Winter's Here: Head for the Snow!

Well it has been a while since I took the virtual pen from the holster, in fact last time I posted it was waaay back in Autumn! But now that winter is here, why not head for the hills and explore the snow through your lens?

Three Mile Dam, Kiandra

Planning

Planning if critical for a successful, safe trip into the hills. It is not like a quick trip down to the local lookout or beach. It is a harsh, unforgiving environment that deserves respect. But good planning will also provide you with the best results.

For me, there's nothing more enticing than a fresh, untouched blanket of snow. For this reason, I plan on being there toward the tail end of the next snowfall or first thing the next day. Keep an eye out for the forecasts on websites like Weatherzone or the Bureau of Meteorology. For the more adventurous, you can check out the snow forecast models {here}.

The Cold

The cold is more than just taxing on your digits! In extremely cold weather you may find your batteries can loose their charge very, very quickly. In short space your battery that normally gives you 700-800 shots can pull up stumps after only a couple of hundred. The key here is to try and keep your batteries warm, by any means possible (I heard of one wedding photographer keeping her batteries in the straps of her bra!).

A great asset in battling the cold is fingerless mittens. These nifty little things have a mitten type pocket that flips over your fingers, keeping them toasty warm. When you need the dexterity back, simply flip the pocket back and there are your toasty digits ready to rock and roll.

Another common problem when going from cold to warm environments is condensation. Pretty quickly the glass elements on your lens can get a nice layer of fog and while these can make for atmospheric throwbacks to the 80's the condensation can pose a threat to your gear.

While there isn't a great deal you can do to eliminate the fogging up of lenses - other than keeping everything warm - once you're done throw a couple of those gel sachets from shoe boxes in your camera bag. These will absorb the moisture from your gear and help avoid problems down the track.

Exposure

Eucumbene River, Kiandra.

Snow is bright. Very bright. Anyone who skis or boards will now just how bright the snow can be. Unfortunately this can play havoc with your exposure meter, resulting in underexposed scenes. Just keep this in mind when you're shooting and perhaps dial in a bit of exposure compensation.

Something I recently tried was exposure bracketing scenes and then blending the exposures into an HDR. This just seemed to really bring back the scene to how I remembered it.

There's a couple of things to watch though: very quickly you can lose the snow to a muddy grey colour. Don't forget that snow is bright white (unless you come across a patch that has recently had a wombat relieve itself on)! It's supposed to be borderline blown and it just really lacks if you move too far away from that.

Alpine heath and rock,
Thredbo

Black and White?
Don't dismiss black and white. In fact I think black and white lends itself pretty well to snowy scenes as they're already largely monochramatic. Black and white also allows the viewer to focus on the textures and patterns present within the scene; deep blue skies, gnarled tree trunks or lichen covered rocks are some of the elements you'll come across up in the hills.

Reflector!

Lilly enjoying her first real experience
of snow, Mt Selwyn

Having what is essentially an endless reflector underneath you can yield some pretty ethereal results, especially when you're photographing people.

A funny thing about the brain is that it remembers what it expects to see. And when you're outside your brain expects to see shadows under your chin, nose, eyebrows etc. But with this huge reflector sitting under you, the shadows are largely filled in resulting in said ethereal look. Throw in a bit of fill flash and you can get some quite flattering even light!

So that's all I have for now. All the usual tips, tricks and rules (to be obeyed or broken) for landscapes still apply. Have you made a trip down to the snow? I'd love to see some results if you have!

As always, make sure you head over to my FB page to keep up to date with new blogs, photos and other little tidbits of fact, fiction and fun.

Cheers,
Will