotography.

4) Clear Outside

This app gives you hour by hour information on the cloud cover in your chosen location. Not only does it tell your overall cloud cover but it also tells you whether they are low, mid or high clouds. You can also see visibility, fog, chance of rain and temperature. The cloud cover numbers are so helpful for predicting clear nights for astrophotography as well as chance of clouds for enhancing sunrise and sunset.

5) My Aurora Forecast Pro

This helpful app will give you the current KP index and show you the likelihood of seeing the Northern Lights in your chosen location. There is an Aurora Map that shows the best locations to see the Aurora and shows you the long term KP potential forecast. A forecast is always a forecast though, right?!  The app also will alert you of high aurora activity.

Again, forecasts can be unpredictable and no app is perfect, but the combination of these apps can help to figure out when and where I can find the best opportunities for landscape and astrophotography. Do you have any favorite apps not listed here? I’d love to hear about them and add them to my tool list 😊

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Just 3 spots left in my 2023 Ladies Landscape Retreats! 1 spot in the June Magic in the Tetons Retreat and 2 spots in Magic in Hilton Head!

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Kristen Ryan is an award winning and published landscape and fine art photographer and educator residing in the Midwest suburbs of Chicago. All images are available for purchase in the Fine Art Store or by request. Kristen leads ladies landscape photography retreats in the Tetons, Chicago, Glacier, Hilton Head and the Canadian Rockies, and offers private mentoring.

5 Tips for Shooting in Overcast Weather

It’s no secret that I love clouds, as most landscape photographers do. Clouds make a sky far more interesting than a clear blue sky. They create mood and atmosphere. But sometimes the clouds are so thick that the sky becomes gray and overcast, which is not any more interesting than a clear blue sky. What do you do in those situations? I suppose if you are home, you can just sit that one out and spend your day editing or engaging in life outside of photography. But when it happens during a long awaited trip to a dream destination, you want to make the best of it. So here are a few ideas of how to embrace that overcast light.

1) Seek Out Waterfalls or Other Moving Water ~ Overcast light is the perfect time to shoot waterfalls, rivers, or streams. Grab your 6 stop Neutral Density Filter and play with shutter speed and long exposures . The soft, overcast light helps to shrink the dynamic range and eliminates the dappled light and harsh shadows that come with bright sunlight. Bonus in the autumn, overcast light lets you bring out the fall colors without the harsh highlights.

2) Experiment with Slow Shutter and Panning ~ Experimenting with tree panning is a perfect activity for an overcast day. Panning can be done in any light, but in softer light, it will be easier to get a slower shutter speed and avoid bright highlights that come in full sun.

3) Fill the Frame ~ Look for some beautiful details in the foreground and fill your frame with them. For example, maybe a mix of fall colors in the foliage or fog floating through the trees. I often use a longer focal length for this kind of shooting.

4) Minimize the Sky in the Frame ~ If the sky is not adding interest to the scene, make the foreground the majority of the frame. Place the horizon or tops of trees, mountains or hills near the upper line of the Rule of Thirds or even higher. Typically in these situations I will use a mid focal length or longer focal length rather than my wide angle.

5) Underexpose the Sky ~ Sometimes the sky is a pure gray or white blanket over the scene, but other times you might be able to see some texture in the clouds. If you see texture, you can work with it in post processing. By underexposing, you capture more sky detail and can edit to create some moody atmosphere.

So next time the clouds got you down, remember these tips and get creative. There is always some beauty to be found!

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Kristen Ryan is an award winning and published landscape and fine art photographer and educator residing in the Midwest suburbs of Chicago. All images are available for purchase in the Fine Art Store or by request. Kristen leads ladies landscape photography retreats in the Tetons, Chicago, and the Canadian Rockies, offers private mentoring and teaches an online landscape photography workshop.

7 Tips for a Great Sunburst

One of my very favorite techniques for adding drama and impact to landscape images is creating a sunburst when the sun is in the frame. Sunbursts introduce added interest to any frame and are especially fun to add in when you have a completely clear sky.

A starburst of the sun happens as a result of diffraction. Light goes into the small opening of a narrow aperture of our camera and is then bent around the edges of the blades. This disperses the light rays into a starburst.

Here are some tips and thoughts to think about as you capture sunbursts in your shooting!

1) Choose A Wide Angle Lens - Wider focal lengths will produce more rays in the starburst so your best bet will be a focal length in the 14-35mm range. This is not to say you cannot capture a sunburst with a longer lens, but the wider angles are ideal. Keep in mind that regardless of focal length, different lenses create different looking sunbursts. For example, my Nikon 14-24mm lens produces a bit of a circular flare starburst at 14mm (image below) which is different from my Nikon 16-35mm lens at 16mm. (image above) Experiment with your lenses and focal lengths to see which one produces your favorite burst!

2) Close Down Your Aperture - Closing down the aperture will produce more distinctive rays in the sunburst. It is possible to get a sunburst with an aperture wider than f/16 but f/16 or f/18 are my top choices for a great sunburst.

3) Sky Matters - The best conditions for a good sunburst will be a patch of clear sky for a bright and sharp sunburst! Trying to create a starburst through a thin layer of hazy clouds is like banging your head against a wall. When the sky has some thicker clouds amongst clear sky, when the sun hits the clouds, this can create nice potential for a burst of rays into the sky and over the clouds.

4) Consider the Position of the Sun - When the sun is in the middle of a clear blue sky, a nice sunburst can be achieved. Other times, the best sunbursts are created as the sun hits another object, such as a mountain top, horizon, building, tree, etc. This helps the rays to disperse over the object the sun is hitting. This can require patience waiting for the sun to rise or set to the position desired. And sometimes it can require a little movement on your part to line things up.

When shooting sunbursts through trees, even slight shifts in position can help create a better or more distinct sunburst.

5) Expose for the Highlights - One of the keys to getting a great sunburst with distinct rays is to be sure that the highlights are well contained. Ideally, it is best to avoid blowing any of the sun highlights except for the circle of the sun. Exposing for the bright sun does mean that the overall image is somewhat underexposed and the shadows will be quite dark.

6) Bracket Exposures - Following #5’s tip for exposing for the highlights to get a great sunburst, consider bracketing your exposures and also taking an image exposed for the shadows and one for the midtones. Then combine them in post processing so you have detail in the full tonal range of the scene. You can bracket manually or program the camera to automatically take several images at different exposures.

7) Consider Your Position - As mentioned in tip #4, both the position of the sun and your position matter for creating a strong sunburst. Another thing that is impacted by your position is additional flare. Shooting into the sun can bring creative and desirable flare but it can also create unwanted and distracting flare. Look for this unwanted flare as you shoot and in your test shots and consider shifting your position. Sometimes minor adjustments in your position can remove unwanted flare or position it better in the frame where it is less distracting or more easily cloned out. A lens hood can also be a useful tool to avoid unwanted flare. Though sometimes nothing avoids it completely.

Kristen Ryan is a landscape and fine art photographer residing in the Midwest suburbs of Chicago. All images can be purchased in the Fine Art Store. Kristen leads ladies landscape photography retreats in the Tetons, Chicago, and the Canadian Rockies, offers private mentoring and teaches an online landscape photography workshop twice a year.