Lessons

Lesson Info

Researching Locations, Trip Planning, & Conservation

In this section, we're gonna talk about researching locations and trip planning. Now, I can't always predict where I'm going to find wildlife, but to ease the stress of a job, the best I can do is be as prepared as I can. So, even though I might not know where the Wildlife's gonna be, it's super helpful if I already have kind of like a rough timeline in my head of where I'm going, what we could potentially be seeing, so that I'm educated when I'm in the moment. I think knowing as much as you can about the area you're in, the environment that this animal lives in will prepare you as much as possible to get your best shot. So, I want you to think about where is it you want to go? What kind of animal do you wanna photograph? And when you've kind of narrowed that down, I think it's important to research all you can about that animal. What kind of behaviors does it exhibit? So, you will know how to properly capture that animal and also tell its story. I also think a part of that is the more...

you research this animal, the more you feel like you're developing a relationship with it. And that again makes for a better story. I can't stress enough that Google is going to be your best friend. And with these kinds of things, you can't be lazy about it. I get some many DMs of like, "Hey, tell me where this is," and you can't go into it with that attitude. Sometimes researching these places takes weeks. It takes so much work, but you can definitely always find the answers that you're looking for. A place I love to go to, to find about locations is Facebook community groups. There's so many photographer community groups out there and if you're just respectful and help each other, people are usually willing to help you back. And Instagram and stuff like that, that's also a great place if I know like an animal is in the Arctic and I wanna figure out where it is, sometimes those accounts can help as well. I also believe that the more time you can spend in a place, the better your work will be. Sometimes it's pretty stressful for me because I go to these locations and I only get to be there for a day or two because of time limit, budget limit. In the perfect world, I would spend weeks or months there, because I firmly believe when you feel a connection to a place, you're able to spend time there and put everything you have into it, the stronger your connection is with that place, and the better outcome of your work will be. You can feel the connection in the photographs. For example, I spent almost a month in Iceland, and that was... I spent the whole time going around the whole country, meeting people, making friends, having locals show me around to different places, and Iceland will ever feel like a second home to me and have like a massive piece of my heart. I hope to also be developing this relationship with Alaska as the years go by. And the more people I come to befriend and the more wildlife I find, I'll feel more and more tied to this place, and I think my work will develop as a result of that. I also can't stress how much I kind of already mentioned it, but how much offending locals can be such a treasure, not in the sense of like, oh, they can just help you find a cool place and that's it. And that sometimes when you go to these places with people that have the connection to that place, it helps you to have that connection with that place. And then you also in turn, have a connection with them and they become a lifelong friend. And you're bonded over this moment, which is really cool. I think, with researching for where you're going and what you wanna shoot, it's also too important to keep in mind that you can't control everything. So, as much researching and prep goes into it, it's also important to have this balance of letting things happen in the moment. For example, you could spend a year planning a trip to Svalbard, to Greenland, or Antarctica, or Africa or any of these places. And then you get there and you have some bad luck, and you don't even see the animal you were hoping to see, like maybe you don't even see the polar bear, and that could be devastating, or you can have a different perspective and choose to focus on what is there, maybe there's an amazing like rare sea bird that no one sees often or maybe a whale crazily jumps off out of nowhere and you photograph that. Or if you don't even get anything, just appreciating the amazing landscapes that are there and focusing more on that. So, I think it's important as for as much planning as you do to prepare yourself to also just embrace the moment at the same time. A perfect example of researching locations and trip planning is actually this workshop. There were so many things to think about going into this. First, we kind of started with the seasons. When is the best season to see a certain type of wildlife in Alaska? We looked at polar bears, we looked at eagles, we looked at bears, caribou, walrus. And right now, it's September, it's fall here, and it's perfect for bears. It's just the end of salmon season, so they are super fat. They are stocking up on salmon. They have zero interest in humans. So, it's a perfect opportunity to photograph them. For this workshop, I decided that Katmai would be the best option because it's a pretty hot topic in Alaska right now as far as environmentalism and conservation. And again, it's just like the golden opportunity to see the fat bears all lazy and by the river. And hopefully tomorrow when we go, we can get pretty close and it'll be an amazing experience. The cool thing about wildlife and photographing it is that it is everywhere. You don't necessarily need to be in Africa going on a crazy extravagant safari. You can plan just a weekend warrior getaway adventure and something might pop up. So, it's more important to focus on what's around you, the nature that's right in front of you and find that connection with what you already have. And from there, branch out as you go. Wildlife photography and conservation go hand in hand. If you are photographing an animal, researching all about it, educating yourself all about it, documenting its story, if you don't grow in your desire to protect that animal, protect the environment it's living in, you're doing something wrong. The more you spend time with this animal, the more you can't help, but fall in love with, become obsessed with that animal and desire to protect it. So one of my biggest pet peeves I'm seeing increasingly grow on social media is photographers that are just getting into wildlife photography are going to places like a zoo, not really checking into the ethics of that place and how they're treating the animals. Photographing that animal, and then kind of posting or acting like they took that shot in the wild. And I think if you're doing that, you're kind of missing the whole point. Well, first of all, I don't know how successful you'll be because I feel like all you can do in this life is be honest and be authentic, and that makes you feel better about yourself but it also can draw people to you. So, if you are doing that, I would say, well, one, first of all, your morals are being compromised, and you could be supporting a corrupt place like a tiger king, but also you're missing a massive opportunity. You could be supporting an amazing place that is actually helping animals. And you could also be telling an amazing story about the hardships that that animal has survived. So, when I'm photographing an animal in a sanctuary, I do my best to try to disclose that I'm working with that sanctuary, or posting in the location section, the name of that sanctuary. I don't feel if you get a whole set of photos from there, that you're gonna be constantly posting. I don't feel like it's necessary to disclose it on every single post 'cause that can be kind of repetitive, but just use your good judgment and do what you think is right. Shooting sanctuaries has actually, or working with sanctuaries has become actually a massive part of my work. I found I was just in search in situations where I was in a lull, maybe I hadn't seen wildlife for a long time. And so I would just reach out to my local sanctuary to see if I could help them in any way. And it ended up leading to amazing opportunities where I'm up close and personal with this amazing animal and usually hearing some really incredible stories about what that animal has survived and overcome. So, rather than shooting at a zoo, I would encourage you to find amazing sanctuaries. One way to tell if a sanctuary is doing it right is to see if they release animals back into the wild, that usually is a good sign. Sometimes animals can't always be released back into the wild due to health issues or some sort of case by case scenario. But for the most part, releasing back into the wild is key. If they can't be released back into the wild, then researching, does this animal have a big enough space to live in, is it being taken care of properly? Is it being used for educational purposes rather than entertainment kind of like SeaWorld or that kind of a thing? So, I think one of my most favorite experiences that I've had so far was I was given the opportunity to photograph for the nonprofit Four Paws International Inc. So with working with them, it was an incredible opportunity to be a part of documenting Four Paws International Inc rescuing these two tigers that were being owned illegally. I couldn't help but think of like tiger king when I go back and think about this now, but they were born and raised illegally in Germany and they were being used for entertainment purposes and Four Paws rescued them, and they were kind of holding them at a sanctuary in Germany. And we were helping document the transfer of the tigers from Germany to South Africa. So, tigers are not native to South Africa. So that was at first a little like, huh, but they have such big awesome cat sanctuaries there that the tigers adapt really well to that environment, even though they're typically native to India and China, I believe. So, that was the craziest thing I've ever done. We were on an airplane with the tigers below and the flight attendants were freaking out and super excited. And the tigers adjusted well to the move to Africa. And it was just the most life changing experience that kind of skyrocketed me into caring about all of this and caring about conservation. And while I was there in Africa, we got to meet so many different animals and hear their stories. One in particular, one of my favorites was this leopard named Bakari. And he was, I think, taken from the wild as a cub, and then used for entertainment at Christmas parties. And there were all these photos of just like people having a Christmas party around a Christmas tree with this baby leopard like being used for photos, and it's pretty upsetting because these animals should just be in the wild, that's where they're most beautiful. So, his story's kind of cool because once the sanctuary rescued him and he was given his space, he actually reverted from being used to humans. He used to let people pet him and things like that. He actually reverted back to his wild nature and hated humans after that and didn't want anyone to touch him and literally became a wild cat again which was really a beautiful story to see. So, as you're developing your relationship with wildlife and researching and educating yourself and getting involved in sanctuaries, it becomes impossible to also not notice the fact that environments are changing and climate change is affecting the wildlife that you're photographing. And at this point it's not really a debate, it's real. And my kind of thought about it is I know a lot of people view climate change as this depressing, daunting, massive subject that they feel hopeless against. And it can feel that way, but it's all about trying to just do what you can do to just make little changes and have grace on yourself that no one is perfect. For example, let's say you go vegan, but yet you have to fly in a plane all the time for work, or you recycle like crazy, but you have to drive a car. No one's perfect, it's just about doing what you can, making little adjustments that help to take care of our planet for the future. Besides that, the biggest thing honestly that we can do is try to vote people into power that care about this planet, which is kind of hard to find sometimes. So if you're still skeptical, a thought that I come back to is let's say climate change is real, so you try to do your best to ease the burden that you're making on the planet. Great, you helped make the world a better place in your own little way, that's all you can do. And let's say you do what you can for the planet. You modify your lifestyle and climate change turns out to be not real. Well, what did you lose from that? Literally nothing. You still took care of this beautiful planet that we are gifted with, and you made it better for the future generations, so, good job either way. We cannot talk about conservation, wildlife photography, and go film in Katmai without talking about one of the biggest issues that's facing Alaska currently, which is the Pebble Mine. If you don't know what the Pebble Mine is, it is a project proposed to mine Katmai for its gold and silver. Katmai is a truly a special place. I cannot wait for you guys to see it in the next section. It provides 40% of the world's salmon. It is the largest salmon run in the entire planet. It provides over 14,000 jobs in ecotourism and to local natives in the community. And it also provides $1.5 billion from that every year. So, if this area is mined, everything will be affected, not just Alaska, but the entire world. So let's say maybe you've never been to Alaska or maybe you're never going to come. If you are gonna visit one day, it will affect your visit. And if you're not, well, it will affect the world being is that this is such a huge amount of a food source that we're talking about. So, the mine will have negative impacts on the water, the air, which will in turn affect the salmon, which in turn will affect the bears and all the wildlife and the humans that live off of this water. And these effects that I'm talking about will be negative. They will be devastating. They will cause harm to the whole ecosystem and human health. It's a massive hot topic here in Alaska right now. And so, I would encourage you if you're interested to check it out, do some research, sign petitions to help. And if you can ever come visit Katmai yourself, you should because it will definitely change you.