These eight companies offer dozens of photography tours and photo workshops in colorful countries around the world. You don't have to be a professional photographer to join in most of these tours and workshops in 2013. Whether taking a photo tour of Cuba, Italy's Tuscany region, Turkey or Croatia's Dalmatian Coast, pro photographer leading the trips will show you how to create dramatic images. Don't have the time or money to travel so far?
One company offers mini-workshops often in big city locations, including New York City and San Francisco.
Some of the photo tours are only scheduled to go once in 2013; others are offered several times during the year. Most of the travel companies mentioned below offer photography tours and workshops in many more locations than are listed here.
Cuba Cultural Travel: Cuba Photography
The Cuba Photography tour, offered by Authentic Cuba Tours, is designed for all levels of interest and accomplishment in film, or digital photography. While the emphasis is on improving photography skills, it's also a cultural journey. Cuba, with its mix of Spanish and African roots, offers myriad opportunities for amazing photographs, while you're having cross/cultural people-to-people experiences.Photo Tours to Adriatic Countries
Adriatic2Alps Photography Tours & Workshops will take you to Croatia, the Balkans, Slovenia, Morocco and other locations in this region. The Croatia tour is a photographic exploration of the walled cities in Split and Dubrovnik, he many islands, and Plitvice National Park's steep cliffs where dozens of locals climb.Photography Travel Tours in Italy
Photography Travel Tours welcomes both beginners and advanced photographers on its tours to Tuscany and Venice.The groups are small, and may be led by Jim Nilsen, an award-winning photographer, and his wife, Magrit, who emphasize personalized instruction during the trip.
Picture Yourself Photographing Bali
With Focus Adventures, you could be photographing the Balinese people performing two-thousand year-old dances, temples, and the scenery. Led by photographer Karen Gordon Schulman, you could also be photographing the villages and the Cliffs of Mohar in Ireland.Live on a Yacht and Photograph Alaska
You can photograph whales and glaciers on the cruises offered by Light Photographic Workshops. You'll spend nights on a yacht that can tuck into coves during the day, where you'll be able to see whales breaching, glaciers calving, and huge schools of Pacific herring that attract humpback whales, harbor seals, bald eagles and other sea birds.Photograph Sites in Bhutan and China's Silk Road
Enhance your skills photographing the rich colors and Buddhist traditions in Bhutan with Grasshoppers Adventures. The company has partnered with professional photographer and travel journalist Ewen Bell to create a tour centered around attending festivals, and includes visiting religious sites and chances to photograph the mountainous scenery.Photo Workshop Adventures Around the World
You can explore many parts of the world, while taking tours with Photo Workshop Adventures. Wrap a vacation around a photo workshop in Capetown, South Africa or Cappadocia, Turkey. Italy, Spain, France, South Africa, Morocco, Iceland, Israel and Costa Rica are some of the other locations. The workshops have a casual format with a blend of hands-on learning techniques.Explore Alaska & British Columbia With NATGEO
You can enhance your photography skills on trips with National Geographic Expeditions photo tours to locations from Baja California, and Alaska's Inside Passage to Mongolia or the Galapagos Islands. Picture yourself photographing sloths in Costa Rica, or camels walking across Moroccan sand dunes as the sun sets.This adventure travel company also offers weekend photography workshops in several cities, including New York City, New Orleans, Seattle, Washington DC and Tucson. The workshops are designed for amateurs interested in improving their skills using digital camera.
Both the trips and the weekend workshops are lead by the photographers who have made people open National Geographic magazines for years just to look at the photographs. They will give you tips and techniques that they use, which will enhance your photographic skills.
Questions to Ask When Choosing a Photography Tour
You'll find lots of excellent photography tours and workshops both above and in additional online searches. Many of these companies offer photography tours to the same countries. Here are a few suggestions for questions to ask when deciding which company to choose.- What is the group size limit? How many professional photographers will be leading and teaching the group?
- Ask for detailed information about the background and teaching experience of the photographer, or photographers, who will be leading the tour.
- Ask about the skill level of the other participants. Is it similar to your skill level? If there are beginners to advanced participants, or even travelers with expert photographic skills on the trip, how will a single guide handle teaching such a diverse group?
- If you're traveling in a foreign country, or on a multi-day trip anywhere in the world, including the U.S., will there be an additional group leader who handles details, so the photographer can focus solely on teaching?
- What type of camera is needed? A point and shoot? A DSLR?