This Year, Autumn Photography Was Spectacular. Here’s What I Learned!

One Happy Landscape Photographer!

First and foremost, what a spectacular autumn for landscape photography! The sheer vibrance and range of colours were absolutely incredible. It has been a long time since we had an autumn as good as we saw this year. From memory, I’m pretty sure that the previous couple of years were a washout, plagued with poor weather and storms. This year, however, we escaped! A couple of storms threatened strong winds, however, by some miracle, the north-west avoided the worst which allowed the natural landscape to work its magic. The stars of the show for me were the beech trees, truly beautiful at their peak, proudly flexing their golden hues.

I truly hope you all enjoyed this autumn as much as I did. Anyway, before I get too caught up in reliving how incredible autumn was, I thought I would briefly talk about a few lessons I learned along the way. I will definitely be taking this information onboard and look forward to improving my flow next autumn. Grab a brew and let’s run through some of my own feedback for autumn landscape photography.

Don’t Be Too Eager!

Exactly as it reads, don’t be too eager! One of my biggest problems when it comes to photography in general and planning trips, I get too excited. Honestly, I’m like a kid at Christmas. I struggle to sleep the night before even though I know my alarm is set ridiculously early to catch sunrise. I’m forever running through scenarios in my head, envisioning epic light and planning how I will react. The ironic thing is, no amount of planning will change the fact that when the conditions are great, my head always falls off!

What Exactly Do I Mean By Don’t Be Too Eager?

When we think of autumn, we think of the beautiful range of vibrant colours. The transition of the natural landscape from its thriving greens to its vibrant hues as the days grow shorter and daylight hours become fewer. At a specific point during the autumnal period, we reach what landscape photographers refer to as “peak autumn”. Peak autumn is the window at which autumn colours are at their absolute best. Typically, peak autumn lasts a couple of weeks at best and is impacted directly by the weather. Unless you’re scouting for locations, making several trips weeks in advance of peak autumn can be considered too eager.

Making too many trips too early is something which I fall into the trap of. This year, for example, I made several trips far too early. For the most part, the trees were still predominantly green, with subtle hints of autumnal colour poking through. It all boils down to the fear of missing out. From experience, I know first-hand how a window of bad weather can steal the moments we landscape photographers wait so dearly for.

Now I know no trip is ever wasted, certainly not in the outdoors! I live for the outdoors, and any excuse to escape with my camera for a few hours is more than welcome. However, the obvious downside to making too many trips too early is that you risk exhaustion. Those ridiculously early mornings catch up with you. Maybe I’m starting to show my age, but by the end of autumn, I was ready for a break!

A Few Solutions For Eager Landscape Photographers

I’ve thought long and hard about how I can tackle being too eager and have come up with a couple of solutions. The solutions below aren’t specific to autumn and can be applied to any season or event throughout the year. If like me you also fall into the too-eager category, I hope that the solutions below will be of some use to you.

Keep Up-To-Date Via Social Media

Social media is the bane of our lives, yet, it’s such a valuable source of information. We all have our gripes about social media, I know I do! However, as a tool, it can be used to our advantage. By following the right groups of people and organisations we instantly gain access to content that can help guide our decisions. For example, the National Trust, Woodland Trust and various other sources will frequently post updates about the natural environment. We can use this to help inform our decisions and plan our photography more effectively. Putting this into practice, before heading out with my camera to capture a specific set of conditions, I will be making good use of the information available via social media to guide my planning process.

Don’t Panic, Embrace The Conditions

We all want those perfect conditions, regardless of the time of year. My constant worry throughout autumn, especially approaching peak autumn, is that we’ll fall victim to a series of storms which will strip the leaves from the trees. It is a storm season after all, as pressure systems battle for control in the atmosphere above. Ultimately, this is out of our control, and deep down I know this, but this is one driving factor which pulls me out too early. There is no such thing as bad weather, I’ve said this time and time again. Next autumn, I will worry less about the potential for storms and embrace what Mother Nature throws our way. We can’t control the weather but we can control our locations, our subjects, and how we conduct our landscape photography. The more we understand the varying weather patterns and their impact on our subjects and locations, the better we can take advantage of whatever Mother Nature throws our way!

Don’t Be Too Reliant On Weather Forecasts!

I would be lying if I said I didn’t fall into this category. A big part of my planning process is studying the weather. I say studying the weather, what I really mean, is obsessing over the weather. I start off by looking for good-looking weather forecasts a few days in advance. Once I have found what I think is a forecast with potential, I keep tabs on it. The day before, however, I obsess! Frantically refreshing the forecast every hour or so, checking for any drastic changes. Surely I’m not the only one who does this, right?!

What Weather-Related Information Do I Consider For Landscape Photography?

It’s worth touching on this briefly, hopefully, I can pass on a bit of useful information to anyone reading. When I say I study the weather, what I mean is that I look in detail at a wide range of information that collectively determines the overall weather conditions for a specific time period. Typical considerations are as follows:

1. Wind speed and direction.
2. Cloud cover percentages for high, medium, and low-level clouds.
3. Precipitation.
4. Humidity levels.
5. Dew point. Useful for determining the possibility of mist and temperature inversions.
6. Visibility. Useful for determining the possibility of fog and/or haze.
7. Temperatures at various altitudes.

There’s quite a lot to talk about when you consider each of the above and I don’t think this is the place to go into great detail about what I am looking for and why. With that in mind, I will put together an in-depth guide and add it to my “Guides and Resources” section very soon.

There are several resources that you can use to collect the above information. Most landscape photographers will use a couple of well-renowned weather apps called Clear Outside and Ventusky. You can also make good use of Met Office data and mountain forecasts. Bear in mind, that the weather at ground level can be drastically different to the weather experienced at higher altitudes.

So, Why Should We Not Depend On Weather Forecasts?

Put simply, weather forecasts aren’t always 100% correct. They are predictions, albeit based on very sensitive modelling, but they can be wrong. 99% of the time, you can have full faith in forecasts and they will deliver exactly as expected. However, there’s always that 1%, the anomaly. Nothing can prepare you for it! I’m not talking about equipment or clothing. I’m a firm believer in being prepared for the worst. I’m talking about the shock and exhilaration of being caught off-guard and witnessing extraordinary weather conditions that simply should not have been possible based on the forecast data available.

Loughrigg Fell, Wrong Forecast, Epic Conditions!

This autumn, I experienced incorrect weather forecasts not just once, but three times! Three! I’ll talk you through one of the instances in a little detail as this particular day will live with me forever.

Setting the scene I had planned a bit of a scouting trip up to Loughrigg Fell in the Lake District. The forecast the night before was clear skies to the east but clouds to the west, great for a sunrise I thought. With this in mind, I woke up in the early hours and headed up to Elterwater. Not the best starting point for Loughrigg Fell but I don’t mind the extra walk. As I headed past the Langdale YHA, it started to rain. Odd, I thought, there wasn’t even a remote indication of rain in the forecast. I continued up to Loughrigg Fell, rain still pouring down, luckily I always carry waterproofs so it wasn’t an issue. I almost contemplated heading back down and writing off the morning but something in my head said no, wait it out. I hit the summit just over an hour before sunrise, I always like to be early just in case, at which point it was still dark but the rain showed signs of slowing.

As blue hour began to creep in, I started to notice it. The formation of mist in the surrounding valleys. If you’ve ever seen mist forming in the early hours, you’ll know the excitement it brings as a landscape photographer. By sunrise, the entire area around Loughrigg Fell was swallowed up by mist, the most incredible temperature inversion I had ever seen!

Be Open-Minded, Your Landscape Photography Will Benefit

I guess the point I am trying to get across is to be more open-minded. Do your weather research by all means. 9 times out of 10, it will pay off. But don’t ignore those curve balls. If conditions feel good to you based on your judgement, take the chance! It’s much better to be out with no regrets than to stay at home wondering what if. Using the above trip to Loughrigg Fell as an example, I could have easily decided to head home and write the morning off. Instead, I made a decision based on my judgement and it paid off massively.

React To The Moment!

In some ways, this is closely tied to the above. So you have done your research and found a great opportunity to photograph some potentially amazing conditions. However, you arrive at the location and the conditions aren’t exactly as you had imagined. What would you do?

This very scenario happened to me a couple of weeks back. I’d planned a trip to Yew Tree Tarn in the Lake District, between Coniston and Ambleside, a stunning little tarn and incredibly accessible. The forecast looked pretty strong for fog. Driving between Ambleside and Coniston along the A593, the forecast looked to be accurate as quite dense patches of fog engulfed various areas along the road. However, as I arrived at Yew Tree Tarn, there was little to no fog. What I should have done is reassessed and relocated back towards Ambleside and Elterwater where the fog was forming. Instead, stubbornly, I persevered.

I still had a great morning, and I did manage to capture a couple of photographs I was happy with. However, I couldn’t help but wonder what would have happened had I reacted to the situation and followed the fog.

Don’t Be Afraid To Relocate

It all boils down to instinct. If you know, based on updated information, that your intended location isn’t experiencing the conditions you had planned for, don’t be afraid to move. Using the above as an example, fog and mist are very dynamic weather conditions. Both of which can be influenced by a wide range of variables. I had updated information based on the drive to my location, which I should have acted on but chose not to. Moving forward, this is something which I will be taking into account so that I can continue to capture the most impactful landscape photography that I can.

What An Autumn, Now For Winter!

In summary, what an autumn! It has been one of the best autumns I have experienced in a long, long time. I have enjoyed every moment of it, and it is only now after finally getting some computer time, that I realise how much editing I have to catch up on. Looking back though, it has been a great season for development and improvement. I’ve taken myself out of my comfort zone and really made the most of some pretty spectacular moments, for which I’m incredibly thankful.

I hope you all had a great autumn and that you find some use for the points discussed in this blog post. I will leave you with a couple more shots from autumn as I leave to catch up on admin and start preparing for winter.

Thanks for reading if you made it this far and I would love to hear your experiences of autumn too! You can leave a comment on this post or send me a message via the link below and I will get back to you as soon as possible. You can also keep up-to-date with my latest photography adventures via my social media channels. I am most active on Instagram and you can find the links to each of my channels within the footer of my website.