The plants, animals, and unique terrain that make up desert landscapes offer photographers the perfect environment for epic portraits. Whether you find yourself shooting on a sandy dune or just off the highway on the road to Las Vegas, you can use the patterns, colors, and desert forms to create compelling compositions and express your creativity. Desert photography, when done well, can yield incredible, portfolio-worthy images. When shooting in a desert, however, it’s important to follow some basic guidelines to keep yourself safe. While beautiful, desert visits require careful preparation. Use the following 8 desert photography ideas and tips to help plan and make the most of your next trip to the desert.
8 Desert Photography Ideas and Tips
- Check the Weather and Scout Ahead of Time
- Avoid Midday Shoots
- Pack the Right Gear & Equipment
- Stack Composition Tools
- Take a Panoramic Shot
- Use Flash (not always, but try it)
- Capture Sunset Silhouettes
- Catch the Stars
Desert Photography Tip 1: Check the Weather and Scout Ahead of Time
It goes without saying, when you plan to spend time in the desert, keeping yourself safe will require a bit of due diligence. In fact, you’ll notice the safety theme recurs often throughout the tips below. One of the first ways to stay safe during your desert photography session is to check the weather in advance.
Early on in the planning portion of your desert photography shoot, check the forecasted conditions for the time and location of your session. I can tell you up front that you’ll probably want to plan your trip sometime in the spring or fall, when the weather is cooler. Even then, you’ll need to make preparations to stay safe, but it’s a good place to start.
Desert Photography Ideas: Location Scouting
Regardless of whether you plan to shoot during the day or at night, make sure to show up early and scout the location. This will help you in two ways. First, for safety reasons, you can familiarize yourself with the terrain and decide on where you’ll shoot. Secondly, scouting locations in advance will help you plan out some of your shots and craft more creative, compelling compositions.
Desert Photography Ideas, Tip 2. Avoid Midday Shoots
Once you’ve dialed in a date and location, check for the hottest times of the day and try to shoot around those times (not through them). While you can shoot at all hours of the day, I recommend avoiding midday shoots in the desert whenever possible. Aside from the challenges of shooting during the hottest hours, the lighting is also less interesting with fewer shadows on the ground. Moreover, deserts are known for epic, colorful sunrises and sunsets, so why not take full advantage of what the location has to offer.
Tip 3. Pack the Right Gear & Equipment
The desert can test the ruggedness of both you and your gear, so pack accordingly. Here’s a quick look at some of the recommended gear and equipment to take along on your desert photography session.
Desert Photography Ideas: Camera Gear
When it comes to the camera gear you’ll want to take into the desert, aim for weather-resistant gear that also enhances your photography, and always place a strong emphasis on keeping your gear clean. The desert is rife with elements that would hope to destroy it.
Lenses
- Wide-Angle and Telephoto Lenses (with Lens Hoods): Like camera bodies, lens choice remains fairly wide open when capturing photos in the desert. Because the desert provides such a vast open space, for example, a telephoto lens often works perfectly well for capturing wide shots. Whatever you can safely carry without causing too much strain, take it along. Try to use lens hoods for whichever lenses you choose as well to minimize glare from the desert sun.
- UV Filters: In order to better protect your sensor from the bright light and your glass from the sand, it’s a good idea to place UV filters on your lenses.
Accessories
- Towel: Depending on when you schedule your shoot, you may spend a bit of time shooting under direct sunlight. You can help avoid overheating your gear by taking along a small towel that you can place over the camera to protect it from the sun.
- Tripod: Tripods come in handy for a wide variety of situations, and they’re great to keep on hand for desert photography shoots for extra stability when needed (such as shooting under the starry night sky). If you plan to walk a great distance, you’ll have to consider the weight of everything you carry, including your tripod. At the very least, ensure the tripod is rated for more than the amount of weight in gear you plan to place on it, and get one that is also compact for packing.
- Cable Release: Along with a tripod, a cable release will help you further stabilize your desert photography shots and avoid blur caused by shaky hands, especially when shooting at night or with a slow shutter speed.
Lighting
- Flashes & Light Stands: If you plan to incorporate flash as one of your desert photography ideas, you’ll obviously need to take along flashes. If you’re trying to overpower the sun, you’re going to need more powerful flashes, like a couple of Profoto B10 or Flashpoint eVOLV 200 flashes, or anything with 200-500 watt seconds of power and a small, portable build.
General Desert Equipment
The most important equipment you can take into the desert is that which helps you keep you safe…and alive. Here are some recommendations for general desert comfort and possible survival.
- Water: Try to take at least two liters of water on foot and somewhere in the neighborhood of five gallons to keep in your car or tent. In case anything goes wrong and you find yourself stranded for some time, you don’t want to run out of water.
- Sun Blockers: Minimize direct contact between the sun and your skin. To help avoid getting sunburned, wear the following:
- Sunscreen
- A wide-brimmed hat
- Long sleeves
- Pants
- Hiking Boots
- Sunglasses
- GPS: Depending on the remoteness of your location, your phone may not get reception, in which case it will not allow you to call out or map your location. GPS devices can help in these instances and track your movement so that you’re able to retrace your steps and leave the same way you came.
- Light: Taking along a light source like a flashlight or headlamp will help you in a couple ways. First, you can use these light sources to safely navigate the desert floor should you get caught away from your car or tent after dark. These lights can also be used creatively for night photography shots, which we’ll cover in more detail below.
Bonus Tip: Always make sure that somebody knows where you’re going and when you expect to be back. This holds true regardless of whether you plan to go alone or with friends. Share these details with somebody who will not be joining you on the trip.
Desert Photography Tip 4. Stack Composition Tools
Among the other desert photography ideas on this list, this one holds true for most genres, including portrait and landscape photography. Your images will almost always benefit from what I like to call compositional stacking. This approach calls for combining compositional elements like leading lines and patterns, for example, to add depth and visual interest to your photos.
Many desert locations lean more to the desolate side of the spectrum in terms of objects in the scene, which makes it harder to focus on a particular subject within the frame. While this becomes less of an issue if you take someone or something along to photograph, you can combine these tools to more easily identify an existing subject and take better desert photos.
Size & Space
- Subjects for Scale: One common factor deserts share, whether they be hot, semi-arid, coastal or cold, is that they consist of large open spaces. In order to give the viewer a better sense of the grand scale of the scene, include a subject (ideally another person or your vehicle) in the frame. If you’re there alone and can trigger the shutter remotely, make it an epic selfie!
- Negative Space: Similar to the tip above, take advantage of the negative space in the wide open desert environment to draw focus to your subject.
Balance
- Rule of Thirds: Just about everyone knows the rule of thirds. In case you’re absolutely brand new to photography, the rule of thirds calls for dividing the frame up into thirds, both vertically and horizontally. The subject in the frame is then placed on one of the dividing lines, preferably with the desired focal point (such as a person’s head) placed on one of the intersecting points of the vertical and horizontal thirds. It’s true that it is widely used, but for good reason. Even if you’re short on subjects, place the horizon on the upper or lower third and automatically make the image better than it would’ve otherwise been.
- Symmetry: Look for symmetry in the scene to help balance your image and create a more striking composition.
- Patterns and Textures: Even the plainest deserts tend to offer up plenty of patterns and textures in the rocks and sand, not to mention any of the local plants. One thing you can do to capture more striking patterns and textures in the sand is to shoot perpendicular to the sun. The dramatic interplay of shadows and light that results from shooting this way will help you capture more interesting photos and add depth to the objects in your scene.
Depth and Direction
- Leading Lines: Some desert locations, like sandy dunes or dry lake beds, often feature naturally occurring lines that you can use to add visual interest to your photos and lead to a particular subject.
- Foreground & Perspective: Try to avoid always going with the simple point-and-shoot approach in which you simply walk up to a scene and shoot it just as you’re seeing it while standing there. Doing this for a couple of quick shots of an epic scene like the Grand Canyon might work, but the use of foreground elements and unique perspectives in the frame can go a long way.
Tip 5. Take a Panoramic Shot
Given the vast expanse of space present in deserts, you might wonder why anyone would need to take a panoramic image as part of their desert photography portfolio. By using the Brenizer Method to capture a scene in the desert, you can take your wide angle portraits to the next level. Ryan Brenizer’s panorama technique allows photographers to create an impossibly shallow depth of feel in wide angle photos that truly adds a surreal feel to portraits. Read our write-up on panoramic stitching to learn more about how to use the Brenizer Method in your desert photography.
Desert Photography Ideas, Tip 6. Use Flash
I’m not suggesting you always do this, but incorporating flash as one of your desert photography ideas can open up a ton of creative possibilities. In the video above from Adorama TV, for example, Daniel Norton uses flash and a softbox to enhance a series of portraits he captures on a dry lake bed in Boulder City, Nevada. A portable lighting setup and a bit of creative application will allow you to create studio-style portraits on the go, even in the middle of nowhere.
Tip 7. Capture Sunset Silhouettes
Earlier, I mentioned that deserts tend to serve up epic sunrises and sunsets. These times of day also lend themselves to epic silhouette photos. So long as the background is brighter than your subject in the foreground, you can create a silhouette. To capture a striking silhouette as one of your desert photography ideas, do the following:
- Set your exposure for the sky and capture those vivid sunset colors
- Position your subject to be clearly outlined against the background
- Adjust your perspective so that the majority of your subject stands above the horizon
- Deepen the shadows & blacks and boost the contrast during post-production to further emphasize the silhouette
Desert Photography Ideas, Tip 8. Catch the Stars
No desert photography trip is complete without a night sky portrait. Away from the city’s light pollution, we can find more stars on clear nights and easily recognize the Milky Way as it makes its way across the sky. I recommend looking for prominent features in the landscape, such as a rock formation, to help compose your shot. Or, you can always insert yourself into the frame to make your night shot that much more interesting.
Before attempting a night shot out in the desert, you’ll need to familiarize yourself with night photography techniques. You can find some examples demonstrated in this compilation of tips for photographing the night sky. You should also check forecasted temps in your planned location so that you can dress and prepare accordingly.
Conclusion
I hope you enjoyed these desert photography ideas and tips. You don’t have to travel too far into a desert location to capture the remote appearance of these beautiful landscapes. If you plan accordingly to compose your shots and keep everyone safe, your desert session should prove worthwhile. Also, while your safety is important, it’s also important to take care of the environments that we visit. Do your part to leave no trace when heading out for outdoor photoshoots. Finally, you can find additional tips here for taking better travel and landscape photos on your way to the desert.
