Taking snow photos may seem like a daunting task. After all, taking photos after a fresh snowfall, especially with snowy landscapes can make for tremendous landscape photograph. When photographing snow having the right DSLR camera and camera settings are crucial. As you will be dealing with weather conditions making for harsher lighting conditions such as the reflections from the bright white snow. Therefore, understanding you’re in camera settings such as shutter speed, aperture priority mode and the f-stop, ISO, white balance will assist you greatly in taking beautiful snowy scenes photos. These can be set via Autofocus which will let the camera determine the optimal settings for your photography scene, or manual mode as professional photographers like to use which gives the user complete control over these settings.
With winter landscape photography it is important to remember that you will most likely be dealing with cold temperatures, overcast skies and harsher lighting conditions. Capturing photos and videos of the snow scene in the winter wonderland of your shooting environment, can still get you great photos that could be on your digital camera or Apple iPhone as an example.
Getting the correct exposure can not only show off a great photo but also help you in your photography journey. Therefore, we would like to provide some snow photography tips and tutorials which will have your snow photos ready to upload to social media and share with your friends, family and subscribers.
When shooting winter snow photography, there are several key metrics to keep in mind which can help you ensure that you get the right exposure compensation with hopefully minimal photoshop needed. These are both hardware and software items which will factor into getting that fantastic exposure.
Start by getting your hands on a great digital camera which is not only great for winter and snow photographs but for all year round. We recommend a top notch DSLR camera from manufacturers like Canon. Having the best camera cannot be overstated.
One of the newer ways of taking landscape photography is with drones. Check out some great drones from class leaders like DJI which give an amazing depth of field due to its ariel photography.
The last thing you want is an overexposed image. Keep watch on your histogram of photos taken with your digital camera to review and make any changes to how you approach your photography for a consistently good exposure.
You can use metering mode say “SPOT Metering” or center camera metering, which is great for portrait photography, especially with the bright light of the sun reflecting off the snow. So, this is a good setting when shooting in a high contrast environment. This can still be done when the camera is set to manual mode. However, autofocus may be more amenable to beginners.
Watch the time of day you want to conduct your photoshoot?
Hit up those amazing early morning snow photos of snowflakes falling gently on your subject in the snow scene for some beautiful additions to a photo album that can be uploaded to social media with confidence.
A great time of day to shoot your winter photography is the golden hour. This is the period when first hour of light after sunrise, and the last hour of light are viewable in the sky. This is during sunset times and sunrise times when the color of the sky goes from red and orange to yellow. The beauty of this after a snowfall can really capture some great photos with fresh snow lining the street, trees and lawns and if you have a subject for portrait photos you can make for some jaw dropping winter photography.
Another interesting time of day for photographing the intricates of winter photography is the Blue Hour. The Blue Hour is the time of day immediately before sunrise and after sunset where the sky takes on a blue hue. Photographing the blue sky accompanied with freshly lined snowy streets will make for some great landscape photography. Keep in mind that photographing during this time of day which may be overcast, and you may experience some rain or a drizzle prior to the snowfall as the temperatures would be lower than when they rise during the day, so a rain cover for your camera and lens would be quite useful.
Speaking of the temperatures, as you will be dealing such cold environments, you may want to put your camera in an airtight plastic bag which can be easily stored in a for added protection in a camera bag, keeping it closer to room temperature for longevity. You might need the portability of a camera bag as you conduct your winter photoshoot from a further location from where you are. You should have a lens hood as well to protect your camera lens which can be a hefty investment from dust debris and water splashes.
The best DSLR cameras will have multiple viewing options on it from an LCD screen to a Vari-Angle Tilt EVF or “electronic viewfinder” so when photographing a specific area in your shooting scene, you can hone in on your subject in a specific portion of the frame and get an amazing exposure focusing in on every detail of your subject.
Attach a filter to your DSLR camera for additional light adjustments that you may face in getting your photograph A polarizing filter, ultraviolet light filter will help with bright lighting exposures. The UV filter will help protect your lens from moisture, scratches, and damage acting as a sort of lens hood in this regard.
Take your photos while using a light meter. A light meter can detect the amount of light hitting either the camera sensor or the image subject. By following the information provided by the light meter, you can select the settings recommended for your camera covering (aperture, shutter speed, ISO and white balance) to get the best image. Use this when shooting in manual mode.
A reflector should be part of your camera staple, to help redirect light to fill in shadows and get a softer light for the subject of your photo. So, in a snowy environment, this will help you get a softer warmer light which can really highlight a subject during a light snowfall showing beautiful snowflakes falling around your subject for an amazing exposure to show off on your social media site.
Because many of your snow photos will be taken during the day when there is bright light, you will want to use a fast shutter speed, which will allow for less light to hit your cameras sensor. This will help you avoid washed out images and result in sharper images.
If your snow photoshoot is taking place when the sky is overcast and there is much less natural light, you may want to opt for a long exposure to get every bit of light you need to hit your camera’s sensor.
Try and using your camera in manual mode versus Autofocus. As we previously mentioned this will give you greater control of the in-camera settings. For example, if you are dealing with a lighting scene which has abundance of natural light, you can manually adjust the ISO to a lower setting as well as the aperture priority mode which will allow for less of the natural light from the bright blue sunny sky to hit your camera’s image sensor. This will help considerably when taking snow photos as there is usually quite a bit of reflections from the white snow.
Like on an Apple iPhone which allows you to shoot in RAW files which are uncompressed and allow for the most detailed post processing you can perform on a photo, this is a great way for photographing snow. Besides for the built-in post processing app that may be included with your DSLR camera or iPhone, you give Adobe Lightroom a look. In addition to editing images, it gives you templates and ideas for future photography sessions.
As you winter photography will most likely take place outdoors, you may be on the go and want to ensure that your DSLR camera has good battery life. Camera batteries are typically Lithium-Ion, so there would be a normal degradation in the battery life capacity on your camera, over time in general.
However, when dealing with extreme weather conditions and bitter winter cold, battery performance may be even further affected in a negative way. That is why we recommend having spare batteries. You don’t want to run into an issue where you are in the middle of some great winter photography and must stop because your camera battery died. You can also look at portable power banks to charge on the go, these have come a long way with many having enough mAh to even power 240V outlets. However, in essence a portable power bank will usually get you somewhere between 10,000 mAh and 50,000 mAh. It all depends on your needs and what you are charging. If you are just charging an iPhone them 10,000 mAh is plenty to get a couple of full charges for your phone, however for photography you may want to look at one of the more powerful power banks.
It’s not a bad idea to get some over the counter hand warmers which usually last about 8-10 hours. These would be very helpful when taking snow photos and are spending a significant amount of time outside.
Taking photographs and video recordings in cold weather may put stress on your camera, so check to make sure that all your camera gear is packed back in safely and securely in a camera bag before and after usage.
It’s January!! Snowfalls with beautiful snowflakes are abound. Utilize the tips and tutorials and get your hands on the right products!!