Winter Wonderlands: Photography Tips from Benjamin Williamson

Winter photography can be a challenge—from enduring sub-zero temperatures to mastering the technical and safety essentials. To uncover the secrets of capturing stunning winter landscapes, I turned to one of my favorite landscape photographers, Benjamin Williamson.

Hailing from snow-covered Maine, Benjamin previously served as the photo editor, staff photographer, and adventure leader for Down East Magazine, giving him firsthand experience capturing the rugged beauty of the region. In this episode, he shares his top tips for winter photography, insights on shooting in New England, and stories from his daring backcountry adventures. Whether you’re venturing out in freezing conditions with your camera or simply intrigued by the magic of winter photography, this conversation is filled with inspiration and practical advice for photographers at every level.

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:31:00

Well, if I go with you, it's a big responsibility. It's a huge responsibility. And if I go with you, buy an evac helicopter, too, because I'm just some bald, like it's. I mean, look at me, dude. I'm like some bald guy with big teeth. But I really do. I'm. I'm a unique person because I'm not, like, an outdoor adventurer by default. But I am inside, like, everything. I want to do it all. 

00:00:31:02 - 00:00:32:26

But I'm not built to do it. 

00:00:32:28 - 00:00:34:16

Who's built? What do you mean built to do? 

00:00:34:18 - 00:00:46:01

I don't know, I feel like you could like. Like if you and I were stuck outside, you would live, like, with no food, no water, like in the middle of nowhere you would live. And I would be like, feast for the birds or something. 

00:00:49:00 - 00:01:10:14

Welcome to the Big Photo Hunt Podcast, a show where we talk with aspiring and professional photographers to help us all grow and improve our photography together. I'm your host, Ken Deckinger. If you're one of our community members and you'd like to be a guest on the show, please visit Big Photo hunt.com for more information. 

00:01:20:15 - 00:01:53:21
I'm excited for today's guest, Ben Williamson.  Ben is a professional photographer from the great state of Maine. His work captures the landscapes, wildlife, and just the beauty of New England, and he fits in perfectly with us as amateur photographers because he picked up his first camera while he was a bartender at a place called the Sea Dog. He started sharing photos with customers at the bar. 

00:01:53:27 - 00:02:39:19

Someone was like, hey man, these are good. Next thing you know, he was hired by Downeast Magazine, where he worked as a staff photographer, photo editor, and adventure leader. Today he leads workshops, which is how I originally came across them. And get this. Ben has a photo that has been turned into a US postage stamp. A stamp like what you put on a letter to send mail. Today's episode will focus on winter photography because I don't know if you know, but main, which for our global listeners is located here in the northeast of the United States, just along the southern border with Canada, has a lot of winter. 

00:02:40:03 - 00:02:56:05

It is a true pleasure to have you here. I want to talk about winter photography, among other things. But I was thinking maybe it might be a good place to start just to have you share a little bit about yourself, just your story, so we can let our listeners know who you are. Yeah. 

00:02:56:23 - 00:03:30:04

Not many people know that. I grew up in Mississippi and moved to Maine when I was 16, and, um, it wasn't always into photography. My dad is a pretty good amateur photographer, and he took lots of photos of us when we were kids, and every now and then he'd drag a tripod out and set up something and usually just photos of the family. But I remember in high school he started getting into it a little bit more as a hobby, and he would go out and photograph ice floes in the winter on the on the ocean and do a little bit more kind of art photography. 

00:03:30:06 - 00:04:18:18

And I thought it was cool what he was doing, but I never took an interest myself until, um, I moved to Maine and then spent a long time as a bartender trying to make it as a musician, actually, which is really hard to do, and just one day picked up a camera, kind of after giving up the dream of being a musician, I feel like I had all this creative energy that needed an outlet and picked up a camera to take with me on nature walks at the beach or in the woods and just put, you know, put four corners around everything that I was coming across and thought about stories I could tell and just how things looked interesting within the frame, and what to include and what to exclude and loved. 

00:04:19:00 - 00:04:49:13

Just the intrinsic nature of of photography. At first it wasn't about sharing it. It wasn't even about I never looked at any one else's photography. I just knew that I like to make photos and to create things. And then the the sharing came later, and the looking at other what other photographers were doing came because I started to quickly just become really obsessed with photography and knew that it was something I really loved and wanted to pursue further. 

00:04:49:15 - 00:05:18:29

So the big photo on, as you know, is a community for amateur photographers, and I love your story because it starts, as any amateur does, just someone that starts falling in love with photography and then realizing that they're hooked and they're stuck, and they got to keep going, going and getting deeper and deeper, which is obviously good. But once you're in, you're in, you know, how did you educate yourself? How did you learn photography? Because for me, I'm not educated in photography and I'm trying to learn as much as I go. What did you do to make that transition and learn as much as you could? 

00:05:19:12 - 00:05:54:19

I think that still, like, I so admire the spirit of an amateur, and I hope to retain some of that in myself, just that innate curiosity about the world around us. And it doesn't matter what forms or what means of expression it is, it's just something that we do to deepen our understanding of the world around us. And at its heart, that's what photography still is for me. I'm still a hobbyist, and even when I'm not making work on assignment or making work that I know will sell, I'm still taking a camera with me on my adventures. 

00:05:54:21 - 00:06:26:09

Like a lot of the work that I do now is in the mountains, in Maine, in New England. And that's not something that necessarily is, because I think that I'll sell prints of it or I'm I can't lead a photography workshop on Mount Katahdin. I'm just taking the camera along with me on my adventures still. And I think the spirit of an amateur is a beautiful thing. But to to improve on your work and to learn. I first read a lot of books. I actually got a book called The Guide to Outdoor Digital Photography by Gerry Monkman. 

00:06:27:00 - 00:07:03:05

He was an amazing photographer in the area and it taught me everything I needed to know about post-processing, which is the really hard stuff to understand as a beginner is get jumping into Lightroom and Photoshop and understanding what the sliders do, how much you need to edit a photo from a raw file, or even from Jpeg as I was doing in the very beginning, and then looking around at photographers like when I was starting Jim Kelly, a guy named McCann here in Maine, we're making amazing work and it was all local photography. 

00:07:03:07 - 00:07:22:29

That was what I was really interested in seeing more than the international big names, I, I love seeing what people were doing in my backyard, and there were some really skilled and talented people here that I could emulate, see where they were going, see how they were seeing things and learned that way. 

00:07:23:09 - 00:07:54:18

You're not the first person to tell me that about looking at other photographers. I had an episode with a wedding photographer who learned in a lot of ways. Like you, he just one day decided he wanted to be in photography and just taught himself and became one of the top 20 photographers. And he said, find a photographer that you admire their work and that you want to be and just learn from them. And I was like, okay, but I don't want to be you, Ben. I mean, you're you're you're wonderful and all, but, you know, I'm kind of happy with him, but no, no. But then I heard it again and he said the same thing. 

00:07:54:20 - 00:07:58:24

He was like, find someone's work that you want to emulate and just study it and learn from it. 

00:07:58:26 - 00:08:30:04

Well, to going back to what you just said, there is a big conversation in the photography community about looking at other people's work right now, whether or not that's a good thing, whether or not you should emulate anybody. I think it's an open question and it's very personal. If you don't want to do that, then don't. If you do, I think there's a lot of room for a lot of learning opportunities and studying other people's work. And kind of the way I approach it is in a very honest, natural way. 

00:08:30:06 - 00:09:04:00

Or I'm not emulating just one person, but I'm probably emulating a lot of different people, and a lot of my influences are coming together and it's all filtered through my own experiences, my own childhood. I guess, and whatever life has thrown at me and where I am in the world. All those things combined to create a human being and a person. We're all influenced by other people, whether we like it or not, and we just get to choose how much we. You follow those influences or try and shut them out? 

00:09:04:07 - 00:09:30:10

I agree, and I think it is when I say emulator or be Ben Williamson, I don't actually want to emulate someone or to a T, but I do think every time you study someone else's work, you can take things from it. And eventually what I've learned is you start developing your own perspective. But I do feel that you have to, in a sense, understand like what people are doing and why they're doing it. So you can kind of understand what you may want to incorporate into your work. 

00:09:30:12 - 00:10:02:07

Yeah, your best work is always going to be whatever you're most passionate about and what you're most curious about, and it's going to be so personal to you because you can't help it. You just can't help but be passionate about the things that you're most interested in. I don't think that you have to think too much about it. It's when you overthink it and you emulate maybe something that really isn't true to yourself, that your work just isn't going to be as good. It's not going to resonate as much because you're not putting as much of yourself into it. 

00:10:02:09 - 00:10:10:06

You mentioned Katahdin, and I saw your photos from there recently. I think it's a good segue into winter photography because it was cold, I could tell. 

00:10:10:08 - 00:10:11:01

Yeah. Very cold. 

00:10:11:03 - 00:10:11:19

Yeah, I. 

00:10:11:21 - 00:10:13:15

Do most of my photography in the winter. 

00:10:13:21 - 00:10:22:21

Can you tell our listeners who don't know what Mount Katahdin is? Can you explain, like what it is and its significance essentially to Maine and the East Coast? 

00:10:23:04 - 00:11:00:01

It is the highest mountain in Maine. It's over 5000ft, which doesn't sound high to anyone who's listening, who's been out West or a lot of other parts of the world where the high mountains start at 14,000ft. So 5000 doesn't sound like a lot, but it's 3 or 4000ft vertical elevation gain from the base. And to get into Katahdin, you have to have permits. Um, you have to plan ahead. We got these dates months ahead by a friend waiting in line at the state park in Millinocket to get this time slot. 

00:11:00:07 - 00:11:02:14

You never know what the weather's going to be. And then it's. 

00:11:02:16 - 00:11:03:01

A. 

00:11:03:09 - 00:11:40:23

It's an expedition. It's a two day trip. In the first leg is a 13 mile cross-country ski with you're pulling a sled behind you with about £50 of gear on the sled, all your winter clothes, snow shoes, crampons, ice axes, stoves, food, a lot. A lot of the weight is food. And you're bringing that up to the first camp and setting up there. There's not a lot of photography in the first day. There are a couple little areas you can go around and photograph there, but then the next day is a three mile slog uphill without skis because it's too steep to a place called Chimney Pond. 

00:11:40:25 - 00:12:10:08

And from there you you're really in the alpine zone, and you can make attempts on a couple of different peaks. On Katahdin. There's one called Hamlin, and then there's Baxter Peak itself, which is the high point. And we stayed there for two nights and I think did three assaults on the really high areas and that. It was really difficult. You know, we're at hiking for, I think I was averaging 10 or 11 miles a day with about 5000ft of vertical. 

00:12:10:17 - 00:12:17:27

And is it the kind of thing that someone like. I don't know if someone like me or a normal person could do yes with training. 

00:12:18:06 - 00:12:50:15

Like I was hitting the stair stepper at the gym pretty hard, and I've got a pretty good walking routine at home where I, you know, I walk an hour a day every day just for, for health reasons and get in pretty good shape with just like an hour of walking a day. That's one of the best exercises you can do. And then I'll supplementing that with the stair stepper at the gym and some other winter hikes in New England, like I did Mount Shira and Mount Washington and Mount Adams on the last few months too. And that was good training. But we had normal. We had guys who hadn't done a lot of training with us on that trip, and they did great. 

00:12:50:27 - 00:13:06:08

And why do you like the winter environment so much? Because I've hiked every summer. I try to get at least one hike in in the presidential in the White Mountains, and by three quarters of the way up, I'm like, I'm pounding on my water and on the ground breathing, you know? And so. 

00:13:06:10 - 00:13:07:25

Oh, yeah, winter. 

00:13:07:27 - 00:13:10:26

I mean, what is it about winter that you love so much? 

00:13:10:28 - 00:13:49:12

First of all, just the aesthetics of light reflecting on white snow. I mean, if there's any kind of light going on, having the snow being bright, you know, and photography, your eyes go to the brightest part of the, of the frame. So having your subject be the brightest part of the frame is ideal versus all the light being in the sky, which we're used to, especially in New England. We've got a lot of dark surfaces with trees and rocks and stuff. So having the eyes drawn to the the snow being lit up first instead of the sky and just the pristine environment. 

00:13:49:14 - 00:14:20:12

The trees look amazing when they're coated with snow. If there are any trees textures, the way light falls off of contours in the snow is really beautiful. How it simplifies what can otherwise be a really busy and distracting foreground. You know, in New England, our mountaintops are pretty much piles of rocks. In the winter, those rocks are covered in snow. And I know in the presidential as that can get a little windblown and you do see a lot more of the texture. 

00:14:20:14 - 00:14:40:18

But when we're on Katahdin, we had a fresh snow that was just coating everything. And same when we were on Kaikoura earlier in the winter, and that snow was just such a lovely contour and texture. I think aesthetically that's tops for me of why, you know, I go to the mountains in the winter more than any other season for photography. 

00:14:40:20 - 00:14:54:20

And I think. Do you have a workshop tomorrow in Acadia? I do, I was actually contemplating signing up for that. Um, next week though, I'm going on a trip. I'm going somewhere warm. I'm going to go to the Virgin Islands. So I was like, it's a little. 

00:14:54:22 - 00:14:56:13

Different. Yeah, different kind of island. 

00:14:56:15 - 00:14:57:00

Yeah. 

00:14:57:02 - 00:15:09:08

And it's not. It's not that I, um, was averse to going on this. I actually want to get deeper into winter photography. I looked at the weather. It's like it's not that bad. It's like 23 degrees. That's not terrible for Acadia, right? 

00:15:09:12 - 00:15:13:10

Oh, it's going to be 23 at night and 40s in the day. It's going to be pretty warm. 

00:15:13:12 - 00:15:51:07

I think you'll have a great trip. I was thinking about joining, but I just couldn't pull it off now and then turn around and go to the Virgin Islands. And not so much because I couldn't pull it off, but because I want to stay married. And so I figured, yeah, hey, if I tell. Yeah. So one of the things that I, I have been told about winter photography when it comes to like technical stuff, is that you really have to pay attention to your exposure settings differently than, than normal photography because the snow is so bright. Could you talk about that, and maybe some of the technical challenges that you have to deal with, or that anyone that's an amateur photographer that wants to get into winter photography might have to pay attention to? 

00:15:51:09 - 00:15:51:24

Yeah, that's. 

00:15:51:26 - 00:16:24:29

An important consideration, because when speaking for myself when I was starting out, I did rely mostly on the camera's internal metering to take photos and what your camera meter is aiming for when it makes an exposure. As a middle gray and middle gray is great for blue skies and green grass, and a lot of the scenes that we see in day to day life, like our tone of our skin, renders as a pretty close to a middle gray. So if you're exposing a portrait or a landscape, uh, that middle gray value works really well in photography. 

00:16:25:01 - 00:16:56:09

The difference in a snowy landscape is that if you meter snow for middle gray, you're going to get a gray and kind of dusky looking snow, and anything that isn't snow in the scene is going to render black or otherwise very, very dark because of the dynamic range between those two values our eyes want to see. Snow is white. I'm looking out the window right now at piles of snow around, so we have to compensate versus the exposure that our camera gives us that middle gray. 

00:16:56:11 - 00:17:10:15

We want to increase it by at least a full stop, usually around two stops, to get it bright enough to render aesthetically as, as snow and to have the things that are around it bring those up in exposure. At the same time. 

00:17:10:29 - 00:17:11:22

It doesn't blow it out. 

00:17:11:25 - 00:17:42:10

Though you have to watch out for blowing it out. It's possible, but I always tell students to keep a good eye on the histogram at the same time that they're changing their exposure values so that you don't have that spike on the far right side of the histogram, or if you have high light alerts on your camera, the blinks, as they call them, have those set to 9,095%, so that if you start to clip your highlights, you'll be alerted to that and you can then compensate, make it a little bit darker exposure. 

00:17:42:13 - 00:17:50:08

And as far as subjects go, obviously it can be anything but the subject. It probably pops with the white background. What kind of. 

00:17:50:10 - 00:17:51:11

Subject? For contrast. 

00:17:52:00 - 00:17:55:08

I'd imagine. What kind of subjects are your favorite subjects to shoot in that environment? 

00:17:55:20 - 00:18:30:26

Uh, a lot of different things. I love finding a pop of red in the snow. I think if I can say, like, what's the most exciting, uh, my best selling photos or, you know, not necessarily the the best of my work, but if ever I see a Red lobster boat or a red barn or some pop of red in the snow is really interesting and exciting, it really, really stands out against white. But then just anything, a lot of the subjects that I've photographed any other time, like lighthouses here in Maine or lobster boats, look great in the snow. 

00:18:31:06 - 00:18:54:14

I've been doing a lot of work in the mountains. Uh, trees look beautiful when they're covered in snow, like I was saying earlier. And then anything I notice a lot with the rocky coast of Maine. Anything that would otherwise be a busy and distracting foreground. When it's covered with snow, it just simplifies it. And all your attention goes to other parts of the scene and it looks like flat negative space. 

00:18:54:24 - 00:18:57:06

Are you trying to do that? Try to create negative space with it? 

00:18:57:10 - 00:19:18:07

I do sometimes, yeah. One of my favorite images of Portland Headlight is taken in an area where there's a lot of rocks, and usually there's a lot of striations that lead your eye into the scene. But when it was covered in snow, it just became about this one line that kind of frames the lighthouse within the snow covered rock. And it worked out really, really well. And it's a lot of negative space in that photo. 

00:19:18:27 - 00:19:24:00

Speaking of Portland Light, I don't think it was impacted, but Maine got beat up really bad recently, didn't it? 

00:19:24:25 - 00:19:46:27

Really bad. Yeah, we had back to back storms in the middle of January that were some of the highest. One of them was the highest tide ever recorded on the coast of Maine, and the other one was in the top, I think it was third highest. So it was unbelievably bad. That combined with a lot of wave action. It was really pretty major here. 

00:19:48:00 - 00:19:49:14

Sorry. I don't know if you heard that. My. 

00:19:49:23 - 00:19:50:10

That's all good. 

00:19:50:12 - 00:19:54:26

My wife was just texting me to tell me that she signed us up for SoulCycle on Saturday. 

00:19:56:00 - 00:19:56:28

That's important. 

00:19:57:00 - 00:20:03:29

Yeah, I guess so. I remember I was on a SoulCycle kick, like, years ago, and. But I haven't been since before the pandemic. 

00:20:04:01 - 00:20:05:21

Gear you up for some winter photography? 

00:20:05:24 - 00:20:12:10

Exactly. You know what it is. She knows we're going to the Virgin Islands next week. She's like, I gotta get that guy in shape. 

00:20:13:28 - 00:20:14:28

That's funny. Yeah. 

00:20:15:18 - 00:20:27:25

Um, okay, so I'm just curious, I don't you may not have enough experience in this, but does when this erosion happens, does it naturally come back or is that it? It's eroded like the coast of Maine is now changed. 

00:20:28:13 - 00:20:59:23

Um, I was at Pompano Beach yesterday, and a lot of the sand is starting to find its way back onto shore. But the dunes are gone, and the protection that these houses had is having to be replaced. They were out there with the backhoes filling up sandbags to start rebuilding the dunes in front of a lot of houses and buildings. A lot of things are going to have. If they are rebuilt, I'm imagining they're going to have to be raised up on stilts. 

00:21:00:06 - 00:21:19:17

I it's hard to believe, but the ocean is predicted to rise by 3 to 7ft and the next 75 years. So what does that look like for Maine? And and, you know, Boston and Cape Cod. You've got Low-Lying areas there that flood pretty regularly as well. 

00:21:20:00 - 00:21:43:29

It's mind blowing. I have a house in Cape Cod that I go to in the summers in a low lying area, and our street is actually called salt Marsh because there is a salt marsh there, and I have sump pumps in my basement and they are always running. I can't imagine, actually, I can't imagine because I got to sell this house before that happens. 

00:21:44:02 - 00:21:44:21

No. 

00:21:45:25 - 00:21:47:12

Is that close to Salt Pond? 

00:21:47:18 - 00:22:02:09

No, it's it's in other direction. Yeah. It's nice actually. Actually, if you're ever out that way, shoot me a note. There are like I think it's Ospreys. They have these, um, osprey like nests and yeah, there are people shooting out there all the time. Shooting photos, not guns. And, um. 

00:22:02:19 - 00:22:04:03

Shoot the Osprey. Yeah. 

00:22:05:20 - 00:22:11:01

I just have to make that distinction. I've actually trained myself to not say shooting. Yeah. Any more for photography. 

00:22:11:03 - 00:22:19:10

I've done the same thing for that reason. Yeah. Yeah. Welcome to the aggressive. Yeah. Welcome to the Big Photo Hunter podcast or something. 

00:22:19:12 - 00:22:19:27

Yeah. 

00:22:21:16 - 00:22:22:18

Exactly. No. 

00:22:22:29 - 00:22:25:21

So you must know of Betty. Betty Wally out there on the Cape? 

00:22:25:25 - 00:22:27:13

No. Is that a photography Wally? 

00:22:27:15 - 00:22:31:13

Isn't it a wonderful photographer that you need to look up? Yeah. 

00:22:31:15 - 00:22:32:07

It's just you should. 

00:22:32:09 - 00:22:32:24

Have her on the. 

00:22:32:26 - 00:22:33:11

Podcast. 

00:22:33:13 - 00:23:08:05

I will definitely look her up now. It's just my naiveté. And also, you know, photography came to me about four years ago or so, and so I'm still, like, learning, uh, and following people. And it's, it's ironic, despite having a house out there, it's not my favorite place to shoot. I prefer Maine, I prefer different scenes, and I love street photography. There's some things out there I've gone out to like P-Town, like actually in winter and done some shooting, and it's pretty cool because there's not a lot of people out there, and the people that are there are very chill, and they are usually great subjects because they're just cool people. 

00:23:08:07 - 00:23:41:11

And so I like it. Yeah, I like it a lot. Yeah. But back to the climate change concern. I gotta sell that house because I am terrified and I am terrified for Maine. We didn't really talk about this, but. So when I was a kid, I grew up down near Miami, and at about eight years old or so, I got shipped up to Maine for summer camp. I spent ten years at the summer camp and had such a bond with Maine and a connection to that state, that I still go back at least once a summer. I go back every year, and I've been going back except for a few summers, like when I was in college or something. 

00:23:41:13 - 00:23:55:22

It's just one of my, if not my absolute favorite place. And had we not bought a little beach house in Cape Cod, it would be a house on a lake up there. And and I'll leave you with one other thing too. You have a workshop coming up with Derrylin. Is that her name? Derrylin. 

00:23:56:04 - 00:23:57:06

Derrylin. Leonard. Yeah. 

00:23:57:08 - 00:24:17:11

Yeah, because I've been following her work because that's the area that I basically spent my time in and spend my time. And now where she lives, about 2 or 3 years ago or two years ago, I was like, hey, I love your photos. Are you gonna have any workshops? And at the time, she wasn't, but now she's doing it. So I have your work, your fall workshop on my calendar. So I got to sign up for that with her. That's awesome. Yeah. So I'll I'll see you then. But she is. 

00:24:17:13 - 00:24:18:05

Amazing. 

00:24:18:18 - 00:24:20:00

Unbelievable. Right. 

00:24:20:02 - 00:24:20:26

And she's lovely. 

00:24:21:03 - 00:24:32:26

Yeah. She seems really nice. Her photos are amazing and I, I know the areas she shoots. So I see what she's doing. Like in her photos. I'm like, I know how good she is because that's a very pretty lake. But it's not that pretty. 

00:24:33:18 - 00:24:35:07

You know, I know she. 

00:24:35:09 - 00:24:36:26

She makes magic out there. 

00:24:37:16 - 00:25:08:16

Unbelievable. So just touching back into winter photography, if someone does want to get out into winter, do you start doing winter photography? Okay. Aside from like the technical considerations which we touched on, which mostly I relate to exposure, what are some other things that they should consider, such as, say, locations to go to, maybe places to start shooting in the winter. And if you do want to get deeper into the woods or the mountains or something, just things that people should consider for safety and preparation and all of that. 

00:25:08:26 - 00:25:09:11

Yeah. 

00:25:09:13 - 00:25:45:28

Two of the biggest questions that I get asked as far as logistics and winter are how do I keep my hands warm? That's a very important question. And does the cold do anything to the camera? Is it going to hurt the camera? And the answer to the first one is I keep my hands warm with wool liner gloves. So they cover my fingers completely. And then I put heavy mittens over those liner gloves. And whenever I need to adjust something on the camera, I take the heavy mittens off, make my adjustments, and then sometimes, if it's not super cold, I'll operate the camera, which is the line of gloves on. 

00:25:46:20 - 00:26:22:26

Um, if it's very cold, I'll put the heavy mittens back on and try and press the shutter with the the mittens on. The important difference from what other advice I heard when I was starting photography was that you need the gloves with the removable let your fingers be exposed. That is a recipe for having super cold hands. Please don't buy the fingerless gloves or the removable fingers on the gloves. And don't buy gloves, period. Except for just a nice pair of really good wool liner gloves, because those are going to be a great base layer. 

00:26:22:28 - 00:27:05:12

But to keep your hands warm, you need heavy mittens. That would be my biggest recommendations. And I shoot when it's 20 below 25 degrees below zero wind chills or 30 to 40 below. Sometimes when I'm out there and I'm nice and toasty with my big heavy mittens and I've got a 400 fil down jacket on. I don't wear parkas, but I've got a base layer and a heavy mid layer and a big fluffy, you know, down jacket on over everything, and then a wind layer to long underwear, Gore-Tex pants with insulation in them, to heavy wool socks and serious winter boots with insulation. 

00:27:05:14 - 00:27:36:08

So staying warm is a huge consideration in winter photography, especially if you want to photograph see smoke, which really only occurs when it's below zero. Um. You got to dress really, really warm. Don't let your fingers be exposed. Because I've had friends who've had frostbite and have had a little frost nip myself just from trying to operate a camera when it's that cold. As far as camera operation and the cold, your camera is made of plastic and metal and it's going to be fun unless you get moisture in it. 

00:27:36:13 - 00:28:17:05

One of the big problems you have is going from a really cold environment into a warm one. We saw this when we were on Katahdin, photographing in the cold, and then bringing the cameras back into a hot bunkhouse with a bunch of sweaty guys. Especially on the days that we're photographing in the snow. There's snow getting on the camera and moisture in the camera. So when we brought it back in, the condensation was just terrible. So put your camera in a plastic bag when you go in. It's definitely an important consideration if you're photographing an event or a wedding and you're moving from a cold environment into a warm one, which a lot of times you have to do in the winter, uh, have some kind of strategy to mitigate moisture. 

00:28:17:07 - 00:28:48:16

First of all, wiping everything off with a towel before you bring it inside. And then when you do bring it inside, either leave it in your camera bag or a plastic bag. I actually have a baggie that I keep in my camera bag, put it in the baggie, and then that lets it adjust slower over time and keep some of that cold air in the bag to let it adjust. If your camera batteries are of an older camera model, they technically can drain a little bit faster in the cold, just like a car battery you know, will not start when it's really super cold. 

00:28:49:03 - 00:28:59:05

Just keep your camera batteries close to your body. If you have an interior pocket and a jacket, or your pants, have the camera battery stash on your body and set them in your bag. 

00:28:59:27 - 00:29:17:28

I think these are really good considerations that people might think are common sense, but are not because I've gone out before. Once you get out into the cold, if you are not properly covered, or if you think you are, but you're not, it's just going to ruin your time and you're not going to be able to function well. So I think that that's important. 

00:29:18:00 - 00:29:18:15

Yeah. 

00:29:18:23 - 00:29:40:07

And for safety, a lot of that stuff is common sense. Number one, just letting someone know where you're going to be, uh, partner, spouse, whoever your closest point of contact is, just say, hey, I'm going to go for a photo shoot at the lighthouse and might be getting down close on the rocks. And if you don't hear from me and six hours and send out the search parties. 

00:29:40:09 - 00:29:41:29

Your family must love this. 

00:29:42:05 - 00:30:19:10

My wife made me get a life insurance, uh, for my Katahdin trip last year, which was the first time I did it because I was doing keep doing more of these winter hikes. And a good thing to have now in the backcountry, which I don't have, but I always have friends. Um, and that's another thing. When I'm doing the winter hikes, I never do them alone. It's always with another person. And they usually have a Garmin inReach G.P.S., uh, where they can text or call emergency services. My new iPhone 15 has the SOS function now, so technically I could send out an SOS on my iPhone or on my Apple Watch. 

00:30:19:12 - 00:30:27:27

I can retrace my steps using maps, and I download, uh, maps to my phone whenever I'm going into the backcountry, just for safety reasons. 

00:30:28:01 - 00:30:44:09

You mentioned sea smoke, and I love that and have never been able to find it. So when where why? Like, how do you do this? You mentioned you have to get out there when it's below zero. How do you find the steam and smoke? Because it makes photos look so cool. 

00:30:44:11 - 00:31:19:24

It's amazing. It's one of my favorite things to photograph. I mean, to get it in some of these deeper water locations like Portland Headlight or Double Lighthouse. It's hard. It has to be really, really cold. Of those 15 to 20 below days, it helps if there's a little more humidity, there's a little more saturated sea smoke forms when the just like any condensation, when the dew point and the air temperature match and you have 100% humidity. So on those mornings when it's really cold, it's usually really, really dry too, because there's been a high pressure system. 

00:31:19:26 - 00:31:50:05

And all the reasons that make cold air usually lead to really dry air to. There are a couple of go to locations on the coast of Maine. Five Islands is a big one. It's a little more sheltered, so it gets a little colder and the water stays a little bit warmer. I'm guessing in that pocket. Pine Point and Scarborough, Maine is another place where it has pretty consistent sea smoke. The big one for you in Massachusetts that I think you could target would be well back. 

00:31:50:07 - 00:32:12:09

Lighthouse from Newcastle common in New Hampshire. That's one of the most beautiful sea smoke locations around. Sometimes you get boats coming through the sea smoke there, but always well backed. Lighthouse looks awesome with the steam rising around it. And if you try that on a really cold morning, you won't be alone. You'll be safe with, uh, quite a few other photographers there. 

00:32:12:11 - 00:32:24:09

Oh, so the the ingredients are below zero, the specific locations that have better than others. And then the other is their timing. Like, do you want to get out before the sun comes out or anything? 

00:32:24:12 - 00:32:25:05

Yeah, the coldest. 

00:32:25:07 - 00:32:54:07

Time of day. I mean, it's cold up in the morning because radiational cooling leads to the coldest temperatures at night, and then the sun warms up there during the day. The most interesting light occurs in the morning, too, usually when the sun hits the sea smoke and it's backlit is the the way that it looks best. And a lot of the photos you see that are look like they're is just full of drama and kind of boiling. Looks like water's been boiling, uh, at sunrise with backlight coming through. 

00:32:54:09 - 00:32:56:29

I may try to. Well, I'm trying to see what the weather is. It's like. 

00:32:57:06 - 00:32:57:23

It hasn't been. 

00:32:57:25 - 00:32:58:20

Below zero this. 

00:32:58:22 - 00:32:59:07

Year. 

00:32:59:09 - 00:33:00:08

That's what I'm looking at. It's like 30. 

00:33:00:11 - 00:33:01:25

On a single time. Yeah. 

00:33:01:27 - 00:33:17:08

Yeah, it's 37 degrees here right now. It's like. Yeah. So just so we're on the record here, if you ever decide to have a back country like Winter workshop, I'm in. All right I will I will be there. I would love to learn that stuff. 

00:33:17:15 - 00:33:36:18

I've had a couple of people messaged me about that, like ready for the Catalina Expedition workshop. I'm like, oh my God, I'm gonna have to get my, uh, Maine Guides license and my wilderness first aid training. And after all, quite a few certifications. But before I feel comfortable bringing people along. 

00:33:36:20 - 00:33:37:09

Well, if I go with. 

00:33:37:11 - 00:33:38:18

You, it's a big responsibility. 

00:33:38:20 - 00:34:09:15

It's a huge responsibility. And if I go with you, buy an evac helicopter, too, because I'm just some bald, like, it's I mean, look at me, dude. I'm like some bald guy with big teeth. But I really do. I'm. I'm a unique person because I'm not, like, an outdoor adventurer by default. But I am inside, like, everything. I want to do it all. But I'm not built to do it. 

00:34:09:17 - 00:34:11:05

Who's built? What do you mean built to do? 

00:34:11:07 - 00:34:22:21

I don't know, I feel like you could like. Like if you and I were stuck outside, you would live, like, with no food, no water, like in the middle of nowhere. You would live. And I would be like, feast for the birds or something. 

00:34:22:26 - 00:34:23:23

No, no, I. 

00:34:23:25 - 00:34:24:18

Feel like you do. 

00:34:24:24 - 00:34:25:09

I feel like. 

00:34:25:11 - 00:34:26:29

I'd be one of the first to go. 

00:34:27:01 - 00:34:30:02

Oh, dude, I don't have any survival skills. 

00:34:30:04 - 00:34:33:27

Or, you know, I don't have an underground bunker. Not hoarding. 

00:34:34:10 - 00:34:34:25

I don't have. 

00:34:35:11 - 00:34:45:24

Well, if I'm not, not implying you're like, you're like a doomsday or. But like, if if we. If I go on a Catan adventure with you. Like if you a workshop do this. Okay. Like you can eat me. 

00:34:46:00 - 00:34:47:04

So that's funny. 

00:34:47:21 - 00:35:01:07

Anyway, are there any resources that you would recommend that would be valuable for our listeners to look at? If they're interested in learning more about winter photography, or just even landscape photography, or just Main or New England photography in general. 

00:35:01:25 - 00:35:32:12

Uh, Matt Payne has a great podcast F stop, collaborate and listen. He just did a rundown of his Antarctica trip. That's some pretty hardcore winter photography, a lot of Jerry Monkman writings, and the guide to outdoor digital photography. He dealt a lot with winter photography. So look him up, see if you can get your hands on either that book or see if he has any resources online. I think he's a wonderful teacher and photographer. He's a full time conservation photographer. 

00:35:32:14 - 00:35:56:12

Actually. His name is Jerry Monkman and I will have of a tutorial just on winter photography, probably next winter coming out through my Substack newsletter, and it'll probably be included in a guidebook I'm putting together for photographing the Coast of Maine, to which I talked to a publisher about this morning. 

00:35:56:16 - 00:36:05:13

Ah, congratulations. Fingers crossed man. Thanks. So where can everyone find all this information about you, your Instagram, your website, your Substack? 

00:36:05:27 - 00:36:39:19

Uh, the website will bring you to everywhere. And that's Benjamin Williamson photography.com. Uh, the Substack newsletter is a new venture where I share, like, trip round ups of, uh, some of these big expeditions that have been going on. Give a rundown of what went into planning for those. So probably some information in there. And then the Guide to Photographing the Coast of Maine is going to be released through the subs newsletter as well. And installations over the next year. I've got the first post actually being edited right now, and should be ready to go in the next day or two. 

00:36:40:05 - 00:37:01:29

Your photos are absolutely gorgeous, and I look forward to when you post new stuff on social media, because I just admire even you posted a photo from Katahdin. I forget what you wrote, but you said something like, you know, the sun was coming up and or it was going down and it was I had like 12 seconds, so this isn't the best photo. And I'm like, are you kidding me? Dude, that's the best boat I've ever seen in my life. 

00:37:02:27 - 00:37:06:00

Okay, thank you for the kind words. It's beautiful. 

00:37:06:02 - 00:37:16:19

And finally today for all of my guests, I always ask three questions. The first question is, what's your favorite genre to shoot and why? 

00:37:16:27 - 00:37:36:10

Favorite genre? I define it as scenic photography. It's not true nature photography and it's not street photography. It's kind of this combination of manmade subjects in nature that tell a story about how humans interact with the landscape and how we fit in into the natural world. 

00:37:36:17 - 00:37:40:00

Unexpected. I didn't expect that answer. Very cool, very cool. 

00:37:40:02 - 00:37:40:29

Yeah. That's true. 

00:37:41:11 - 00:37:52:04

I love street photography to look at, and I love nature photography to look at. Um, I think there's a kind of marriage of those two in my sensibility. 

00:37:52:18 - 00:37:55:23

Question number two what camera system do you use? 

00:37:56:00 - 00:38:29:09

I love the Sony systems mostly for the dynamic range is why I switched to them. I was photographing with canon when I started. I had a rebel and then I upgraded to A6D, and then the Nikon's got really good and I was like, uh, I'm happy with canon and then Sony for a very short period of time, there was a little bit better than Nikon's on dynamic range. So I was like, I'll, I'll switch to Sony and I could marry some of my old canon lenses to the Sony, which played a big role in making that switch. 

00:38:30:00 - 00:38:43:17

I have the A7, R5 and the A7 three, which are both great cameras. I use the A7 three for the last two years exclusively, and it's not as expensive as they R5 and has smaller files. I just love that camera. 

00:38:43:26 - 00:38:53:16

I got a gift of an R5. It is unbelievable. So I was shooting with the A7 four and great camera. Love. 

00:38:53:18 - 00:38:54:08

Amazing camera. 

00:38:54:10 - 00:39:08:21

I love that camera. I didn't need another camera. I would never have bought this. Like right now I just don't need another camera. Like. And they're not cheap. And I'm like, um, but it was a gift. Uh, it was a birthday gift. And it's, uh, it's unbelievable. 

00:39:08:23 - 00:39:18:02

I got it mostly for making large prints, which is a goal of mine to do some more gallery shows and print really, really big. There's no better camera for that. 

00:39:18:04 - 00:39:18:27

It's like 61. 

00:39:18:29 - 00:39:20:11

Megapixels. And if you can, like. 

00:39:20:13 - 00:39:21:24

Yeah, it's ridiculous. You're gonna fill. 

00:39:21:26 - 00:39:23:10

Up your hard drive so quickly. 

00:39:23:12 - 00:39:24:00

I know, tell. 

00:39:24:02 - 00:39:36:12

Me about it. All right. And my final question of the episode is, on a scale of 1 to 10, how often do you get that burning itch to just get out there and shoot photos? I'm sorry. No more shooting photos. 

00:39:36:14 - 00:39:38:23

Make photos, make photos. 

00:39:38:25 - 00:40:07:12

There we go. Um. Oh, definitely a nine. I've got a I've got young children. I've got a six year old and twins who are three who keep me very busy. It would, it would be a ten if I, if it was just me. But I love being home with them and spending time with them, and they're a bigger part of my life than photography, for sure. But, uh, any free time that I have 100% going going out to make photos somewhere. 

00:40:07:14 - 00:40:18:09

Ben Williamson I am so thankful for your time. Love your photos. To all of our listeners, go look up Ben, because, uh, you'll be happy, I promise. Thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate it. 

00:40:18:14 - 00:40:21:00

It was great talking to you, Ken. You're a great host. 

00:40:21:02 - 00:40:21:17

Wow. 

00:40:21:19 - 00:40:23:21

That's subjective, but thank you. 

00:40:25:22 - 00:40:40:14

Thank you so much for joining me for today's episode. Our next show will feature more valuable stories from our community members. If you'd like to audition to be a guest, please visit Big Photo hunt.com for more information. Thanks again for listening today.