The Wild Photographer

Talking with Eric Rock: How to Become a Better Wildlife and Nature Photographer in the Field

• Episode 71

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In this episode I sit down with legendary photographer, guide, and longtime friend Eric Rock for a conversation packed with field-tested wisdom, big-picture perspective, and the kind of insight that only comes from a lifetime spent photographing (and guiding instructional photo tours) in wild places.

We dive into what it really takes to become a stronger nature photographer, from learning to capture a wildlife subject with intention, to building fieldcraft techniques that help you create better images before you ever touch the shutter. 

We also get into the nuts and bolts of photography: prime lenses vs. zooms, what focal lengths Eric tends to trust most for wildlife, how he thinks about exposure, and why the histogram is still one of his favorite tools on a digital camera. Eric also discusses his editing philosophy, his evolving visual style, and how photography can be used as a meaningful tool for conservation and education.

This episode is full of practical advice, but it’s also a deeper conversation about patience, purpose, and staying connected to the passion that got you into photography in the first place.

In this episode, we discuss:

  • Why bears are such powerful teachers for wildlife photographers
  • How to approach wildlife photography ethically and effectively
  • The importance of guides, awareness, and fieldcraft
  • Telephoto choices, zooms vs. primes, and lens versatility
  • Setting photography goals for daily practice and long-term growth
  • What makes a compelling travel photograph
  • How to become successful in nature photography today
  • Why the histogram still matters
  • Eric’s minimalist editing workflow and evolving creative style
  • OM System gear, favorite lenses, and surprisingly useful non-camera gear

Find Eric Rock online:

Additional Photo Resources: Court's YouTube Channel

New Course! Conservation Communications Course - with Court and Colby

Court's Websites

Sponsors and Promo Codes:


Court Whelan (00:00)
Hey friends, welcome back to the wild photographer. I've got an episode today that I really, I enjoy all these episodes, but I really love connecting to a long time buddy of mine, Eric Rock. He's, he's such an icon in the industry. He has really in a lot of ways pioneered our collective ability to be photo guides and professional photographers. And he's also probably one of the most well-traveled photo guides and just general guides and or photographers that I know.

Like he's probably traveled to twice as many countries and led twice as many expeditions, photo expeditions that is, then the runner up, whoever that might be. So incredible breadth of knowledge here. We cover a lot, including practical tips for how to

metaphorically walk up on the wildlife subject that you are photographing. talk about how to use the histogram for great exposures. We talk about ethical wildlife photography, his techniques for editing and processing and quite a deep dive into his own personal photo gear. There's so much else that we cover in today's conversation. I really enjoyed it. I think you're going to really love what we have in store for you today. Before I welcome Eric, I wanted to do a shout out to one of our lead sponsors of the podcast.

So first up it's MPB. And I want to talk about something that pretty much every photographer either deals with or is like me kind of obsessed with. The need to get new photo gear, whether it's new technology, whether it's just a wishlist item. And MPB makes it incredibly simple to buy, sell or trade used camera gear. It's all in one place, all one platform without any sort of uncertainty that comes with these random online marketplaces where you don't know the person.

⁓ if you're selling it, you don't know the quality exactly of what you're buying. When you buy from MPB, every single item is carefully inspected. It's tested to very rigorous professional standards. It's photographed so you can see exactly what you're getting online. And you just really, again, know what you're getting. There's no surprises. Plus everything comes with a warranty and you can do hassle free returns if need be. And this is a really big deal when you're like myself or like Eric, where you rely on these tools as a professional photographer.

On the flip side, if you've got equipment that are just sitting around collecting dust, you need to replace things or upgrade. MPB is wonderful to sell to. It's very, very simple. You get a quote fast, like instantaneous on their website. They handle the shipping, which is also insured. and once your gear is checked, you get paid directly. There's no awkward meetups. There's no back and forth messages.

So whether you're upgrading or just making room for new gear in your kit for your next adventure, whether that's to Africa for a proper wildlife safari or just on one of your photo walks, MPB makes the whole process feel really, really simple, very easy.

and probably most importantly, very professional and certain. So check them out at mpb.com. And now let's go ahead and get into the episode and talk with Eric.

Court Whelan (02:56)
Eric, welcome to The Wild Photographer. Thanks so much for joining.

Eric (02:59)
Hey, it's good to be here. Thanks. Good to see you again.

Court Whelan (03:02)
Yeah, this has been a long time coming, but so thrilled to have you on and talk with you about all your adventures and exploits around the world. ⁓ To start off, you you, one of the real superlatives about Eric Rock, I mean, there are of course many, many that we'll touch on today, but one of the big ones is honestly, are probably one of the more, ⁓ not one of, you are probably the most well-traveled.

photographer, wildlife, nature, landscape photographer that I know in terms of how many places you've been around the world. And I say that not lightly, like you probably have done twice as much as the second in line of anybody I know. And that's obviously saying something. ⁓ What is your favorite place to photograph on planet Earth?

Eric (03:47)
You know, it's funny, but I get asked that question a lot, usually when I'm out, you know, leading a photo tour somewhere or a nature tour somewhere. And I've got to fall back on, you know, how I started things, but I'm a pretty here and now kind of guy. So I'd have to say, when I get asked that question, I say, you know, wherever I'm at, I'm a here and now kind of guy. And I figure if I'm there, it's for a good reason. And if for some reason I'm not enjoying it,

Court Whelan (04:08)
Good answer.

Eric (04:14)
I probably shouldn't be there. I shouldn't be there photographing. I probably shouldn't be there leading that particular photo safari. And so I'm here now kind of guy. So whether it's, you know, on a safari in Africa or leading a trip into the Arctic or maybe, you know, even just a photo walk around my neighborhood, you know, I've tried to be in here now and really enjoying squeeze the juice out of that. So that would be my, that's my standard answer. And I'd have to say overall it's true. Now I might say, you know, somebody pushed me a little bit more.

you know, where do you feel the most comfortable? I'd have to say probably the Arctic in some way, because of my background in Alaska, you know, living there for 20 years, exploring, trips, working in ⁓ wildlife research area. led me to a lot of places where even Alaskans who lived there all their life wouldn't have a chance to go. So, and then from there, Arctic Canada, ⁓ you know, Greenland, you know, another good location to spend time and ⁓ Svalbard.

as well. So those are all pretty amazing places.

Court Whelan (05:17)
It's a tough borderline unfair question to ask right off the bat. I also am asked that a lot. I'm like, gosh, can I give you a top three or a top 10? So yeah, thanks for playing along with me there, but I'm going to do a follow-up, which is probably equally as hard, but a little bit more distilled. about favorite? Well, good.

Eric (05:32)
That's okay. I didn't find it a hard answer. I didn't find it a hard question to answer. found it, you know,

a good chance to kind of refocus a little bit.

Court Whelan (05:43)
Yeah, and it is funny, you whenever I answer that question again, when I'm guiding photo trips or just out traveling anywhere, it's like, well, favorite.

For what is it to photograph landscapes? Is it to photograph wildlife? Is it just to be, is it a place that I could see myself living? So yeah, I know there's, there's a lot of different things that go through my mind, but yeah, I I'm going to kind of take away from that. The Arctic. know you have deep, deep roots in Alaska and that obviously counts for that, that region. And then yeah, I think about Svalbard and, I don't, I guess that's a good seed for the next question is, okay. So place aside, favorite critter. What what's like photographically, course, favorite critter, favorite.

animal and you know maybe it's not an animal but ⁓ what's your favorite thing to photograph out there?

Eric (06:27)
You know, like many photographers, wildlife photographers, you know, I'd have to say bears and whether it be brown bears or what most of us know as grizzly bears or polar bears, even black bears, you know, and I want to say that for a different reason. I probably learned more about nature from spending time with bears, again, from brown bears to, you know, moving on to polar bears eventually by learning what they're about.

you know, how they interface with the environment. I learned more about nature from those two teachers than anybody else. You know, I studied river otters for two summers in Alaska, really ⁓ in-depth studies, doing some techniques, using some techniques that had never been used before, allowed us some really incredible windows into their world. But it was nowhere near dynamic. Learned a lot, but nowhere near dynamic as spending time photographing, watching bears. So.

And it doesn't matter what kind of bear, just they interface with their world in such an ⁓ intimate way that they're probably the best teachers when it comes to learning about nature.

Court Whelan (07:33)
Yeah, I'm gonna agree with you there. Bears, I mean, we've got what eight species in the world we can pick from and they're all quite different, very different regions. You've got some that live on or very near the equator, whether it's the Andean spectacled bear, Bornean sun bear, you've got others that live in the, you know, basically polar opposite pun intended, you know, in the polar region, you know, up in the Arctic with polar bears. ⁓

Eric (07:40)
Mm-hmm.

Court Whelan (07:57)
If we're to think generally, and this is a very loaded question, but how do you walk up on photographing bears? And you might need to pick a single species or even a place, but like what's going through your mind when you want to photograph that animal? I think, you know, for myself,

I'm very opportunistic. know, I, whatever the conditions are, whatever the lighting is, like I'm making the best of it. And of course, you know, I'm using certain settings. I might want to shallow depth the field. If it's a portrait shot, I might want to deep depth the field for a, you know, a wildlife in landscape shot. But what's, what's kind of going through your mind as you are, you know, walking around in grizzly country and you see mothers and cubs or you're, you're out in the tundra and photographing polar bears. there any lessons, kind of generalities that you can impart?

on listeners of what to think about how to how to set up your shot for the most success. ⁓

Eric (08:55)
⁓ First, I'll take even half a step back from that and I would say anybody looking to do that and myself included, ⁓ I would go with a very well-trained reputable, ⁓ insightful guide for that area. ⁓ When I was leading the trips, I was that person. so ⁓ I wasn't photographing, I was watching what was going on. I was checking the six to make sure everything's fine there and not so much for, know, out of respect for the

for the bear, out of respect for the animal, out of respect for my subject. The last thing I'd want to do is get into a place where I was compromised or my subject was compromised. So going with somebody who's going to be there to help guide you, to help keep an eye on what's going on around, to anticipate those behaviors. Because when you're looking through the lens, you're seeing a small little window, which is what you want to do when you're a photographer. You want to concentrate on

What is that going to be a portrait? Is it going to be a landscape shot with a bear in it? Is it going to be an action shot? And by going with that guide, and this is a big plug for the good guides that are out there. Okay. They're the ones that are watching. They're going to tell you, okay, be ready. This, we've got a good potential for this behavior to happen. then hopefully pow, there it happens for them. So that would be the first place I would start. For myself, again, I tend to go.

just because I want somebody with a broader view at the time. I'll go with another one of these guides and I might trade off and say, hey, you shoot for a while. I'll kind of keep an eye on things and kind of see what's going on around you and help you out. so taking times passing the baton for who's guiding at that time so the other one can concentrate on really get into their photography. Because that's what I like most about wildlife photography is to really kind of make that connection through my lens.

to be there for when the action happens or for when the light changes. And I don't want to be distracted by other things. So guide or somebody watching everybody that I can trust is going to be the key. And I really ⁓ suggest that for anybody thinking to work with bears. Because they are large animals, they deserve a lot of respect.

Court Whelan (11:02)
And what about like the average lens choice, the average camera settings? We're going to get into a little bit more of a gear section later on per the norm, but yet just for someone starting out that might not really know, well, should I be shooting with a wide angle? Should I be shooting with a telephoto? Like what, are some of the go-to settings? Do you have any tricks with, you know, all the aperture shutter speed ISO stuff, or is it all pretty standard?

Eric (11:28)
Oh, it's well for me, it's pretty standard. I'm a run and gunner if you can imagine. I like to keep things pretty much simple on the camera so I can concentrate on the moment. And the lens choice, almost always I'm gonna be working with at least a 300 millimeter lens or something with that kind of perspective, maybe 200. Mainly because I wanna give.

whatever my subject is, we're talking, if we're talking about bears, you know, I'm to give them the respect of some distance because they need to make a living. And the less I'm in the way, the better. Now there are times where, you know, it's okay. You might be closer and you're shooting closer and you know, that's the time for the real tight, you know, close up of the head. And I love portraits. I love wildlife portraits. So I'm not afraid to use that long lens to get that. But then again, I might kind of reach around behind me, pull up another camera with a wide angle and get that landscape shot and show that wider perspective. And that's

Wonderful. But I tend to, with wildlife, you know, if I were to say I have a walk around lens on, run and gun theme, it's probably going to be at least 200 millimeters, probably closer to 300 millimeters or more. And with the gear I shoot, that's pretty easy to do. And I use that on my daily photo walks. So, and not, I'm not always walking with bears. can, I've got black bears in my yard here in the summertime and I have the potential to run into them here in the neighborhood when I'm doing my photo walks, but.

You know, around Alaska, same thing. you know, if in a remote area of Canada, I'll be pretty much following the same guidelines.

Court Whelan (13:04)
And I know you've shot with a few different camera systems over the years, but what are your thoughts for wildlife photography with comparing primes, which would be those fixed focal length lenses where you can't zoom in and out versus a telephoto zoom where you have that flexibility? Do you gravitate to one or the other?

Eric (13:22)
Yeah, absolutely. You know, I love primes. I will tell you that. That was kind of my era for lenses where if you were shooting at a professional level, you had to be shooting a prime. It wasn't until, you know, the pro 70 to 200 2.8 zooms came out that all of a sudden zoom started getting some real notice. Now there is a couple exceptions to that, but I don't want to go into the history, but.

It was really, for me, the 70 to 200s became good pro level lenses. And those are the 2.8 pro level for sure. But nowadays, mean, it's a great time to be a wildlife and nature photographer because the Zooms are just so much better. And I mean, they're much more versatile and you can actually travel lighter, less gear. I would love to take a big bag full of primes, but I'm not that young anymore.

And, you know, it saves me time switching. want to, you know, just that moving and constantly shooting or looking for subjects. I don't want to be switching lenses when the action happens. So zooms are definitely a way to go. And again, the technology nowadays, since let's go back, I won't go back too far because then it starts, you know, kind of, it gives you an idea of my age, but let's say, let's go back to the nineties. You know, there weren't that many zooms that, you know, you could go out and produce the same level of images you do today. So between digital cameras.

and the Zooms we have, it's a much better time to be a nature photographer.

Court Whelan (14:52)
So this is a bit of a selfish question because I'm thinking about renting a lens for an upcoming trip. What are your thoughts on like the 300 2.8 class versus the 400 2.8? And for those that are not familiar with the difference in those, obviously one gives you more reach. They're the same aperture, but the 400 is like a bazooka. It's gigantic. I'm like, yeah, I mean, it's a different class in a way. And then they're both very, very sharp.

Eric (15:14)
A lot of glass, a lot of weight.

Court Whelan (15:20)
I wouldn't say one's necessarily sharper than the other. We could probably go online and look at some lens tests, ⁓ like, would you ever choose the 300 for wildlife ⁓ routinely because of the risk of being too far in being, too, I don't want to say zoomed in because these are primes, but like that's one of my big concerns. I don't shoot on big primes, but ⁓

Eric (15:40)
Yeah.

Court Whelan (15:45)
Again, with the ability to rent lenses so affordably these days, I'm thinking and just kind of wondering like, am I going to regret having this bazooka that, you know, is too far in on my animal where I can't get those landscape shots or is the 300 going to not just just not quite be enough to get that portrait shot?

Eric (16:05)
Oh, I would say weight wise, if there's a weight concern, the 400 2.8 is going to be more detrimental. The 300 2.8 is going to be more versatile, especially if you're using the, you're taking a set of converters with you. I think you just have a lot more flexibility. I used to do it for Safari all the time. I can remember traveling around Africa for two months with a 300 2.8 in my bag and a set of converters, which was, this is.

time ago, film days. After I came back from that particular trip, I put that lens away and it's like, I'm not touching you for a while. I mean, that was a good bit to lug even back then. So 400 2.8 is great. I mean, it's also versatile, but not quite as versatile as 300 2.8. If you're going for more bird life, I would say the 400. If it's more mammals, I'd lean more towards the 300. I just love the...

The perspective of 300 millimeters also, plus that out of focus background works really nicely for if you're in close and you're doing portraits. It's just a beautifully sharp, most of them are beautifully sharp lenses. I'm not sure which brand we're talking about or system we're talking about, but I think both Nikon, Canon, ⁓ any other manufacturers at 300 2.8 it's gonna be a very, very well researched and built lens and it's gonna give you the sharpness you need.

Court Whelan (17:25)
Well, Canon just came out with, don't know how much you follow Canon these days, but they just came out with one of their Primo, know, tip top, big prime lenses of a 300 2.8 that's not a prime. It's a 100 to 300 2.8 at that tip top quality. And I'm like, oh my gosh, is this the best of all worlds? But I'm shooting with 100 to 500 right now, which I love and hate at the same time, because it's like F 7.1 at 500. And it's like, I don't like that at all.

Eric (17:38)
I saw that.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Court Whelan (17:53)
But thinking I'm like, my gosh one to three hundred as sharp as the tip-top primo best of all class kind of thing But am I gonna be really bummed? Having to shoot at 420 f4 or just not being able to have that same distance and again selfish question because I'm truly thinking about this from my upcoming trips, but it's tempting

Eric (18:12)
Yeah.

I would rent that. You know what I'd is I'd rent ⁓ that new Canon lens. That's what I would go with. And I suggest that to a lot of people if they're not sure about a lens and it's a ⁓ trip that, you know, ⁓ it's a very specialized trip. Sometimes that's way to go. I should be careful, you know, what I say there because I don't want to, you know, cut off my nose to spite my face. you know,

Court Whelan (18:18)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Eric (18:36)
I represent a brand, but at the same time, you know, if you check it out on a rental and I've had people do this, they come on a trip, say, well, that's kind of expensive lens for one trip. They rent it and then they go back and buy it, which is perfectly fine. It gives you a chance to try it out and you know, a goal to shoot for, which a lot of photography, a lot of good photography is about setting goals and whether that's in gear, but also in, you know, what you're, what you're out there capturing. So.

Court Whelan (18:48)
Mm.

Mm-hmm.

Tell

me tell me more about that setting goals in photography

Eric (19:04)
⁓ I always said, you know, I have my annual goals, of course. You can start at any level with goals. ⁓ It could be everyday goals. Like for me, I have a goal every day to get if I'm not out photographing or leading a photo tour, and it's not part of what I'm supposed to be doing that day. Excuse me. Is I try to do a photo walk. It may only be around the block if it's I'm limited on time because I'm online or meetings or working on other projects or.

Maybe my wife's got me doing something here at the house. I try to get out for at least a little bit. Other times it might be three to five miles. And sometimes it becomes more of a walk where I just kind of zone out and it gives me a chance to reflect a little bit. But from that photo walk, I get some exercise, I get out of the house, I get a chance to work with gear. So we can always go down that road anytime you want to. But just...

a chance for me to keep active in photography and I, you know, whether I live, yeah, I live in a pretty decent place, but for people who, you know, maybe live in a city, hey, walk around the local park, you know, maybe local, maybe the nearest state park, get out every now and then do a photo walk. It keeps you shooting. I also have bigger goals and they tend to go more, most of them tend to go more annual. I, ⁓ for instance, during COVID, ⁓ I was living on a little Island out in Puget Sound and

was nice place to be, kind of not a whole lot of people. And so, but at the same time, pretty sequestered away. So my photo walks every day were good, but I made an annual or I made my yearly goal to get out and you know what? I've got plenty of birds here. I'm going to try to photograph every single species of bird on the island and become a better bird photographer. Not just get the shot, but force myself to get the shot and make, get a better one at each time. So.

uh, for this year, I'm going to plan on spending more time, uh, I level with waterfowl. don't know if you've watched any of my stuff, but lately I've been working at from floating hides and local ponds and lakes here in Montana, and especially in the springtime that may early June time is great because they're all arriving. They're looking good and they're getting right ahead north. So I want to spend more time in that water. Trust me. gets, you know, may here and he's high mountain lakes, pretty cold. So I can usually spend.

maybe two hours at a time in the water before I have to crawl out and kind of shiver for a while. So, ⁓ you know, each year I put together a different mesh of goals for myself and kind of work on those. And sometimes they're species oriented. Sometimes they're activity oriented or just, you know, what kind of things I want to get, maybe a breeding behavior or, ⁓ you know, different backgrounds. So, and maybe I might even go out each day with a different goal on my photo walks. So.

It's all possible.

Court Whelan (21:54)
Do ever set goals for individual trips that you might be guiding or joining?

Eric (21:59)
Yeah, when I have time. ⁓ It depends on the particular trip and the particular group. Sometimes I have time to do that. And I usually know if I've done a trip and not, I usually have a pretty good idea of what that goal could be. Say from, just got my last trip was a photo tour in Costa, bird photography tour in Costa Rica. And my personal goal was if I had time between shoots, which often we do come back for lunch, have a little bit of downtime, charge batteries, sneak off with my macro lens.

know, chase things like leaf cutter ants, know, or, you know, scorpions, any kind of cool little thing like that. So it's just a little break from my work to go enjoy a different aspect of the photography.

Court Whelan (22:43)
I love that goal setting and photography. So you, we've sort of alluded to this, but you, you lead some of the most epic nature and wildlife adventures around the world to areas that are honestly coveted by every photographer out there. How did you get into it? And what advice do you have for those that wish to follow in your footsteps, perhaps?

Eric (23:04)
Okay. ⁓ yeah. You know, I'd say, find your, I think with anything you do, you should do this for passion. ⁓ The photo tour side, it's a mix of your toolkit. You've got different tools needed to bring to the game. You can't just be a good photographer. If you're going to be a photo tour leader, you have to be an incredible people person. ⁓ Something I'm constantly working on, you can always, it's...

And it's kind of a game that changes under your feet. So you've constantly always got to be adjusting for being that people person that takes that experience and makes it what each person needed. back in the, when I first started doing photo tours, it really designed for professional photographers that wanted to increase their portfolio with different animal photos or landscapes or different types of photos to bring into it, to make them more marketable and sell more images.

It's not like that anymore. It's a much better place to be a photographer, nature photographer. Cause you're not, know, if you're, Hey, congratulations. If you're making a living as a wildlife photographer, there aren't that many people out there doing it, but I would say it's not a great time to be a wildlife photographer. Cause it's a real hard market to make sales in now enter competitions, all that stuff. Have fun with that. don't want it to take, but it's a great time to be a nature photographer because of the gear, because of the trips have been finessed and

You can go to these amazing places because of all these tours that are out there. ⁓ I would say, you know, this toolkit that you develop is going to really be something that you're going to constantly add new tools, maybe put some of those old tools away for a while until maybe you need them again. But it's really about being a people person. So develop that side while you're developing as a photographer. And all that should be your passion. If that's not your passion, you know, you might have some fun for a while. You might burn out. You might not make it too long, but really.

⁓ work on that passion and working with people. Because if one of my favorite things to do is to see when one of my guests gets that shot, I've helped them get that shot that they're just completely blown away from. I don't have it, but they have it. Hey, that's even more valuable to me as a photo tour leader. And on a personal level, if you want to grow as a photographer and learn how to communicate this stuff, really, something we forget about is find a sense of place.

⁓ you know, I've been lucky enough to say Denali National Park was my sense of place for the longest time and still want to go back. I can step on the ground and get a feel for what's going on. know, find a sense of place and really see what is all possible within that small little microcosm that you've created for yourself. And it might be a little park in your neighborhood. could be a great national park somewhere in the high Arctic. But for the most part, if you can,

find how those intricacies all come together, that's going to be a very good background for when you go to a new location. That's going to be your of your ⁓ foundation. So a sense of place can be a foundation for you to take other places. If I could say in just a couple of words.

Court Whelan (26:05)
Yeah, digging deep. think that's a, that's a really good bit of advice. And I think the, the photo walks you're talking about, it's a great way to do that. You know, when I heard you say that I was thinking back to a conversation that had the other day with someone asking, you know, well, how, did I learn photography or how does one learn photography? And probably the simplest quickest answer is practice, practice, practice. And, know, even if you're doing street photography in your town that has little to nothing to do with nature, it's going to make you a better nature photographer. Cause you're going to learn.

Eric (26:26)
Mm-hmm.

Court Whelan (26:35)
your camera better. You're going to learn what this setting does versus this setting. You're going to experiment with white balance maybe or, or slow shutter speeds and that will translate into the field. But I think the other part of it is, you know, doing the same walk five days in a row or 10 days in a row and seeing how the light changes at different times of day, or you see that little mushroom that just sprouted in the grass next to the sidewalk and you start to be able to look deeper into the landscape.

which I think is really, really important. If you're doing a photo trip, you know, you have two weeks on the ground. You need to be able to capture all the big showy, awesome stuff that you wanted and hoped for and expected, but also to do yourself a service and do photography service. You got to go a little bit deeper too, and photograph it in ways that people may not have seen it before or take photographs that aren't out there in, in hoards on the, the internet. So yeah, I really, I really liked that advice. ⁓ I often think about.

being useful in photography and more specifically having my resulting photographs be useful. And there are many ways you can take that and the many ways they can be useful. I think a lot of us just, know, we want them to be useful for ourselves. We want to take beautiful photographs that we're proud of, that we can kind of showcase and show off and maybe print off and put in our home or our office. ⁓ But I notice with a lot of your photography,

You're an excellent travel photographer and this is another way to be very useful where your photographs might make it into brochures or travel catalogs or other media like that where, yeah, this may not be something that I put over the sofa in my living room, but it shows this really interesting story about the trip that you're planning or about the region that you are helping protect, et cetera, et cetera.

Can you tell me a little bit about that? And specifically my question is, what ingredients do you think make for compelling travel photos? ⁓ Travel photos that might be used in more of a marketing sense, not necessarily a big showy awesome, I guess climactic type photo for a wall or the cover of Nat Geo, but something that's useful in marketing.

Eric (28:54)
notice, by the way, thanks for noticing that that's important to me on my background my ⁓

University education was in photojournalism. that was kind of, that's a nice, and I'm still pulled that way. I'm pretty eclectic in my photography. So what most people tend to see on social media is my nature wildlife stuff, but I do put those in there and those are very important for me. ⁓ On a personal note, I think what really makes it's, actually pretty simple, I think, to get to your question.

The answer should be pretty simple. I think really what you want to do is present images where people see themselves in that, whether it's up against, they're standing looking up at a really nice waterfall to maybe from a, and I've seen you do this too, from a safari vehicle back behind them while this beautiful, this incredible scene is developing in front of them.

And you're photographing them totally immersed in the experience. I think you don't need faces, but we all want to put ourselves in that scene and say, ⁓ if that was me, I would be shooting it this way. I'd be looking for that movement or I'd wait for that moment when that lion pounces or whatever it is. ⁓ I think really that's it. Creating an image where people want to put themselves in it. did this just last year. ⁓ My wife and I were in ⁓

Zimbabwe. We spent a couple nights in Zimbabwe on our way through to Zambia. And of course, we go spend some time at Victoria Falls and ⁓ standing there and so working some video with her in it and the waterfalls, all that movement and just, you know, the appreciation of place. so for me, you know, giving somebody to focus on and your viewer putting themselves into the scene, how can they do that?

Court Whelan (30:42)
Yeah, excellent. And I realize not everyone out there has, you know, access to submitting photos to a travel company like, like we might, since we're deeply immersed in that world, but oftentimes, you know, putting people in those photos and getting that picture yourself here, doing air quotes now picture yourself here, a type shot actually.

is a really good photo for your own personal album, for your portfolio, for your slideshow, for when you show friends and family coming back home. think people often knee-jerk to the idea that when that safari vehicle from another group pulls in front of the sighting, you say, ⁓ no, like they ruin the shot. But the reality is I think that's one of the

best foreground elements, best storytelling elements, like those always make it into my final album, just on a personal level. Like when I want to look back on photos and reminisce because it does, it puts yourself back in that moment when it's, when it's this perfect clear shot of a cheetah on the Serengeti, like cool. can, you can count the whiskers on its cheek. That's great. And it's all tack sharp and perfect. But sometimes when you can see a person, another photographer,

or just more of like a wide angle shot of like, what did this actually look like when I was there? Those are really, really great memory making tools. And if you do have access to ⁓ companies that might want your media, of course, there's always stock photography. There's always just contacting these companies with your photos and seeing if they want them. A lot of times they will. ⁓ It's a really, really good skill to hone. So yeah, thank you. Thank you for sharing that.

Eric (32:10)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I know that most companies don't get enough of that type of shot that that's what they're just digging for. They really dig that stuff.

Court Whelan (32:23)
Very true, very true. So on a similar note, and I'm kind of calling back to a previous answer you discussed, what do you think it takes to be successful with photography? And I would say especially nature photography, which encompasses the travel like we just talked about, but also landscapes and wildlife. It's hard to be a dedicated wildlife photographer and go to countless art shows throughout the year or.

rely solely on website sales. You can make some scratch for sure, but to be professional where that is paying your rent and your electricity bill, it's getting increasingly more difficult. So what do you think it does take to be successful with photography

Eric (32:53)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Court Whelan (33:03)
today's day and age? And do you think it's changed over the years and where might it be going if we're on a trajectory into the future?

Eric (33:12)
Oh boy, you know, great question. I don't know if I can answer all of that, especially where's it going. Uh, so it depends. think the success depends on which avenue you go. Cause there are new avenues like influencers, um, good or bad, whether you like it or not right now, that's a place, you know, that's a place to be as a photographer, a nature photographer as well. Um, so that's a good place. Now let's go to kind of the first kind of part of the question as a.

you're selling images, whether it be what little bit of stock industry there is nowadays versus you know, gallery sales. I think the first thing to be doing this to make those images that stand out that people are going to want to buy is patience. That in all aspects of nature photography and most photography especially, but nature photography is patience. That's the only way you're going to get those images. You just don't drive up or hike up and take that picture. You've

do some research, you spend some time getting to know it, maybe hire a guide that knows a little bit more about the area, or just put in the time. So whether that's a landscape or a wildlife shot, it's going to require patience and time. Now, finding your vision, that becomes a little bit more nebulous because sometimes ⁓ it can be, maybe you're really interested in the small creatures in our world, macro photography.

incredible place to be and it's actually a great place once you establish once you become good at it there are fewer people out there making that kind of living and there's a actually a fairly good size market for it because you know there's publications there's ongoing research and books and places where that stuff can go plus new discoveries to me to to be made through macro photography so you find your genre where you really feel comfortable and like let's go back to what I said earlier

put your passion into it. And that's really going to show up. work, I'm lucky enough, I work with a couple of photographers at OM Systems that have really done an incredible job of that. You know, when I think about who should I be looking at for macro photography, I go right there because these people have an amazing passion for what they're doing. And I think by showing that patience and pouring your time into it, developing your genre, that passion comes out and that's what people are drawn to. So ⁓ there's also, you know, a few.

You can make a little bit of scratch as maybe an educator as well if you have those skills. If people realize, wow, this person is doing some amazing work. I'd really like to learn their technique. Well, maybe they've put on a workshop for you or some one-on-one education. Not everybody's a good educator. That's something to keep in mind. Some people may be great photographers.

And when it comes down to sharing your experience, they may not want to, or they may not be very good at it. So you have to be very careful about that too. Hopefully it's not too much trial and error. Hopefully you have good resources. And with the internet nowadays, you can usually find out something about people beforehand and how good of educator they are, maybe how much further they're going to take you into your passion. I don't know if I answered all that, especially where it's going in the future. Honestly, I can't tell. Most people just...

throw up their hands and say AI, which is quite possible. you know, I think what I usually tell people is photograph yourself first. If you're judging yourself from your photography and you're using that to educate yourself, ⁓ make yourself better, then there's a success in there that it's not necessarily a monetary success, but it can fuel almost everything else you do. So shoot for yourself first. If you're ever gonna say,

Success for me is when I come home and I feel good about that experience and that maybe even had a couple of photos from it. So that's my cop-out answer. Shoot for yourself.

Court Whelan (37:05)
No, no, I love it. And that was a complete answer. All good. So I can't even imagine how many photo trips you've guided over the years. I mean, it's got to be in the many hundreds, if not probably thousands realistically. And my question is, you know, we often get quite a spectrum of photographic experience and prowess in our trip participants.

But oftentimes folks are, I would say maybe the middle of the bell curve, at least for me, is kind of in like the serious hobbyist. They'll go on a small handful of trips every year. They take fantastic photos. But are there any commonalities of lessons that you teach kind of early on in the trip to that type of person? And I don't want to say necessarily beginner, like definitely not the first time picking up a camera, but someone that is pretty.

passionate, pretty serious. They want to do it. They're not professional. They may be in their retirement career or they may just be doing this as, you know, as we're talking about here is just something to be very fulfilling on a hobbyist kind of level. Are there any lessons that you find are some of the most important or most well-received? And I'm just going use an example, not to see the answer too much, but you know, things like compositional elements or ways that you see lighting.

or framing, that kind of stuff. Like things that are people say, yeah, I remember I learned that back in the day, but this is a great refresher. Are there any things you start off your photo trips, which are really in a way, multi-day photo workshops and multi-day photo lessons. So those early on lessons that you find for that cohort of individuals, where they really take something away and can instantly improve from those lessons.

Eric (38:36)
Mm-hmm.

Mm.

absolutely. know, and you don't underestimate the power of just good basic, going over the basics, you know, whether it's talking about, you know, ⁓ use, what files are you using? Are you shooting raw or shooting, ⁓ JPEG?

you know, go over the basics of that, go over the basics of handling those files on through to, you know, different settings, whether it be in making it what a good exposure is, you know, reading history. I love talking to people about, you know, reading a histogram. I think it's still one of the most important tools in a digital camera, something we didn't have back in the film days at all. Man, if I'd had that in the film days, I'd been a much better photographer much earlier on. So covering those basics right off the bat, just to make sure everybody's on the same page

or has a chance to be on the same level there. And then I go into it. And I think one of the most important things is ⁓ fieldcraft. And I've worked with another gentleman off and on, ⁓ ambassador for OM Systems, Lee Hoy. Great guy. ⁓ And we talk about fieldcraft and how important that is in the photography. And one of my things,

early on is where does your eye go? Where does your eye go in a scene? You know, how are you going to complement that? Do you add more to it? you subtract? whether it's, and a lot of times that's landscape where you have the time to really walk through it step by step, but the same thing applies in wildlife and more fleeting types of photography like that. But you're concentrating on where your eye goes. And if you're doing landscapes, you can easily bring that over and you'll be a little bit more natural when it comes to wildlife or things that tend to move and are more fleeting.

I think there are certain things that are easier to teach and go over on landscape trips. And then in wildlife, it's more about ⁓ seeking out, you know, where's the action going to occur? How's it going to occur? know, what settings do you need to capture that? you know, those are really the kind of you got your broth and now you start adding the different elements to it. And that's what makes it that fine, know, tasty soup of a good image. And so that's kind of how I go about it.

And I try to have at least a good photo tip every single day that can help be developed throughout the course of the day on a trip.

Court Whelan (41:14)
So I want to go back to the histogram and I realized that this would be way better explained if we were together in the tidal flats of Alaska photographing brown bears and we could actually see the histogram. But would you mind explaining in sort of podcast friendly terms, what are you looking at with the histogram? What are you, what data are you gleaning from it? What decisions are you making when you see that chart?

Eric (41:28)
Yeah.

Ugh.

All right, I'm going to try to keep the more you go into detail on this, the more the trolls are going to come out. You realize that, right? So seriously, I mean, it's amazing how people can fight over, you know, the small technicalities when you start to describing us what I'm looking at in histogram and for, just say for a well exposed image. Now let's leave out for right now, let's leave out high key and low key.

Court Whelan (41:46)
Ha ha ha.

Eric (42:07)
⁓ exposures and where we're going with that, which is all fine. mean, there's technically whatever you want to do is going to be fine. But for me, and let's just say I'm a middle of the road photographer, I'll put that out there right now as far as, you know, not challenging exposure would look at it that way. I've shoot raw. So it gives me some, it gives me some leeway to correct if I am off or on, which is one of the reasons. Yep. Even lighting, even lighting. Yeah.

Court Whelan (42:30)
Yeah, so we're talking about like a well ⁓ lit scene, like something that's not overly bright. Yeah, yeah. So it's

not, again, high key would be super artistic and very, very bright and they are beautiful at times. Low key, very, very dark and ominous and moody. So yeah, something kind of not extreme on either end is what you're going for.

Eric (42:38)
Mm-hmm.

Exactly. So I'm looking at it as a chance to, I want to see everything from the left-hand mark. I want to see a graphic value of the exposure that represents everything from the shadow side on the left to highlights on the right. And so if you were to photograph, you know, we used to call it a Denali in Alaska. When you photograph, say something a medium tone, you know, 18 % reflectance, it would kind of have this bell-shaped curve going right through it.

And we'd say, oh, hey, I got a Denali. But not every scene is going to be like that because the number of highlights versus shadows and midtones are going to be different each place. I don't worry about what goes up over the top margin of the histogram because that's still all going to be captured in there. It's just the histogram on the back of your camera. Can't really show that. And by the way, a good reminder to everybody that that histogram in the back of camera is histogram for the JPEG.

of that particular image, not necessarily the raw. So you have a little bit of leeway on the right-hand side and the left-hand side. I'm still a firm believer, or I should say I practice exposing to the right. I tend to, if I don't have a whole lot of highlights and I've got this blank space, you know, on the histogram to the far right, I'll open up and I'll do, ⁓ increase my exposure till I move it over. I can always darken it down later. And I don't feel that I lose anything by doing that, but I'm still...

you know, capturing as much of that data as possible over on the highlight side, ⁓ because I tend to like the way I can process that particular image and bring that into play. So.

Court Whelan (44:24)
And the basic gist is I understand it because I'll be frank, I have used the histogram. I went through a phase where I was really a fan boy over it, but it's not so much anymore. But if you have that curve in this histogram chart, what you're looking for is the bell curve, those high peaks, the top of the curve is where you're getting most of your data and most of your light. Meaning it's representing ⁓ more of the scene than others.

So what you're trying to avoid is having those big spikes being abutted completely to the far right side or the far left side, because that means that there's too many highlights or too many dark points. So on the right side would be too many highlights, left side would be too many shadows and dark spots.

Eric (45:07)
Yeah, and that's fine as long as they don't touch, really go over that margin on the left or on the right, because that data it's lost. like to use to use it back in the day, even during film, I used to use the example that when you made an exposure, you're filling a cup, you're, you know, you're, and if you filled it too much, it spilled out and that was an overexposure and that's data. You're not going to get back into that, into that file. If you, if you got all this stuff built up on the left and a little bit kind of centering out to the middle.

then you go to say, won't, let's not represent any brands here, but let's say we go to, I'll make it up, Starbusters, and you order a cup of coffee and they give you this cup of coffee and it's only about half full. You're like, hey, wait a minute, I'm getting chipped here. That's the same thing as if you're underexposing, you're not really filling that cup to the brim to where you get all that wonderful flavor in that case of a digital file, all that data in there that you can work with later. You know, I'm firm believer, capture as much data in that file as possible. And then,

you know, suss it out and work it, finesse it, add the secret sauce to it later.

Court Whelan (46:12)
Fantastic. Yeah, I do love blapachinos at Starbusters. They're super tasty. Bumpkin spice blattes. Yeah, the BSLs. ⁓ Okay, so back to the questions. Yeah.

Eric (46:22)
Yeah, yeah, there you go. I love that season. Bumpkin season.

that wasn't a question.

Court Whelan (46:38)
Okay, this is one that I always love asking. So you have had, of course, a very illustrious career and folks in the audience, if you don't know Eric Rock, amazing guy, amazing photographer, ⁓ just kind of the pinnacle of what you want to do if you are into travel, into nature and wildlife photography. What would the Eric of today tell the Eric just starting out?

Eric (47:03)
that, I think back to when I was starting out. This profession really wasn't there. I mean, it was just kicking off. I think about 45 years ago, it was just kicking off. So I was still a young photographer. was out, I was photographing then. What I would tell myself now? Hmm. That's a good question. I would say nothing more than what I've said before is, know, sticking with your passion.

You might have to, you know, take your knocks early on. When I started out, most of my, you this not being here, I started out in wildlife biology, which there weren't a lot of wildlife biology jobs back then either. I worked in, coming out of school the first time, I worked in a restaurant and I volunteered at a Carnegie Museum field campus as a naturalist. So I put in my time. Back then, just starting out.

volunteer work, would suggest, you know, it's a good way to get your foot in the door, especially in wildlife biology. But I started out as a naturalist first because there wasn't really that many photo tours going on yet. And then eventually as photo tours picked up, I saw it was a natural change for me to move into photography. So the only way I really got there was sticking with my two passions. The first one being nature and wildlife, you know, spending as much time in the woods as possible. And the other one is, you know, taking a camera with me and

If you travel with me, I usually tell people the story about how I came into photography and that was early on. I was lucky there. ⁓ sticking with that, find your passion and try not to be pulled away from it by other career promises unless that's the way you want to go. That's totally fine, but it's very easy to be distracted. I got distracted by social work for a few years because I had to make a living. And just the situation I was in.

I took from that some skills that I use today, working with people. So ⁓ if you're using your passion, think you can find, no matter what you're doing, you can find a way to help make you better at what you want to do. So no matter what that is, whether it's, you know, photography, photo tour leading or whatever, you know, you may be distracted from what your passion is or your goals are at the time, but find ways to take tidbits out of that to lead you in that direction.

Again, I'm not sure if that's the best answer, but yeah, I'm trying to fall back on the excuses. This really wasn't there when I was young.

Court Whelan (49:29)
Hey, no wrong answers. That's spoken by Eric himself. I appreciate that. Okay, so I wanna talk and ask about photography as a conservation tool. ⁓ So we're both conservation biologists by training and have a long background. We're very passionate about conservation. And I'll ask this with full transparency that I feel like I have not completely cracked this nut. Like it's a challenging question to what I'm essentially.

alluding to here, which is how does one use photography as a conservation tool? You know, how do you or how could you or how could someone in the audience use their photography as something to support the conservation of nature?

Eric (50:09)
later, but I would say everything you do as far as if you share images, whether it's talking to local, talking to friends. Um, I used to, when I worked in Colorado, doing some field research down there, I used to do annual slideshows for the community. And it was just the people coming into the library. And I loved that because I was sharing stories about nature and what I've been doing, where I was at and what I learned. And was a great experience for

Court Whelan (50:09)
Yeah, no, all good.

Eric (50:34)
myself and I hope other people got some talent. So just share your photos. That's a great place to start. But I think the more you learn about what you're doing, and this goes for taking the photos, the more you learn about the better photographer you're going to be, but the more you learn about your subject is the more influence you're going to have when you share this stuff with people. That's the, that's kind of the ground level of what we're doing. After that, I'd have to say I don't

really have a whole lot of experience. What I do mostly is in the field and an educator in the field. And that gives me an opportunity. For instance, let me give you, use an example, telling a story maybe. I started working doing these macro workshops back East in Maine. And it's just an awesome opportunity to get together. There's usually at least five other photographers. do these long weekend workshops together. And I picked up

The idea of taking what I know from my youth was aquatic insects. I've got it. Ever since I was a, you know, a little squab, I loved aquatic insects. I found them a good way to really get an, I found them an excellent way to get an idea of what was going on in a stream or a lake or pond by which, which different insects were there, understanding their life stages, how that came into play into healthy ecosystem.

And so I figured, you know what, I'm going to add something different to this year's, and this was 2025, to this year's workshop. I'm going to figure out a way to do underwater aquatic insect photography. So I went to the books, which nowadays is primarily the internet, you know, for more up-to-date stuff and started doing some research. And I found a way to make these little temporary aquariums that I could help sit down and have people photograph, you know.

mayflies, stoneflies, dragonfly nymphs, you know, even some cool stuff like ⁓ if you're dobsonfly or what do we call those guys now there's a couple of different names for dobsonfly, troutfly or fishfly is another name for them. So all these really cool aquatic invertebrates and even small little crayfish things like that in a macro setting and kind of like a little studio. But

I use that for an opportunity to talk to people about what a healthy ecosystem is and why these are all coming out of this little stream, why we're seeing those, how they make their living. Are they detritivores? Are they carnivores? Are they out there hunting? so hopefully they took more from that experience and just photographing these cool little bugs because it really was, we had this stream laid out in front of us and you could see how rich and everything was, but to actually get into a place where they were seeing the unseen.

Maybe they saw one as a kid or something picking up rocks in a stream, but this is a chance for them to learn something about it. And for me, that was important for me to help share that with those people. And hopefully most people got something out of that, that it's a very intricate little world in each little stream and pond and lake that you get into.

Court Whelan (53:29)
I love that answer. And I haven't, I haven't heard that explanation. I asked this question a lot and that's a great one. It gets you to see the unseen. It gets you to appreciate truly the engineers of our world, these little ecosystem engineers, whether it's termites or leaf cutter ants or aquatic insects. mean, they are doing a lot more ecosystem services than most people realize. And so yeah, like getting the actual act of photography to be part of the conservation and not just.

not just focusing on the product, like the ending photograph. So yeah, that's a fantastic answer. So I wanna switch to gear, but one final question before this, and it's kind of a two-parter, but it has to do with editing and processing. And I'm wondering, know, editing is becoming such an important part of photography. What is your...

Do you spend a lot of time on the photographs? Do you have a couple sliders that you probably use with each and every photo, but not much more? Do you have any like special settings that you're like, ⁓ people don't know about this one, but it's really great. So I asked a lot there, but then the second part, which you can kind of bake into it. I'm just curious, like what, like how would you describe your photo style? Like for me, I'm interested in kind of big.

Eric (54:19)
You

Court Whelan (54:45)
meaningful, impactful, high contrast, saturated, not over saturated, but very colorful scenes. Again, to summarize that question, approach to editing and also a little bit about what is your ending photo style, if you had to describe it.

Eric (55:00)
Okay.

Fair enough. No, it's good questions. I don't know if I have good answers, but they're good questions. Okay. I would say I'm a minimalist when it comes to editing. use Photoshop. Photoshop has so much into it. And I've tried, I've worked with Lightroom, I've worked with Luminar, a lot of different softwares. I keep coming back to simple. Remember I'm coming from a dark room as a student, as a kid working in a dark room, whether it's working with color or whether...

black and white, there were some, there were certain things you could do to craft an image, and those things are still pretty much in Photoshop and Lightroom as well as everything else, but for some reason I fall back on Photoshop probably because that's what I learned on. But I do real simple things. ⁓ You know, basically just go through the levels. I look at my shadows. Do they need to be lightened up? Usually not too much. Highlights.

As long as I haven't pushed them out, I might try to recapture some a little bit of highlight detail with the highlight or the white slider. Then from there, very few of my images need a little bit of contrast, but maybe if there's a contrast thing, I'll adjust the contrast a little bit. If I'm working with black and white, here's where I'm a little bit different than most people. If I'm working with black and white, I love using the Dehaze.

It just really freaking pops things and people it's a hammer I'll tell you right now dehaze is like taking a hammer into Photoshop, right? But a little bit of it sometimes especially in black and white can really add some drama to the image So I use that more so in black and white, but I usually don't touch too much in color. So And then from there, might vibrance I like vibrant so I like a little bit of the vibrance in there if I'm not using vibrance I'm probably you know touching the saturation a little bit but

That's not too much. And then if the image needs it, if I'm shooting low light and I need to, or I want to work some sharpness and take out some noise, usually use a little Topaz. And not too much, know, 20 % sharpening is about as high as I go in most situations and that seems to do it.

I mean, it really works out well for me there. And I'm, but I will tell you that, ⁓ I could probably do a lot better job processing, but I'm a here and now kind of guy. go through, I grab the images I want to work with, work them up, get them into where they need to go, whether it's to the company for promotional stuff or to my, ⁓ trip report, get those out and then I'm onto my next thing. Otherwise things would back up so far. I would never get anything done. So I'm a high grader for sure. that regards now that's kind of my.

Yeah, that's kind of my technique for working images and my workflow. I could go more detailed, but that would be boring. But let's talk about style because that's a more nebulous thing. I remember talking to my mentor about that. And I would say my mentor is very eclectic in his photography. can shoot just about anything when he, doesn't do, he's a more of a documentary photographer. And, but when he shoots wildlife, it's usually like, wow, that's a great wildlife shot.

that I haven't seen anybody do anything that way before. He's just, he's got a very good knack for that kind of thing. And so we talk about style off and on, and that's a very nebulous thing. My style is very eclectic also. mean, again, what most people tend to see in my wildlife images or nature landscape type images that I post on my social. And I would say I'm pretty most for the most part, middle of row. I don't challenge myself for that. ⁓ I should do more. I mean, I do more in some occasions. I

For me, the images that mean more to me are the ones that are outside that middle of the row shot. Sometimes it's high contrast, that high key or low key image. Sometimes it's a subject that extends far beyond the boundaries of the frame. So you only get a little bit of it, more abstract. Sometimes it's more blur. I love working with long exposures, whether that's landscapes, cloudscapes, wildlife moving.

Cheetah chase or the leopard hunt all that stuff is cool. So I would say I'm kind of middle of the road in that regard and sometimes I push myself and I should probably do that. So I'm still developing my style. I don't know where that's going to end up, but I'm still developing it. Okay.

Court Whelan (59:30)
I love it. Never stop developing style. That's, that's great. That's a good takeaway. So you use, ⁓ go ahead.

Eric (59:35)
There are some

people you can look back and say, hey, that looks like a Nick Brandt image or that looks like so-and-so because, oh, they put that grunge filter in there, which is totally cool. I'm totally fine with that. That's what I'm saying. When people make images, they should be very happy with what they're getting and going for what they want and being happy with it. So I'm happy right now, still exploring style.

Court Whelan (1:00:03)
love it. Yeah, that's something I've always grappled with because my style has probably changed, you know, a handful of times throughout the years, really kind of in response to and in parallel with

the emerging technologies, whether that's editing technologies or just camera technologies. And I do often wonder, you know, what I'd be better suited to stick with such a dominant recognizable style. So anybody seeing your image is like, yeah, that's, that's one of his, like, can just tell because of the way that the colors look or the highlights and the use of highlights. ⁓ haven't done that. It has its merits and just always keen to hear what other people think about that. So.

Eric (1:00:37)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Court Whelan (1:00:41)
So you use full Photoshop. It's not camera raw or Lightroom. You just go straight into Photoshop or is it camera raw? Okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Got it, got it, got it, yeah. Yep, I'm the same way. That is what I use. ⁓ Lightroom, very, very similar, almost identical, but I've never liked the file management aspect of Lightroom. That's always been my Achilles heel. Yeah. Okay, let's get into gear. ⁓ What are you shooting on, Eric?

Eric (1:00:46)
Well, it starts at camera raw and then goes into Photoshop, yeah. So I drop.

Same here. Same here.

Court Whelan (1:01:12)
I'd like to take a quick break

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Eric (1:02:20)
I'm in, well, I've shot just about everything over my time frame from film to now. In fact, I could probably reach over here in the closet next to me and grab a couple of film cameras from medium format to old Canon film SLRs. But I've settled in, it's been about 10 years now, I've settled into shooting what was in Olympus, now OM system. And early on they made, with my connection with them and my shooting.

They acknowledged my skill by making me an educator and then later when it became OM System, they moved me into their ambassador program. I find that that camera system frees me up to be far more creative, far more productive. And honestly, the word that comes out of my mouth more so is fun. It's just been more fun. mean, lighter gear, you know, just the lens, come back to it, the lenses are fantastic and I'm a lens guy for sure.

The bodies are awesome and the incredible computational in-camera computational elements to it, just add to it. But really I go for Zuiko lenses. And I remember back teaching basic photography at university. Students would come in with an, with an OM camera from Olympus and we would look at, we were just using like their Nifty 50 from Zuiko to take photos. I remember putting them on the light, the negatives on the light table and looking, I'm saying, wow, this is just a really nice contrasty sharp.

image you got here and consistently it was Zuiko glass and there's Zuiko lenses and so they're still made and still wonderful and I just still blown away by them.

Court Whelan (1:03:59)
What kind of lenses do you tend to prefer, not to have you list every lens that you use, but kind of favorites, your go-to, your defaults, ⁓ most impressive, that sort of thing?

Eric (1:04:05)
We'd be here.

you know, that's, I love them all. They're like, I won't say children, but pretty damn close, okay? And it's good my wife isn't here right now, because if I did sit here and list them off, she'd say, when did you get that lens? You know, but actually Melissa is also an OM shooter now as well. And she understands, she's got a pretty good collection. I would say for wildlife, it falls on two primary lenses right now and hands down.

Court Whelan (1:04:24)
Hahaha.

Eric (1:04:36)
My favorite for wildlife, especially when you start talking birds is the phenomenal 150 to 400 f 4.5 and it's a 4.5 the whole way through and on top of that, it's got a built-in 1.25 converter Weatherproof one of the best weather weatherproofing and any Equipment out there both for the lens and the camera bodies for the pro level and along with that the image stabilization it just

Court Whelan (1:04:45)
Mm-hmm.

Eric (1:05:05)
blows everything away. And with a 150 to 400 on a crop, something cropped as extreme as a micro four thirds, that gives it's essentially a 300 to 800 millimeter zoom. And then you can add the 1.25 to make it up to 1000 millimeters, which is handholdable, handholdable. It's in, you know, if I'm sure I, the only time I take a tripod on a tour now or a trip now, or any type of photo shoot.

Court Whelan (1:05:22)
It is an incredible lens.

Eric (1:05:33)
as if I'm doing night sky stuff, whether it be a Aurora Borealis or, you know, you know, anything that has to do with the night sky. So I hardly ever, that's cuts down my weight quite a bit. So it kind of talks about the practicality of moving, traveling, dealing with weight restrictions, things like that. And then the lens that backs that up nowadays, and I was lucky enough to have a chance to test this lens out before it came out into the market by taking it to Africa this year is the fifth, the OM system 50 to 200.

2.8 and it's about it's a little bit it's a it's about the size of a 70 to 200 2.8 and most full-frame cameras and but lighter and Image stabilization just as good it might even be sharper than the 150 to 400 but ⁓ brilliant works well with both Teleconverters added doesn't have a built-in teleconverter which disappointed some but you know what it really makes it a very easy little lens to back up and travel with but I

used it on Safari and quite frankly, I could see me taking that and a 1.4 on Safari and be perfectly happy with that combination. Cause you're looking at, know, essentially the same perspective as a one to 400, 2.8 and a lighter weight, you know, than most of the one to 400s or one to 500s and much more compact weatherproof image stabilized. Amazing. So those are my two go. I can't imagine doing any type of nature trip without.

both of those there might be times where I choose to take one of them over the other but it would be a wrestling a mental wrestling match for me.

Court Whelan (1:07:08)
Yeah, that 50 to 200, which is again, the equivalent of a 100 to 400 F 2.8. It has had me drooling when I heard that that thing came out. I heard from someone, um, and I haven't yet researched this to know if it's true, but that because of the smaller sensor, the background separation of 2.8 is different than if you were to have like a 2.8 on a full frame camera. Is that, is that true?

Eric (1:07:29)
Yes.

Yeah, it is. It's a subtle difference. If you're shooting, if you're really looking at it, it's essentially two stops of extra depth of field. It's the same aperture as far as the amount of light coming in for sure. So that's when it trips a lot of people up and it's a fallacy. for the most part, yeah, you do get more depth of field, which in wildlife, in most cases, isn't a detriment. If somebody was really hardcore portrait shooter, things like that,

they'll notice a difference. I don't notice a difference what I'm doing. And if you shoot macro, it's an extra bonus. know, it's that it really is. And, you know, I've seen in well, we don't want to go on the avenue of macro too much here, but for the most part, for most people, they're not going to notice that I found, you know, the difference is more important to separate as a distance from the subject to the background. And that comes into play in what we're talking about. And that's going to be a more important fact.

Court Whelan (1:08:09)
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Yeah. For those that haven't heard this before my podcast, it's such an important point to make that I'm going to make it again here for the 12th time is, know, we, always, we, we love that background blur. You know, it's, it's the subject background separation, the quality of that blur known as Boca or bouquet, you know, tomato, tomato, ⁓ the trolls will come out for that one has how it's pronounced, but B O K E H, you can have a shallow depth of field via that F 2.8.

Eric (1:08:39)
Hahaha

Yeah, yeah, definitely.

Court Whelan (1:09:00)
or even F4 is pretty darn shallow. But what makes the biggest difference is the ratio of you, the photographer, to your subject, to the background. So three parts there, right? It's you and how close you are to your subject and then how close your subject is to its background. And if you are much closer to your subject than your subject is to its background, you can shoot on F8 and it's gonna be nicely blurred. Now, if your subject,

is very close to its background and you're far away, you can shoot on the shallowest depth of field, the F 2.8, F2, heck, you know, we can go smaller F 1.4, it doesn't really exist in big telephotos, but nevertheless it, and it won't be blurred. So yeah, being able to use that, that brain power to find those spots versus being fixated on the small F number all the time is a really, really important point. And that sometimes might be just as simple as you pivoting around your subject, you know, maybe there's a tree.

just behind the subject's left side and you just pivot a little bit. All of a sudden that tree moves out of the way. So now the background is another 50 yards further and then beautiful, creamy blur in the background. So I just wanted to make that point because it's a, a really important one that I've found over the years of choosing your background, pivoting, maximizing that distance. makes a huge difference. So yes. Yeah. Oh yeah. Nice. Nice. Um, okay. So

Eric (1:10:17)
That's very good fieldcraft. Very good. What we talking about earlier, fieldcraft.

Court Whelan (1:10:25)
One of the final questions here, what is a piece of gear for your nature photography that is not having to do with cameras or lenses that is surprisingly helpful that people might not think about? And I'll seed the question a little bit here just to give you an example in a moment to think about it. But I've had answers of like a little piece of electrical tape to put on their lens when they want to lock focus.

but they're in manual for like night photography. I won't get into the explanation. You'll, you'll just have to listen to the Colby episode for that or, um, uh, it might. Yeah. Yeah, it is. is. And then, um, Eddie, uh, Eddie Savage, his is a towel. He brings a towel cause he's photographing in British Columbia, very wet environments, like a little microfiber towel. Is there anything along those lines that Eric Rock loves to bring on trips that is kind of a next level game changer for

Eric (1:10:53)
Hmm.

Sounds like Aurora Borealis if you ask me.

Court Whelan (1:11:20)
photography that's not specifically photo gear related.

Eric (1:11:24)
You know what, what made a big difference for me, especially in cold, wet, wetter climates, especially guiding the, in the Arctic, Alaska, doing the Alaska trips, waterproof socks, you know, it was, it's silly, but you know, they weigh so little. ⁓ you can wear your hiking shoes, shoes. You're comfortable, you're steady, you're stable pretty much the whole time. You don't have to worry about carrying boots or getting into boots. So know how much, you know, most people hate getting into boots, but

know, waterproof socks can make a big difference. And there's some good ones out there nowadays. And I would say if you're doing winter stuff in Yellowstone, Arctic or Antarctic, electric socks. I mean, they've, they've come a long way now too. It's amazing. You recharge them. You know, you're not flipping batteries out and putting new ones in. You're just recharging when you get back. And honestly, when I do winter and Yellowstone, actually I could remember, I'm heading to Alaska next. I gotta remember to pull them out because I'm heading to Alaska for a February, a couple of February trips. I better pull those out before I forget them. So socks are important.

I feel like I'm in was a Forrest Gump, talking about the importance of socks, very important in the field. Exactly.

Court Whelan (1:12:32)
Yeah. He's a sock guy. Yeah. Electric socks.

That's a great band name. If anybody needs to take that further, you know, right. The electric socks, the electric socks and the waiting boots. ⁓ okay. Fantastic. So we've come to the final question. This is an easy one. Eric, this has been fantastic. People are definitely want to hear and learn and see more of you of your work. Where do people find you?

Eric (1:12:38)
⁓ I like that.

they can find me on Instagram, ericsrock eric E-R-I-C-S-R-O-C-K. No silent cues or anything in there, just ericsrock And then my website, ericrockphotography, you can find it by Googling that. I would say I'm a lot better, a lot more updated on Instagram. That's the nice thing about Instagram. It's a really updatable gallery compared to a website. Although a lot of good stuff on my website as well. Okay. And that'll also lead you, if you're on my website, you can...

check out tours, things like that from there. There's a drop down. You can look at where I'm going when for the next ⁓ year and a half and two years should be updated here soon.

Court Whelan (1:13:35)
Fantastic Eric. Well, gosh, what a pleasure. It's ⁓ It's been a long time coming and thanks so much for making the time today Thanks so much for sharing the wisdom and yeah, really appreciate your time

Eric (1:13:39)
Always.

I appreciate the time with you as well. Always good to spend some time with court.

Court Whelan (1:13:54)
Folks, hope you enjoyed that episode. Eric, just a pleasure to connect with. I learned a lot. I'm sure you did as well. I wanted to tune you into a couple extra bits of, well, resources, things you can navigate to to learn more about photography, learn more about guiding even in the world of conservation, things like we touched on in the episode. First up, I wanted to point you to my YouTube channel where I have editing tutorials.

I have this podcast also available on YouTube. That's just youtube.com/@courtwhelan So it's just YouTube. And then there's a little slash with the at symbol in courtwhelan that COURT W H E L A N. I will put this in the show notes. And the last plug I wanted to mention is for a new course. I'm actually designing with my buddy, Colby Brokvist this is a conservation communication course for guides.

I know not all of you are nature guides out there, but if I do have some in the audience, this is an incredible new tool that we've designed specifically for nature guides around the world to help level up their communication of conservation topics.

If you're interested in learning more about this, it's a very, affordable all online course that you can download and have with you forever. And over the course of a hour or two, you can learn some of the most cutting edge and time honored ways to talk about conservation to your guests, to help empower individuals, to influence the influences of our world, as I often like to say, that's just waypointguideacademy.com. Once again, waypointguideacademy.com. And I'm really proud to have this conservation course.

with my buddy Colby out there live and ready for folks to download, listen to and learn from. So once again, thanks so much for joining and looking forward to the next time.


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Court Whelan

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