How-To
Text And Photography By Kerrick James
Notice how the inclusion of people in these photographs gives the scenes scale. As nature photographers, we frequently work to avoid any human element in our photos, but you can see here how a person can positively make the shot. Above: hiking the salty shore of Lago Tuyajito in the Atacama Desert, Chile.
Like many of us, my love of photography began with the wild landscape. My early years were spent emulating icons like Ansel Adams, David Muench and Eliot Porter. I followed the grand landscape dream all over the American West, and after years of chasing light and doing “pure” landscapes with no signs of humanity whatsoever, I began to feel a little boxed in, as if I was repeating my favorite lighting formulas everywhere I went, and missing something I could sense, but not see.
Kayaking under a double arch of sandstone, Lake Powell, Utah.Eventually, I broke out of that mold by showing the friends and guides with whom I was exploring the natural world