Field Notes from a Week in the Smokies

I just got back from 9 days in the Great Smoky Mountains, five of which were for the landscape photography workshop I led with Michael Rung. It was a great trip, but while I work to get caught back up, this week’s newsletter will be more field-notes style, with just a few observations from my time in the Smokies!

Field Note #1: Black and White Photography

Possibly inspired by the Shutter Nonsense podcast episode we released this week featuring Cole Thompson and John Barclay, Michael and I both found ourselves photographing in black and white on several occasions.

While I enjoy processing images in black and white, I rarely switch my picture profile over to one of the monochrome options. On this trip, I started doing that so I could see the scene in black and white as I photographed it. It gave me quite a creative boost while exploring the Smokies this time around.

Given the number of times I have been to the Great Smoky Mountains, it can become easy to get creatively complacent. But looking at familiar scenes in black and white helped me see even old favorites differently. I think I’ll be swapping my picture profile settings more often to see familiar scenes in a new way. It felt quite liberating creatively.

Field Note #2: Weather Planning and Windy

Regular newsletter readers will know I’ve been leaning more and more heavily on Windy, the weather app. One challenge of leading workshops in areas like the Smokies is trying to get a good read on the weather. A lot of my deep dive into Windy came from wanting better weather awareness and forecasting for the workshop.

And while the weather is always changing and no forecast is ever perfect, I felt like the time I’ve spent learning Windy paid off. There was still an element of going with instinct, but between familiarity with the location and the various forecast options in Windy, I felt like we made a lot of good calls about which locations to visit and when.

While I wish we’d had a few more cloudy days, I think forecast-wise we were pretty spot on. I relied on Windy for about 90% of the decision-making, with occasional quick checks of Carrot and Clear Outside for cross-checking.

Overall, I felt pretty good about the day of weather decisions we made in the Smokies.

Field Note #3: Workshop Image Review

With every workshop we do, we aim to make the experience better for attendees. While we’ve done some limited image review in the past, this year we dedicated an afternoon to image review about midway through the workshop. That session seemed well received, and I think the workshop attendees got a lot out of it.

Each attendee had the opportunity for Michael and me to look at 3 or 4 images they had taken on the trip and provide critique. Sometimes it’s easy to miss things on the small LCD screen of the camera, but getting the images onto a computer or larger display reveals things that might otherwise go unnoticed.

We looked at how subtle crops could positively impact an image, the importance of edge patrol, being deliberate with composition, how bright spots draw the eye, and more.

Putting the time aside for an image review afternoon was well worth it!

Upcoming Workshops

I still have workshops with open spots left in 2026! Come see me in West Virginia, autumn in the Smokies, or out in Death Valley this year!

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Until the next newsletter!

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~Jeffrey
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