Composing reflections: Behind the scenes in the Canadian Rockies with photographer Adam Gibbs

posted Tuesday, October 23, 2018 at 5:30 AM EST

In the video below, we join photographer Adam Gibbs and six other photographers on a trek through Jasper National Park in the Canadian Rockies. Gibbs and others worked their way to Tonquin Valley for some landscape photography and the scenery and resulting images are spectacular.

While leading the workshop, Gibbs had plenty of opportunities for photography on the 23-kilometer hike into their encampment. For the interested, Gibbs is shooting with a Nikon D850 and an assortment of Nikon lenses. For each of his featured images in the video below, he shares all his camera settings.

After showing off some behind the scenes footage and numerous photos, we join Gibbs as he composes a lovely snowy scene. The scene is a snow-capped mountain reflecting in a very still pond, along with some grass in the foreground. The challenge here, compositionally, is keeping the mountain’s full reflection in the water without being obscured by the grass. This required Gibbs to have a pretty high vantage, which was tricky with his tripod. It brings up an important point when using water in a scene, you not only need to think about how you are composing the subject itself, but also how you are composing its reflection within the frame. In some cases, there is not a lot to think about, but in other situations, you may need to try out many different vantages in order to compose the reflection in the best way.