Home Forums Gear Photography Tips for shooting in the snow and Rebates!

This time of year is one of the best times for great landscape photography but it can also be one of the most frustrating times. For those of us that grew up shooting film especially. Landscapes covered with snow are fantastic for several reasons. You aren�t battling big crowds usually and they can change dramatically from day to day.
The frustration lies in achieving the proper exposure for a scene. Without getting too detail or technical, a camera doesn�t always know what you are shooting. It just takes in all the reflected light as information and tries to give you the best overall average exposure. Average exposure however is grey or often referred to as medium tone. Snow should be fairly white. This simply means the camera wants to make white look grey. There are several ways to correct this problem. You can shoot in manual mode and simply set the exposure about 1 or 1 � stops brighter than Zero. I shoot in Aperture Priority, which means I am choosing the aperture for depth of field and the camera chooses the shutter speed. Again though, it wants to make it average. I simply will use my exposure compensation dial and select +1 or +1 1/3 stops. This simply changes the reference point for the camera to a brighter exposure.
A couple other tips when shooting in the snow and cold: Always carry extra batteries in a pocket close to your body, try and avoid walking out of a warm humid room and directly into the cold because this will cause condensation on the lens to freeze. Also be aware that if you are out in the cold for an extended period of time, the LCD screen on the camera may turn blue. It is typically a temporary thing and it gets back to normal after it warms back up. Avoid changing memory cards; a lot of static electricity builds up in the snow. Carbon fiber tripods work fairly normally in the cold, they may just feel a little tight or frozen, but they are fine.
Don�t forget to check out the great rebates that Tamron is offering through the end of the year. Give Joel at Camera Land a call to get your lenses ordered and delivered quickly! There is still a little time left to take advantage of the great deal of trading in a working kit lens for an additional $100 off of the Tamron 18-270mm Di-II VC PZD lens from Camera Land!
All of the images below were shot using either the Tamron 10-24mm Di-II or Tamron 18-270mm Di-II VC PZD lenses.