Capturing the Long Hikes in Photos

It's been a really long winter, and if you're a hiker, you're probably itching to get back on the trail - and so are we! So as we are planning our spring and summer hikes, we decided to take a few moments and talk with Eric about his role in recording our adventures and stories in photos. Eric has been with us since the West Highland Way, and the amazing photos on our website (and soon on our new video podcasts), calendars, and social media are serious inspiration for any hiker!

Come learn about how Eric prepares for the hikes, how he uses photos to tell the story of our adventures, and why Michael is not allowed to take photos!

Check Out The Photos at: www.thelongwayspodcast.com/hikes/capturing-the-long-hikes-in-photo

For more from our hiking trio, follow us on Facebook , Instagram and YouTube.

Do you have a story from a long trail that you would like to talk about? Or are you interested in having us as a guest on your hiking or podcast? Then we would love to talk to you! Drop us a message at hikewithus@thelongwayspodcast.com

Transcript

Hey everyone, welcome back to the long ways podcast, and I'm Michael and I'm Eric, and Eric's here with us today. We're missing Devin, who is on assignment elsewhere. We're not really sure what elsewhere is, but he's assigned there. So Eric and I are going to talk today a lot about photography, and if you've been following our website, okay, or our articles, or our podcasts, or any of the stuff we're doing on social media, you're going to see some pretty amazing pictures. And one thing I can tell you is the fact that I did not take any of those, and I'm sure we'll get into that at some point today about my amazing photography abilities. But we're here, really to talk with Eric. So Eric is my best friend in the world. We've hiked the entire entire world together, it seems, now, and many times we've gone hiking, and Eric is usually carrying about a 50 pound pack of camera equipment with him. And so we're going to figure out what he's doing with that and some of the things he's excited about, and some advice Eric may have to to people who want to take photographs on these long trails. So first of all, Eric, obviously, from the background, you're not in Iowa. So where? Why don't you tell me where that picture is first to start?

Well, you asked me to grab a picture, and this is the first one I came across in Dropbox, it was in Montana, actually on a family vacation. So anyone who travels with me knows that when I'm traveling, I like to get up early. I love sunsets and sunrises, so I sat on this porch in this Airbnb for three days straight for a break in the clouds in the morning, and I actually got one snap that was really, really good. So that's the sort of photographer I

like to be. I see a

potential and I'll stalk it, and until I finally get what I'm looking for, pretty relentless, yeah.

Well, we'll talk a little bit about the stalking thing when it comes to some birds and stuff in a few moments, okay, but, but, yeah, I remember we were in Maggie Valley one time doing the same type of thing. And you must applaud it every morning out for the exact spot we had to look at. And then finally, one morning, we got an amazing, an amazing set of sunrises. It was just absolutely gorgeous there for it, but several the days it was very, very fleeting. So you're very patient when it comes to these, much more so than me, you know, walk out, click, click, thumb, camera backwards, you know, all sorts of possible possibilities. So, so trail hiking little bit different, huh?

Oh, for sure, yeah, especially in a group you know,

folks like to stop

or don't stop. I like to stop and take pictures. And when you're on a timeframe, that's really kind of inconvenient for folks sometimes, but we've, I think, over the years, come up with a process

where, you know, it makes sense to stop.

Every once in a while, we kind of feel out the day. See, you know, see what it is, more frequencies, less frequencies, that sort of thing. And sometimes I just say, Oh, guys, I got to stop. And I never, usually get me any feedback,

not from you, but

sometimes I just got to stop. Sometimes I can't pass up a moment.

I love it, because, first of all, Devin is very much a fast hiker. Okay, he really is. He hikes very quickly. And I like taking our time, you know, more, okay, especially being a little bit older, and some of our trails tend to be straight up, so it's kind of nice to stop and, you know, you're like, I need to take a I need to take a picture. Here, normally, what you hear is, thank God for me. Okay, my pack comes off and I'm on the ground, you know, I figure you're going to take the picture. It's going to look gorgeous. You don't need my input. I could just lay there and maybe die outside the trail at that point, and then get up and move on. But so, I mean, some of these trails we are in, some pretty rugged, some pretty rugged areas, you know, to get some of these photos. And so why don't we just start with, like, what do you carry? You know, what do you carry? You know, on on these hikes, it's a little bit different than, you know, car camping, where you can, you know, bring a ton of gear and set up and take a picture like you're sitting in Montana, behind you.

It changed. It has changed a lot over the years. As I've I've learned more the early years I took everything, like wide angle, telephoto, like all the things, and you

learn pretty quickly

that you don't always, you don't always need everything.

For example, like when you're you're in

the in the jungle, you really don't need

a wide angle lens.

When you're on the coastline, like the picture in your background, you don't really need a telephoto lens. So depending on where we're going, I. I'll be really cognizant about the lenses that I'm thinking about or contemplating taking with me. Do I need multiple wide angle lenses? Can I use one, you know, to lessen the weight? I've learned to do recently is take the tripod and hang it off the side of the pack, and then I actually pack my water bottle in the opposite side of my bag to sort of even out the weight on my back, and then I have, you know, one or two camera or lenses, and the

camera in the back of my pack

that has worked out the best for me. I mean, it evens out my this weight distribution, and I actually find that I can get away with maybe one lens, if not too on most of my anymore, and that gives me room for snacks and everything else in my bag. And I've also learned how to use the water cover on my bag too.

I was gonna come to

that very handy over the years. But definitely, you definitely want to have, you know, protection for your for your camera gear, and I also don't hike very often with my camera in my hand, just in case I would fall.

You know, there's a lot of times where there's,

you know, scramble or whatever.

But if you if you do decide to do that, always make sure that you have your lens caps on, because that's the first thing that can happen. Is your lens could get cracked on the ground, or even if you don't drop your camera, it could get hit. But hit. But I tend to not

walk with my camera in my hand.

Yeah, I know we've had a lot of, a lot of issues with water, you know, just, you know, we tend to hike in places where either there is no water and or there is so much water that, you know, it's crazy, like Scotland, a couple other places we've liked, you know, even especially Scotland, but in Ireland as well, just, you know, torrential, torrential rains and things like that. And I know you've got a pack which is water resistant, right? It's a, it's an ape, APE ace case, yeah, it's but you usually cover it up with a

with a with another additional cover on it, right?

It's got a built in one which

but I also keep a Ziplock of ziplock bags in my bag inside, so if it ever gets to the point where it is absolutely pouring or you can't get away from the water. I take the Ziploc bags and put my lenses and cameras inside of zip locks inside my bag. So I've always got, I've always got extra ones, and then I will always air out my case. At night, I'll take everything out make sure that it does get dried out.

You absolutely don't want any moisture inside

of those electronics. Yeah, because

you've got a really nice camera cannon.

Yeah, I've, I think this is,

this is my third cannon in a row. I use the 5d

right now.

I've had really good luck with cannons over the years. I have not made the move to outside of DSLRs, yet the mirrorless cameras not, not because I don't want to. I just, you know, I really have so much invested in that and the attack I have now, it's really hard to make that move to to a new set and start over with new lenses and everything, but the quality is really good with those cameras. But I really, I can't complain with the quality that I have today.

So we're getting ready to go on a hike, you know, you're planning this out and things like that. But then the days we're on the hike, I just want to kind of pick your brain, you know, hopefully the photographers who are listening like, how do you know where you want to take a picture at? What is it? You know? What's when you I mean, when you're saying stop, you know, often you'll, you'll take a picture of something, you know, and then we'll be sitting back at the room later on, and you know, you're seeing something in this is area that I'm not, you know, we just be we're just hiking along. And don't get me wrong, the VISTAs are always fantastic unless, of course, we're on the Dingle way. And you know that the highlight of our trip that time was the Three Sisters, right? And that was a day we could not see each other six feet in front of us on the trail. The rain was so, so bad, but most of the time, you know you're right. Your choices of these photo places like the ones sitting behind me, Isle of Skye. This is an amazing photo that you took, one of my favorites, just because the greens and the colors and things like that. And these are not filtered, as far as I can tell, these are, this is what we saw, you know, this is, this, is that that fantastic? So this, like, when you're hiking, you know, you kind of get the mindset of one foot after the other. It's, it's a long hike. We're going to do 100 miles, you know, we're going to, here's, you know, days that you don't want to hike, but you seem to find a way to like capture these crazy moments. So what are you thinking?

It's not, it's not really a science. It's like this, in this particular moment that you're looking at here, that was the remnants of an old Scottish castle on the left hand side, and when I walked around that corner, just the way it was framed up. Up in the light. I was like, This is the moment I want to capture. I just think, when I'm on the trail, I'll see something that's like, Oh, this is something I this is a story that I want to be able to tell,

and it will tell

itself and in the picture, not in words. Like I just, I feel like I see a moment, and I'm like, oh, I want to capture this. Or I love the way that light is framed right now, like, behind you, like, it's, it was very rare that day for us to see a sun beam shine through, and it was just a moment that the clouds broke, and I was like, Oh, I this is something I got to capture. It's, it's, that's one. That's the spontaneous part. But then the one in my background is like, I know that there's, I know that this is going to be a good picture. Like, I can see that this is going to be a good picture, and I wait for it. Sometimes it's spontaneous, sometimes it's, it's very well premeditated, or I know that there's going to be an opportunity here, yeah.

Like, you like to call it, this could be some drama, right?

And what I mean by that is, you know, a lot of people will take a picture and it's a nice picture like that. You know, there's some of the best pictures I've ever taken are not of, you know, a landscape. It's, it's a memory with maybe a loved one or something like that. But just taking a picture of a blank sky or something, it's just it. You know, you can add more depth to this. You know, if you look at this particular picture, you know, in your background, you've got a foreground, a mid ground, and a background. In the background is that dramatic sky. You've got

that beautiful field

in the in the middle ground, you've got the sea, and then you've got up close in that, in that old building that's been there for centuries. It's like there's so much in that story that your your eyes tell you right away that that's an interesting photo.

Yeah, there's so many that came from the from the Great Glen way trip, but the Isle of sky was just it looked like it was going to be a crummy day. You know, when we got we headed out that day because, but, like you said, the clouds and everything, and then the greenness, and then we have all these rock formations. They just every time we seem to have turned the corner. We had a private guide for this one, which I highly recommend, because we could stop being where we wanted to and avoid the big busses. You know, he would tell us not to get out with the 3000 tourists. You know, we head up a little bit further to like this was one of those spots. But then just the views were just unbelievable, and the colors were just crazy. Yeah, so we have done a lot of hikes together. So on these hikes, what would you say would be the best one for photography, for for the you found and but also which one do? Which one has pictures that you that you are like, this is like, one of my best moments. This is something that I just absolutely,

totally impossible question to answer. I don't, I don't have any favorite photos. I have standouts from every trip that we've taken. Of course, it just when you, when you think about taking photos, you you just have to be like I said, you have to be in the in the mindset that you are trying to tell a story that can't be, for example, if you were to tell a story about your trip, you know you're going to tell your friends about the highlights of your trip, and it's going to be very descriptive, and you're going to use words. I just do this opposite, or do the same thing

with pictures, like

take pictures of the moments that you want to share

with other folks. And I'm, I'm lucky in the in the fact that I do have Lightroom for post processing. You know, I go through, I spend the time to go through and edit my photos in Lightroom, and that gives me the opportunity to sort of put my signature on moments. Like, there are opportunity, like, for the picture in your background, like, that's how I saw that moment, and, like you said, that's how you remember that moment. But the raw photos don't always tell the same thing, and I'll be the first to admit that I never taken a photography class in my life. I don't know what every button on my camera does, and I don't think that you you need to go into photography thinking that there's enough tutorials online now that tell you how to use a camera, and a lot of this technology and cameras will do the work for you, to be honest. But if you're willing to spend a little bit of time and processing. You can even do this on your phone now, like the apps on your phone can allow you to to really make the photos your own, but you just take take the pictures of the moments that are special to you. And I think when you put your personal touch on those, then people will see you know, they'll see how important that moment was to you. And without

words mountains or coast, what do you like?

Again? I like to adapt. I'm always looking for a special moment. Photographers usually depend on light, right? It's whatever, whatever the moment brings you in that particular. Your example, in your background, you know, we had a break right then, you know, had that not been there, that photo might not have been as interesting. So on the coast, one of the things I like to do is use the water to highlight the colors of the the land, right in in Turkey, the the turquoise was also it was accentuated by the sort of rusty mineral color of the sand, and that red versus that green was just electric like so you learn to adapt your style to what the environment gives you. So I love the coast because, you know, it gives you such dramatic changes in colors. But to contrast that with Scotland, you know, we it was, it was a lot of gray. So I actually did a few black and white photos that I don't get to do a lot of. So I'm always adapting. And I think that's, you know, photography is an art, and you should think about it that way. You should think about, how can I capture this moment and tell the story in a different way, like, utilize what the environment is giving you to really make a dramatic photo. And I think that's, that's the most fun for me. So I like, I like the actual adaption of going from different different landscapes, because it challenges me, but it also gives me opportunity to do some stuff that I don't always get to do, right?

Yeah. And it really shows, you know, I mean, the way you do capture some of these is, you know, one of my big jokes is to sit, you know, we sitting around the room that night, or sitting around having a beer, and you're playing around on, you know, getting your photos ready. And I look over and I ask you, I usually ask you a question, like, where's that? Where did we do that? At it? And you're like, you'll say something. And I'm looking at my phone like I was staying alongside of you. What did? Well, I didn't see this. You know, I'm the biologist, right? I mean, you know, I'm looking at storks and things like that. So, so, which brings me, though, okay to I know you love being a landscape photographer, but you have really done pretty well with the with wildlife too. I'm telling some stories about some wildlife, and your your your photos, your wildlife photos are on the covers of four of my books, right? Jaguars and crab spiders, okay? And obviously the storks of Portugal. So I want to go back to the storks of Portugal, just to, just to kind of, because we've been talking a lot about the storks of Portugal, and, you know, everything, but some of your photos of those storks are just absolutely amazing, and some of the things you were patient enough to capture, you know, as we were hiking so, so tell me about, tell me about those storks.

Well, the storks is fun, because

along the coast of Turkey, we knew that storks

were part of the environment, but

those are not sea

birds or shore birds. Be To be honest, it was a perplexing story for all of us, like we were trying to figure out why they were there. But they these storks are massive, and they create these massive nests on the shoreline, and again, with the dramatic colors of the stone granite and the rest of the rocks there,

and then the the sea, and just the

story of the birds I get, I get really focused on trying to

tell a story. And

I'm really, I like to be really into the moment and observe what's around me.

I think that's one thing

about long distance hiking that people lose sometimes, like you get to the fact that you have to hike 12 miles, and you just get laser focused on head down, marching 12 miles. And, you know, really, really recommend that you take the time to, you know, put your head up and look around question, what's happening around you, like, be in the moment. Be so you can see those things. This stuff is happening all around you. There's there's things every step of the way that you could be seen. You just, it's, it's really, really

easy to get lost in the moment.

And I just, it's kind of a gift. I like to, you know, just really be immersed in the environment when, even when I'm hiking around my local trails, some of those, some of those pictures are taken on my local trails, like

the the crab spider, like,

yeah, just have to be aware of what's going on and just be the moment. Like, yeah, there's so much to see. There's so much to learn about, about you. I mean, you even the background that you see there in your the castle there, the ruins of that castle, there's, there's moss and grass growing out of the rocks there. Like question that, how did that get there? Make that something that you talk about?

Yeah, we'll go back. Go back to the storks again. One of the things I've really found from one of your photographs is that we were wondering what they were doing out there, obviously, and there's no major predators. And I know we've, we've talked a lot about this, but you took this one picture, this one time was a zoom picture. Remember? It was like, and all sudden, we were like, looking at what it had in its mouth. Yeah, right. And it was. A big bug right from the field behind us, or the fields, you know, the agricultural fields behind us. And it's like they're not even, it dawned on us, they're not even fishing out there. So why are they out there? There's no predators, right? They're not eating fish, right? They're they're flying in and eating in, eating from the inland. And that began literally, like, another series of, like, 200 photos, probably okay, which ended up giving you the the trail named the storker, for, for for the for the Portuguese trip, but, but more, just trying to recapture this. And we, you know, the conversations we have based upon literally, one photo. You know, we were in, we were in Belize, and we saw a green toucan, okay, you know, eating this red berry, right? And I don't know how long you and I stood there to try to figure out what he was doing with this berry, okay? And in the scouting heat, okay, of the jungle, trying to get a photo of, and you have these amazing photos of of this, you know, him darting in and out of the nest, right? And just just to question that a photo generates in the discussions you and I have from it later on, I just think you're capturing a moment, but it's opening up all this curiosity, like, Why? Why is that like?

And that's exactly kind of the point I was trying to make earlier. Like, your picture should tell a story. Like, yeah, it should be interesting. It should have depth. It should just like you do with words. Like, pictures, to me, are my words. You know, ever since I was a kid, it's how I told a story, and it's just how I express myself. I love to tell a story with a picture and not necessarily with the words, yeah.

So then let's just think about this, you know. And what type of advice would you give somebody, you know, they're getting ready to go out on a on a long trail hike, right? You know, they're maybe, maybe they're backpacking it through. Maybe they're site to site hiking it like we are, right? And, you know, and they wanted, they want to do some photography, and yet, they're gonna, they're gonna, you know, they're, they're gonna do a weight, cost ratio here of what they should do and everything. I mean, one of the, one of the nice things with the three of us hiking is that sometimes, if we're looking, if we know we're gonna have a big foot, big photographic day where there's gonna be a lot of great views, we can actually, you can take more stuff and we transfer stuff over to Devin, okay, if we never transfer anything to me, right? I'm usually the one shedding stuff like crazy, you know, losing stuff like, all over the place anyways. But, um, you know, we can transfer some stuff over to Devin to do it. But if you're, if you're, if you're getting ready to go on one of these hikes, or maybe just solo hiking, you want to be a photographer, what would you say where we have the bare minimum equipment you should bring with you, right?

Yeah, it's, it's really a personal decision. I think the technology in phones now is so impressive, like, I don't, I don't necessarily think you need to go out and buy, you know, a big

package camera.

I mean, if you're just getting into this, I don't know that that's completely necessary, and it adds a lot of weight. You know, if you're not going to be able to, if you don't know how to use all those tools, it's might not be the best move. But I think the no matter what you do, think about weatherproofing whatever you have, whether it's your own cell or your phone or it's a camera, they make really good covers for all that stuff. Now, and I don't know a lot of phones are water resistant to begin with, but have something

that can protect your electronics either way.

If you are going to take a lot of photos and you want the best quality, maybe get

a tripod

of some sort. If you're going to do long exposures, I know some phones will do that now, the less vibration you can have in a photo, the better quality it's going to be, no matter what. And that allows you to take some photos of yourself to, you know, some time lapse photos, if you want to, you know, get in some of the photos itself, maybe a small tripod, something lightweight that you can use. But you know, if you if you are going to go down the big package camera, think about the environment you're going to be in in that particular case,

like in both photos in our backgrounds

here, a wide angle lens. If you're going to be in wide open spaces, wide wide angle lens makes a lot of sense. You may only need one. It's probably not there to have a whole bunch of them, and again, a nice tripod to help you with that as well.

But in regards to the photos, think about that,

that that layers right? And do you have a foreground, a mid ground and a background? Like, think about creating some depth with your photos, and then also telling that story. You know, when I look at this photo here, like, this is an old castle, you could see, you could tell the history in this picture, because obviously the ruins. But, you know, you you automatically get the view of, oh, you know, the Vikings coming across that Bay and what that might have looked like, like? It's telling a story without even knowing it.

Yeah, you have an amazing photo at the start of our calendar we built for the Great Glen way of that wreck just outside of Fort William, right? And, and every time I show that picture to anybody, the conversations like, Where'd it come from? It's. Really, it's really an uninteresting wreck with it, with a really interesting story. I mean, the wreck itself is just a vote that was abandoned. It's just all it is. But how it got there, right? And those are, you know, it's just, it was just a boat. It wasn't really anything fantastic. But, you know, it has graffiti on it the way you capture that makes it look like a real, you know, there's a whole certain story that happens with it, and I think it's pretty amazing the way you do that. We are getting ready to head to Bavaria next Okay, and I think we'll get some nice pictures as we head towards the Alps this time, hopefully we're staying out of the Alps. They're really tall, but we're hiking. We're hiking on the King Ludwig way coming up. So that takes more photos. So anything else you want to share with anybody about about photos in this, in our

little mini I would just say that you don't necessarily need to be a photographer to take good photos. Just, it's just, just put the thought into it. Consider that the whole story, aspect of what you're actually taking and I think it's a very personal thing. So there's, there shouldn't be the necessary, a stigma about a good picture versus a bad picture. It's just perspective, right? You know, find an interesting perspective. You're talking about the boat, you're talking about this background of yours right now. Like it's perspective. Had I scooted, you know, three yards to the right and just took a picture of the bay? It had been a nice picture, but added some depth to it makes a it's a different story. Like, think about your perspective.

Yeah. I agree. Yep. And so what we're going to do here, adding a long ways, is we're going to mix things up a little bit. We've been encouraged to put some videos of our podcast up on our YouTube site. So on that place, and also on our website, I'm going to be sharing some of these photos that Eric's been talking about. There's a get a chance to see them, and we have lots of photos up on our site as well. So if you have an interest in any of these, there'll be a link to contact Eric. Okay and ask him questions. Okay about, ask him anything about photography where we are starting. And ask me anything feature on, on the long ways, where Devin will be handling like questions about the trails, logistics, things like that. So definitely reach out to us if you have questions about anything we're doing, equipment. Photos themselves. If you'd like to get one of Eric's photos onto a metal plate, I have a metal What do you call it, Eric? The metal frames. What do you call it? The metal piece, right? I have them all over my house, and pretty amazing ones from from our travels. And they really, the colors, really pop on a on metal. Just really, really gorgeous. So we are going to be doing some summer hiking this year, okay, both individually, okay, and hopefully get it together for a couple quick trips before our September long ways Okay, into Germany this year. So you'll be hearing more from us. Eric, any last words?

No, I just appreciate the opportunity. And like you said, if there's any questions, I'm happy to answer them. Look forward to maybe seeing some submissions too. If you have a nice photo you want to send

us, yeah, definitely. If you have some photos from some of the trails that we've hiked on, or your own, definitely, or tag us on one of our social media okay? And I'll make sure. We'll make sure Eric is just to see it. We're on Facebook and YouTube, and we have not ventured into the Tiktok world. I have a feeling it's probably not too far away for us now, but Instagram, Facebook and YouTube are our three big ones. But so I'm gonna wrap it up for today on our next one. We'll be talking with more with Devin, with it, ask me anything, and talking about our Ask Me Anything campaign. So if you do have any questions, go ahead and fire those off to us through our website, and we will get to those in our next podcast coming up. So Eric, thanks for joining us. Okay, and we will see you soon on the trail. You.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai