Seriously Clever Travel Tips for Photographers

If you’re about to head out on an epic travel photography adventure, or even a short little vacation, no matter where you go there are amazing pictures just waiting to be taken. And you don’t need a bunch of fancy equipment to capture incredible, memorable shots. Photographer Ray Demski takes us on a little trip to Venice and offers some seriously useful travel photography tips:

Preparation

  • Make your camera look old and beat up so nobody wants to steal it (don’t actually beat it up, you just need to put some worn out tape on it!).
  • If you have a business card, take a picture of it so if you lose your camera and someone finds it, they can contact you.
  • Pack light. Just bring the bare essentials so you aren’t lugging equipment around everywhere and draw less attention to yourself.
  • Take a climbing sling to use as a DIY hand strap or a tripod strap.

travel photography preparation

Remove Tourists from Photos

How often do you stand there, prepped to take the shot, waiting for people to get out of the frame? This is a pretty awesome little trick that many people don’t know about.

  1. Set up your camera on a tripod and take 10–15 shots of the same location.
  2. In Photoshop, go to File > Scripts > Statistics, select Median and upload your photos.
  3. This will automatically remove all the people in the pictures.

remove people photoshop

Find a Unique Angle

  • Get some cool aerial shots by throwing a GoPro in the air.
  • Tape a GoPro to stuff around you to get a different perspective.

unique angle photo

Back Up Your Photos

  • Invest in a good, strong hard drive.
  • Use the 3-2-1 Method: Make three copies of your photos on two media types and keep one in a separate location.
  • You might even want to mail a copy home.

Other Tips

  • If you find a cool frame, wait for the right moment.
  • Get up early. Sure, you’re on vacation, but don’t miss the amazing light by sleeping in every morning!

sunrise lighting photo

Gear Used

What are your best travel photography tips?

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6 responses to “Seriously Clever Travel Tips for Photographers”

  1. David Fish says:

    File >Scripts > Statistics. In “Choose Stacks Mode” dialogue, select “Median.”

  2. Debbie Borato says:

    Do these questions get answered???

  3. Lee Shipley says:

    Or do as I did for my 33 day 900km walk across the north of Spain and go really light. I took over a thousand photos documenting my journey unobtrusively and with comparative ease. I used a good quality smartphone (Sony Xperia 3), the remarkably sophisticated and straightforward Snapseed 2.0 for in-phone editing, a good size and fast SDcard for local storage and Google Photos for my permanent searchable archive. I chronicled via Blogger.
    No, I did not get magazine quality but I was able to quickly articulate my journey for those who cared with only 120 grams of pocketable equipment.
    Think about it.

  4. Hennie Ludik says:

    Thank you for the tips, is a pitty I received it 2 weeks to late, we just returned from Venice

    With the removal of tourists I am working with PS 6, and the menu is not the same – can you please help

    Thanks and regards from South Africa

  5. Debbie says:

    Love the remove tourists from the photo. However, I have PS Elements and LR6, any way to do this in one or the other?

  6. John Sandstedt says:

    I opened my copy of Photoshop CS6 and tried to follow the instruction above for removing tourists. Note I didn’t have any image files waiting to be uploaded. Notwithstanding, File > Scripts > ????. There was no link identified as Statistics to get to Median.

    Is this a link in Photoshop CC?

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