Behind The Shot

Behind the Shot: Sky Pilot Pano

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I was tweaking a few galleries on my website today when I came across this panoramic photo of Sky Pilot mountain in Squamish, BC. The smaller peak on the right-hand side is called the Co Pilot. This photo was taken from a viewing deck outside the lodge at the top of the Squamish gondola, just a few seconds before sunset. You can see the last light of the day is just kissing a few parts of the mountain, but largely the whole thing is in the shade by this point. Something about the symmetry of this scene made me want …

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Behind the Shot: New Year’s Eve in Whistler

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Happy New Year folks! In this BTS post I’m going to be talking about a nightscape photo of the Whistler, BC, that was taken right as the clocks ticked over into 2018. Equipment Used for this Shot Canon 5D Mark IV Canon 24-70 f/2.8 L II Really Right Stuff TVC-24L with BH-55 ballhead Lexar Professional 128GB CF Cards Adobe Lightroom CC Having just returned from a two-week vacation over the holiday period the day before, I decided to get right back to work on December 31st. Mountains of fresh snow had just fallen in the valleys around my home town …

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Behind the Shot: Milky Way Surprise

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This photo of the Milky Way rising over Wedge Mountain in Whistler had a little surprise in it when I looked closely through my shots on a computer. What at first might appear to be a shooting star in the centre of the frame, is in fact called an Iridium Flare, and it’s caused by sunlight bouncing off the solar arrays of a passing satellite! It’s the first time I’ve ever captured a photo of this phenomenon, so I thought it would be a fun one to share. Equipment Used for This Shot Canon 5D Mark IV Canon 24-70 f/2.8 …

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Nice Lighting! So Simple…

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I took this photo for a review of the MindShift BackLight 36L backpack that I posted over on ShutterMuse.com recently. Someone commented that the photo had “nice lighting!”, so I thought I would take a second to explain how I did it. Drumroll… A single Canon 600EX Rt speedlight bounced off the ceiling of my living room. That’s it. No fancy light modifiers, no expensive studio setups and only that one single light source. It just goes to show you how things don’t always need to be made too complicated. I always use the Canon ST-E3 radio transmitter with my 600EX …

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Behind the Shot: Moonscape Mountaineer

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In this image we’re going to talk about the compositional choices and the post processing techniques that were used to create this image of a mountaineer climbing up a snowy slope in the Tantalus Range of British Columbia.

Behind the Shot: Just Keep Swimming

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For those of you that are following these posts in order, I realize there has been a bit of a gap since the last BTS post. I’m going to try and keep things a little steadier from now on, but I got a bit sidetracked with things like the backpacking gear series. Ooops! Sorry. Equipment Used for this Shot Canon 5D Mark IV Canon 8-15 f/4 L Fisheye Aquatech Elite 5D water housing  PD-85 dome port English Springer Spaniel Lexar Professional 128GB CF Cards Adobe Lightroom CC I wanted to share this photo with you because it’s a fun shot, …

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Behind the Shot: Mountain Bike Selfie

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Mountain biking is one of my favourite hobbies and I wanted to challenge myself to create an interesting image in my “backyard” of British Columbia.  I love being behind the camera, but always thought it would be cool to have a good mountain biking photo of myself.  I decided to take on this challenge, and create a custom remote system that was integrated into my bike, so that I could trigger a camera and a flash whilst I was riding the bike. After experimenting with a bunch of different switches from my local hardware store, I settled on a pushbutton …

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Behind the Shot: Snowy Skiing Fisheye

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This is a bit of an older photo, but I posted it on Instagram recently and it got a great response so I thought I’d talk about it in the BTS series because it uses a fisheye lens which is definitely one of the more unique types of lens. Equipment Used For This Shot Canon 8-15 f/4 L Fisheye Canon 1D Mark IV Fisheye Lenses A fisheye is typically a lens that has a field of view in the region of 180 degrees. In full frame 35mm terms this would be a 15mm lens, but note that this is not …

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Behind the Shot: Rookery Rock Removal

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This photo was taken from a zodiak on a recent outing in Nanaimo, BC. I really liked the clouds in the background, the great textures on the rocks and the sea lions barking away on the rocks. As you’ll see from the original image though, there was a distraction that had to be removed in Photoshop, so I thought it would be a good candidate for a BTS post! Equipment Used for This Shot Canon 5D Mark IV Canon 100-400 f/4.5-5.6 L IS II Lexar Professional 128GB CF Cards Adobe Lightroom CC Adobe Photoshop CC A boat! Photographing from a …

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Behind the Shot: Incredible Elk Antlers in Banff

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Find out how I created this image of these impressive elk antlers in Banff. I’ll reveal the compositional choices that were made before I pressed the shutter, as well as showing you the major edits that were made to the image in post processing.

Behind the Shot: Railway Through the Rockies

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This photo was taken at a famous spot called Morant’s Curve, which is viewable from the edge of the Bow Valley Parkway, just outside Lake Louise, Alberta. It’s hard to imagine a view that better sums up many people’s image of the Canadian Rockies! When I’m in the Canadian Rockies, I usually drive along the Bow Valley Parkway to get between Banff and Lake Louise. The parkways runs parallel to the much faster main highway, but there’s ample opportunities to see wildlife if you take the more scenic parkway. Near the Lake Louise end of this road, the famous Morant’s …

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