0:00 - This video is sponsored by Artlist. Travel is one of the key reasons why so many of us get into photography in the first place. All the new sights, sounds, smells, all the different foods that we get to try, all of these things kind of bring out a new level of creativity within us, and there is nothing more addicting than that feeling. Now I've been traveling and taking photos for almost a decade now, which is absolutely insane and early on my photos were halfway decent, they were pretty good, but I'd like to say my photos have gotten a lot better since then and I have learned so much along the way. So today in this video I want to cover a few key travel photography tips that you guys can use on your next trip to make sure that it's number one, less stressful and number two, you're walking away from that trip with much better images. And before we
0:45 jump into it, I'm giving away a free Lightroom preset pack. There is a link down in the description and I hope you guys enjoy. Now this first tip has to do with travel and more specifically, it has to do with flying with all of your gear. Now everyone knows that we should always carry on our photography gear, right? We never want to put our camera, our lenses, or our batteries underneath the plane. You never know what they're going to do with your bag. throw those things around and you do not want to show up at your destination and have your gear be wrecked into a million pieces. That is an absolute worst nightmare. And some airlines can be extremely strict with the weight limit or the size limit of your carry-on check bag that has all of your gear in it. So you need to make sure that you have a plan in case they do ask you to check your bag onto the plane. Now I always recommend when you're actually booking your flight, make sure if they have an option for a heavier carry-on bag or an extra
1:32 carry-on bag, just book that. Or you can book in a higher booking class so you can board first and that will make sure that if the overhead bins do fill up, your bag will still be safe in that situation. Okay, but what if you didn't do those things and they ask you to check your bag? Well, one of the things that I like to do is travel with a modular system. So I have my backpack with a camera cube in it, and I also have just a smaller shoulder bag that can hold a little bit of gear as well. If they ask me to check that backpack, what I can do is easily pull out that camera cube with all of my gear in it. I can also pull out my little bag that's full of my batteries and I can just carry that on to the plane instead. So being able to pull your camera cube out of your backpack and just carry that on is a massive hack and will save you if they do ask you to check your bag. I actually just started packing for a three month trip to Europe. And if you guys wanna see a video covering all
2:19 the gear that I'm bringing and also how I am packing for that trip, let me know in the comments down below and I will definitely make that video for you guys. But building off of that tip, if you guys want to avoid the headache of traveling with a bunch of gear, make sure you're not traveling with too much gear in the first place. But instead of just labeling this tip as a bring less gear, I think a better and more productive way of looking at it is know what gear is best for each trip and don't bring more than you need to bring. Now for me, if I'm going on a dedicated photography trip and I'm gonna be shooting landscapes, I'm gonna be shooting some crazy street photography, I'm gonna bring all of my serious gear. I'm gonna bring my Sony A1-2, maybe my 24-70, my 35 prime and my 70-200. And I'll also probably bring my little Fuji personal camera as well that I can carry out with me on a night out or if I'm just kinda hanging out and doing more casual photography for that day. But
3:07 for other trips, maybe I'll only bring my Fuji or I'll only bring my film camera on that trip because it's not really focused 100% on photography. Now, if you're just getting into photography and you're really not sure what you might need on that trip, a good rule of thumb is to carry a zoom lens, a versatile zoom lens, and also one prime lens as well. Now, for me, that would look like a 24-70mm f2.8 and a 35 millimeter f 1.4 prime lens as well those are the two lenses that i'll bring with me pretty much everywhere because i get the versatility of the 24-70 and i get that wide maximum aperture and the beautiful image quality and the simplicity of shooting with a 35 millimeter prime lens now if you guys have been watching my channel for a while you already know how much i love that 35 millimeter focal length but if you haven't click up here to watch this video where i talk about why it is the best focal length out But
3:56 I think it's really important to ask yourself before you travel, am I actually going to use this lens or am I bringing it because I think I might use it to capture this one specific photo. If you only have one image in mind to shoot with with that lens, then just don't bring it. You're going to be saving yourself so many headaches that come along with traveling with a ton of gear, not only in the packing phase and trying to get everything to fit, but also when you're traveling with the airlines. and you have a heavy backpack and you're walking through this giant airport, it can be absolutely exhausting. So try your best to not bring more gear than you actually need for that trip. Now, tip number three is to build a mood board for your trip. And a mood board is basically where you have a bunch of different images that are inspiring the type of photography that you want to pursue on that trip. Having a mood board can give us a
4:42 ton of clarity on the direction and the style that we want to take our work on that trip. And it can also serve as a way to kind of plan out that trip and highlight specific locations that we want to hit while we're traveling. And this mood board can be as simple or as complex as you would like it to be. Now for me, I like to keep it simple and just have a group of images that I kind of look at as a whole. So while each individual photo isn't something that I'm trying to mimic 100%, I'm not trying to capture that specific photo on that trip. When I look at all of those images together, those are some of the common themes that I want to capture in my photos on that trip. Now, I create a mood board for every single one of my trips, and this is one of my mood boards from Japan last year. And as you can see, it just has a collection of images that inspire me, and this is kind of the style that I wanted to pursue with my photography
5:27 in Japan. And if you look at some of the images that I shot in Japan, I think they line up pretty well. Now there's so many different places that you can create a mood board. I personally use Milanote because it just works really well for me, but you can also use Pinterest, you can use Notion, whatever is easiest for you to be able to access those photos and look at those photos before and during your trip, just use that. And you can find images pretty much anywhere online to add to this mood board. I like to go to Instagram, I like Flickr, I like 500pix, and even just a simple Google search can work really well here as well. But if I can't find an image that I'm kind of envisioning that I really want to capture on that trip, I also like to generate my own images using AI. And I do that with Artlist, who is the sponsor of today's video. So say for example, I want to capture an image of a woman just walking down the street in this small, quaint, beautiful little Spanish town. I
6:15 can easily create this image with Artlist and all I have to do is type in the prompt that I want, choose the photo realistic style from the style dropdown menu, and then I can hit enhance to make that prompt even stronger. And lastly, click generate, and that will generate some AI images that I can use in my mood board. And it's as easy as saving and then just dragging and dropping those into your mood board. And this is exactly the look that I'm going for for that three month trip to Spain that I leave in in just a few weeks. Now, if you want to take this a step further, you can even turn those images into videos as well. And Artlist has a bunch of different AI video models to choose from. My personal favorite is the Kling 2.5 Turbo model, but they also recently added the Sora 2 Pro model, which looks absolutely insane and also includes audio as well. But even if you're not into AI, Artlist is genuinely a no brainer
7:02 for creatives in 2025. It's where I get pretty much everything that I need to create these videos in one place. That includes all the music that I use, sound effects, stock footage, motion graphics templates, title screens, LUTs, whatever it is, the list goes on. Artlist has everything that you need to make compelling videos. And if you guys click the first link in the description, you can sign up to get two months free with the annual plan. Thank you so much Artlist for sponsoring this video and supporting the channel. Now let's get back to the video. Now the next tip on this list is what I like to call the minimum five minute rule. So you remember how I started this video and I talked about how when we're traveling, we're just feeling so creative and excited and all we wanna do is just run around and shoot and find cool stuff. I totally get that. And that's one of the reasons why I love traveling so much, but it's really easy to fall into the trap where you're feeling so excited and you're feeling so creative that you just move
7:50 on from a scene that deserves more time. If you're out shooting in a city, for example, there's going to be so many things that are going to be fighting for your attention, but sometimes you're going to stumble across a scene that deserves more time and patience. And the worst thing that you can do is move on because something else grabs your attention or you think there might be something even better around the corner. In those situations, what I like to do is stop and wait for at least five minutes to see if someone's going to walk into that frame and create that perfect shot that you have envisioned. Now, this is a concept that so many legendary photographers have used in the past. The first one is Henry Cartier Bresson, and he termed this the decisive moment. You're waiting for that perfect person to walk into the perfect part of the frame so you can capture that perfect image that you have in envisioned. And another photographer who did this as well is one of
8:38 my favorite photographers of all time. And that is Fan Ho. He photographed Hong Kong in the 50s and 60s. His images are just absolutely insane. They're so beautiful. And in the past, he's done interviews where he talks about the significance of patience with photography, he'll stumble across a setting that just looks really good, but he needs a subject to walk into that scene to create that perfect shot. And he would wait there for 10, 20, 30 minutes up to a few hours to capture that specific photo that he was after. And while these examples are more focused on street photography, I think this lesson can be translated to any type of photography. With landscape photography, the light is constantly shifting. You never know how that light is gonna hit and change the scene. And sometimes 10 minutes can mean the difference between an average photo and a great photo. So if you stumble across a scene and it just tickles
9:24 you a little bit, you really like it, just wait it out, something cool might happen. now the next tip on this list is do not over plan your trips now i know a lot of us don't have all that much time when we're going on these trips maybe we only have three days or a week at that destination and we have all of these different places that we want to hit throughout that time i totally get that but it is a slippery slope because if you're over planning your trip to the minute and you have everything just locked in you have to be at this place and at this time, you're not going to allow that serendipity to really set in and you're not going to allow yourself to get truly immersed in that place. Sometimes you need to just go out, put your phone in your pocket and just get lost. Walk in any direction that you think looks interesting and just walk for a few hours and pay attention to the things that
10:11 you see. I think it's totally okay to have some specific photography locations saved that you really wanna hit on that trip. But you also need to give yourself some time to just get lost a little bit and explore new locations as well, because I promise you, no matter how much research you did, there is still so much in that location that hasn't been shot yet. And some of my favorite images that I've shot while I was traveling were shot at locations that weren't saved online, that no one had any idea about. I found them because I went out, I got lost, and I discovered something new and it ended up being some of my favorite photos that I shot from those trips. I think this tip is great for not only capturing better images while you're traveling but also it's just so fun to get lost because you're fully immersed in that place and there was no better feeling than that. Now building off of this idea of immersion and just being fully immersed in
11:00 the location that you're visiting, the next step on this list is to try new things creatively. Your creative juices are absolutely pumping when you're traveling. You're feeling excited, you're feeling creative, and that is a perfect opportunity for you to try new things with photography, to get creative, to turn your camera to the side, to experiment with some slow shutter stuff, to break the mold that you have forced yourself into as a photographer. So say, for example, you never really shoot much at night because you're tired at home. You don't want to go out and shoot at night. There's nothing really that interesting. Well, travel presents an amazing opportunity for you to go out at night. You're still excited. You're still buzzing from the day. There's still so much to explore. Well, head out and shoot and try something different. This is the perfect opportunity to do that. And also building off of this idea of trying new things, I think
11:48 it's really important to expand your vision as well. Look up, look down, look to the side. There's so many different things that you probably don't notice while you're traveling because you have trained yourself to look for one very specific thing with your photography. But in reality, there's probably so many different things that you could shoot at that location. You just didn't notice them. Now I played American football in college. I was an offensive lineman. I used to be a massive person, but my coach always used to say head on a swivel, right? You're constantly searching. You're looking left to right up, down searching for threats. Well, it's the same for photography as well. Keep your head on a swivel while you're traveling, because you probably going to notice things that you wouldn't notice before. I think this is really important for storytelling as well because some locations around the world are defined by some of the smaller things that you
12:34 probably wouldn't notice. Whether that's the architecture of a building or the trees that you see in that specific city, whatever it is, sometimes capturing a photo of those smaller things can really help you tell a much more meaningful story about that specific location. And speaking of story, ultimately that's the most important thing with photography. I think we can all agree on that. And building off of this idea of shooting the smaller things, that leads me on to my next tip, which is shoot for diversity. And what I mean by diversity is shoot a wide range of images that all work together collectively to tell a much more meaningful story about that particular destination. That means shooting a mix of landscapes, portraits, still life, street photography, even macro texture shots, whatever it is, when you bring all of those images together into a collection, you're going
13:19 to tell a much deeper story about that particular place. So if you are a specialized photographer, maybe you're just really dead set on landscape photography and that's just what you do, that's what you're known for. Well, try to stretch yourself a little bit. If you're moving from one location to another, keep your camera out and notice some of the things that you see and just try and capture more diversity with your photos. And And plus, shooting a wide range of photos is way more fun as well because it completely opens the doors to things that you can shoot. And I love just going out in a city or in a new country with my camera and just photographing anything and everything that I see that I think looks interesting because ultimately having a diverse collection of images does a much better job of telling the story about that place than one single banger photo. All right now this next tip
14:05 is for those of you who are traveling with a companion. Now if you're traveling solo then you don't really need to listen to this tip. This is for those of you that are going on vacation, maybe you're with your wife or maybe you're with your best friend and you're really into photography but the person that you're traveling with is not really into photography, at least not to the level that you are and this is a conundrum that i found myself in with the past i've been with my girlfriend for two and a half years now i absolutely love her we love traveling together but she's not a photographer and she doesn't want to go out and walk for 30 000 steps searching for things to shoot and over time when i'm on these trips with her i've had to figure out how can i balance you know spending time with my partner but also going out and shooting in this incredible location because all i really want to do there is eat and take photos And the best advice I have for this is number one, first and foremost, you
14:52 need to communicate with the person that you're traveling with. You need to tell them, "Hey, photography is a huge part of what I do. It's something that I absolutely love, and I'm going to need some time to put away to go off on my own and take some photos." I think it's really important to have this conversation before you actually go out on the trip so they can plan some things to do while you're out shooting. But even then, it can be really difficult to kind of carve out that time while you're on a trip. So one of the things that I really like to do is make sure that I'm hitting sunrise while I'm traveling. Sunrise is amazing because chances are your partner or your friend or whoever you're traveling with is still sleeping. And number two, it's just an amazing time to shoot. The light is nice and soft. And also it's just a really fantastic time to see a place wake up. You can see the old people going out for their
15:38 morning walks or whatever is going on in that particular destination. Sunrise is a really interesting time to be awake in a lot of different places on this planet. So I know it can be tricky traveling with a partner, but make sure you have that conversation before you go on the trip. And also, if you are getting up at sunrise, you're probably gonna have a few hours to yourself every single morning, and that's a perfect opportunity to go out and shoot. Now, this is actually my second travel photography tips video. And in that first video, I had a lot of comments of people asking me about theft and how do I make sure that I don't get my gear stolen while I'm traveling. And for this next tip, that's what I want to focus on. And there's really a few key principles that I follow to make sure that my gear is always safe when I travel. Now, this is largely going to depend on where you are traveling to in the world. Some places are
16:24 incredibly safe, and this really isn't something that you need to worry about all that much. But in other cities or in other places around the world, you might be concerned about theft, rightfully so. And you should take some measures to protect your gear. Now the first one is to always keep your gear in front of you when you're walking around a city. Now, one of the places that comes to mind is Barcelona. I went to Barcelona two years ago now, and I spent a few days there shooting and Barcelona is known for pickpockets, especially in some of the more dangerous neighborhoods down near the water. And one of the things that I did was I just always kept my gear in front of me. My pockets were empty and there was no way for somebody to steal my gear unless they actually came up and robbed me. But like I said before, I actually am quite a large human being. So the chances of that happening are rare, but I think it's really important to keep all of your gear in front of you. Keep your pockets empty because if
17:12 you are in a city like Barcelona, Paris, or London, where there are a lot of pickpockets, you need to make sure that your gear is safe. The second tip is to never, ever, ever leave your gear in a car. Even if the car is locked, they can easily break that window and grab your stuff. And this has happened so much in California near the Golden Gate Bridge. A lot of tourists will show up and just leave their gear in the car. Boom, smash and grab. They're gone in 20 seconds. all of your gear is gone. This also happened to me when I was in Portugal. Luckily, I had my gear with me, but my friend's partner left her really expensive purse in the car. Boom, broke the window. We were gone for 15 minutes and they snatched that purse and they were gone with this. So do not leave your gear in a car, even if that car is locked. And lastly, I always like to carry AirTags with me as well. I put this
17:59 in all of my camera bags. I put this in my check luggage. This is great for not only tracking your stuff where you're actually traveling, but also if something does get stolen, at least you have some sort of recourse to get those items back. We are almost done here, guys, but I do have a few more tips. Honestly, when I'm putting these videos together, I have so many things that I want to include and I try to cut things and then I add things in later. So there is a lot of tips in this video, but we are almost done. And the next step on this list is to learn just a few key phrases of the language of the place that you're going to. Now, of course, you're not expected to learn an entirely new language of a place that you're just visiting for a week. But I found that learning just a few key phrases can number one, help you connect with the locals at a deeper level and also make them feel way more comfortable around you. People love it when you try to speak their language
18:46 and you make mistakes. I think that goes for any country on this planet. If you try and you make mistakes, it's very endearing to a lot of people. And it can also give you more access as a photographer because that person now feels comfortable around you. And maybe you learned the phrase, hey, can I photograph you in their language? Now there's really not that much that you need to know, but what I like to learn before every trip is good morning, good afternoon, or hello and good evening. Those are obviously pretty easy to learn and you should know those no matter where you're going in the world. But the next thing is of course, thank you very much. Not just thank you, but thank you very much. The most polite form of thank you that you can find. Try and learn that even if it's not always appropriate for every scenario, learning that can really help open doors. I would
19:32 also try and learn excuse me or I'm sorry. Those are always really good to know as well. And lastly, is it okay if I take a photo or is it okay if I take a photo of you? That's a really important phrase to know because you can ask people on the street if you can take their photo or if you're walking around somewhere and you're not sure if you're allowed to take photos, you can simply ask that question and now you know. Now, the best way to learn these things is just to go on YouTube. There's so many free tutorials for pretty much any language that you can think of on YouTube. And this is what I always like to do before I go on my trip. Now learning just a few key phrases from that language leads me onto my last tip, which is just be respectful guys. When you're traveling in another country, the customs and the norms and the way people do things and the way people live their lives are probably going to be very different from the place that you grew up in. And I
20:18 think it's always really important to remember that and always be cognizant of that when you're in a foreign country. Respect can go a very long way in any country around the world. And I think it's always important to remember that you are an ambassador of your country when you're traveling in a foreign country. So be respectful, treat people kindly, say please, say thank you, and respect the local customs. Know when you should and should not take photos and do a little research about the customs and the norms of the place that you're planning to visit. I really hate that I have to say this, but there are a lot of tourists that go to a foreign country and treat it like they're at home when in reality, you're not at home. You're a visitor in that country. So please treat that country and those people with respect. But these are just some of the things that I've learned over the last 10 years as a travel photographer. And if you guys do have a trip coming up or you're planning a trip and you're excited to go somewhere, the only
21:06 thing I want to say is just go have fun. Travel photography is absolutely incredible. There's nothing more fun than going to a new country with your camera, eating the food, taking photos, and just immersing yourself in that place. It's the thing that I love doing the most on this planet. And if I had a billion dollars today to my name, you know what I would be doing? Exactly what I'm doing now. Going out, traveling, and taking photos. so please have fun on your next trip and i really hope this video was helpful for you guys this is actually the second part of my travel photography tips video if you guys want to see the first one you can click up there to watch that or at the end of this video there's going to be a little box right here you guys can click there to watch that and if you guys do want to learn more about photography i have a ton of photography videos here on youtube i have a super detailed breakdown
21:51 on lighting on composition, on storytelling, whatever it is, I probably have a video about it. So make sure you hit subscribe and check out some of those videos on my channel because I think you guys will find them extremely useful. But that is all for this one, guys. Thank you so much for making it to the end of this video. And also thank you so much Artlist for sponsoring this video as well. And I will chat with you guys very soon in the next one.
