Adventure Photography

I've just spent a weekend on an Adventure Photography course run by Nadir Khan based at Glenmore Lodge.. I'd considered doing it last year but bought new skis instead! As the Saturday came closer I got stick from Loz as it had snowed and there were winter routes to be climbed! Torn! Why don't time machines exist so that we can do everything?!

The trees give a magical feel with the dusting of snow

Love the depth and colours

Birds or branches!

We met on Saturday and headed straight out with Nad and Mark our 'model'! Immediately it was great. We were lucky with the weather, crisp, a dusting of snow and vibrant Autumn colours in abundance. We didn't particularly wander far, learning lots of skills and tips heading past the green lochan towards Ryvoan. Towards the end of the day it snowed and we had a brief blizzard which was atmospheric, and nice to shoot in!

Love the colours and silver birch reflections on the water

just love this kind of shot - Nadir and other at far side

dreamy grasses with sun and snow

On Saturday the main learning points for me were composition, positioning (often getting down on the ground is an example) and making the most of natural features, creating depth in the shot. In the evening we spent some time editing photo's. It was really interesting watching Nadir edit a fairly basic shot of a tree with Autumnal leaves. After his edit it really stood out and was then a memorable shot. I never really do much post production on my images, and will now consider this aspect more often. Quite a full on day!

What I particularly like the Cairngorms for - this middle ground

Posed for sure, but snow and bright colours = thumbs up

Dave talking to Nadir, love the relaxed posture

Sunday dawned another fine day, sunnier so we headed towards the Chalamain Gap again stopping regularly to work on various shots. I learnt lots about using my camera manually from capturing movement, and using features as leading lines for the shot to looking for 'the drama' and using this element in the composition.

texture and movement 

Dave concentrating

Shooting into the sun

 A really great course that I think will have helped my photography for sure. I've included my favourite 14 shots from the 800 I took over 2 days. They are possibly quite staged in one way, but I still like them and each one taught me something new about photography and therefore was a success. Cheers Nadir!

Merely to show the good weather