How to take photos on holiday without annoying your loved ones
This topic is near and dear to my heart, and I think there’s a lot of value in these tips. So if you’re planning a holiday away with those strange non-photography type folks — perhaps your family, or a group of friends — then this is the place for you. It can be quite easy in my experience to get carried away with photography sometimes, especially if you’re in a new place. This can lead to friction. Here’s how you can plan a friction-free, amazing holiday with loved ones, and still get amazing photos too.
Plan Plan Plan
This is a great tip regardless of whether it’s a photography-centric holiday or not, but planning is even more important when you’re with a group of people. You may have limited time to get the photos you want, so carving out some time and making the most of it is essential.
Before you set off, take a look online, or in photo books, or wherever you find your inspiration, and make a list of “must-have” locations or photographs. Then you can plan your trip accordingly to make sure you have enough time in these places, make sure you are there when the lighting is good, and — most importantly — plan for what the rest of the group might do while you’re busy.
2. Photography holiday tips — Set some goals
Specific goals can be super helpful. It helps me set my own personal expectations when I’m in a place and all I want to do it photograph for 6 hours straight but can’t. I think if you set some sensible, achievable goals, then you’ll be able to come away happy and satisfied even with limited time.
For example, in Costa Rica recently, I narrowed down my focus to just three photography goals. They were:-
wildlife photography
authentic lifestyle/street/travel snapshots of Costa Rica
candid fun moments with my group so we can all remember the trip
… that last one is always easier to sell than the rest. so that is the goal. How do we achieve it? Once I had my goals, I could figure out what they each might entail:-
wildlife had to be as-and-when as I didn’t know where luck might strike, but I did plan in a photo walk around a birding hotspot for 1 hour
for my street photography, I was happy to slot it in when we were walking from place to place (more on that later) as well as set aside one hour of a dedicated photo walk
the fun moments gave me a great excuse to always have my camera on me and milk any extra time I had without being (too) annoying.
3. lighting lighting lighting
Make sure that you always factor in lighting. It’s everything, really, when it comes to photography. You can be in the best place in the world and if the lighting sucks, your photos won’t be great. So, be tactical with your planning when you’re carving out some time for yourself! Don’t waste your precious photography time on holiday when there is bad lighting! Use those midday hours to be super present with your group, and keep the camera away. The photos won’t be worth it anyway.
Sunset golden hour
Sunset is trickier, but I think it could be reasonable to say, for this one hour every day (or every other day), this time is mine to concentrate on photography. You could make sure everyone is settled at a great viewpoint so they can watch the sunset with you, or maybe they’d be happier at the beach or in a cafe. Whatever works so that they’re happy and you’re happy too. I think most people enjoy a sunset, so it could be an opportunity to spend some time together and maybe bag a group photo.
Sunrise golden hour
This could be your time to shine if you’re an early riser. You could be out and about, loving life, photographing all you like in the very best lighting, and still be back for breakfast. This is a brilliant solution, especially for landscape photographers. Less so for street photography unfortunately, as there won’t be too many people about, but for some photography genres this is the very best solution. This is also great for birds and wildlife too, as animals tend to be most active during the morning.
4. Travel Photography Tip — Always Be Scouting
There are times during my holidays where we’re all just having a mooch. We could be looking for a place for lunch, or perhaps just walking down the coast, or having a shop. Whatever it may be, you can always use this time to your advantage. If the lighting is bad, then keep your camera away but keep an eye out for interesting spots that you could return to later: Always Be Scouting.
The more locations you have in the bag, the less time you have to spend looking when you do get photography time.
5. Every Day Carry Camera
Here is reason #7984 why having a tiny, every day carry camera is amazing. If you like street photography, travel photography, every-day sort of snapping away like I do, then you can use these “mooching” times for a little bit of photography here and there. If your shutter speed is high enough (over, say 1/250th) you probably won’t even need to stop walking to take your shot.
You can read my top 10 tiny camera every-day carry picks here!
You can still have conversations, and be present, but also keep an eye open for any interesting things you might see. So, use the downtime for scouting, or snapping.
6. Communication is Key
This is a life tip, really, but doubly important when you’re on holiday. Make clear to your loved ones that in order to get the most out of your holiday, you will want some time dedicated to photography. So long as you plan it right, and communicate it ahead of time, I’m sure it’ll be no problem at all. I think, in my experience, it’s the unplanned moments, where I might be so consumed at a viewpoint for example and not noticed I’ve spent 15 mins faffing around, that get me into hot water! Pre-planned, pre-discussed photo walks should be absolutely fine. If they’re not, then get yourself some better travel companions!
7. Travel photography tip — Balance Can Be Nice
Balance can be so satisfying. As fun as photography is, if you’re shooting relentlessly, and always thinking about capturing what’s happening, then you’re probably not really experiencing it. I think having some discipline, and learning to recognise when the camera needs to go away is vitally important to your own enjoyment as well as everyone else’s. Make sure to take some times to soak in the moment. Realise where you are, and who you’re with, and how lovely that all is.
Another form of balance for me, especially in Costa Rica, was which camera I used. If I was using the Lumix G9ii (review here), then it was wildlife time, and I was focusing on photography. If I had my little every day carry compact out, then it was people first, photography second.
8. Steal The Last Day
This is a trick I’ve learned when I’m away and I want to film some YouTube videos. I like to “steal the last day”. This can sometimes be super convenient because people might want to buy souvenirs, or revisit their favourite place on the last day. Meanwhile, I can be off with my camera and my tripod filming what I need to film.
This could work great for photography too. Perhaps you can steal some hours on the last day while people are wrapping up to hit some of the photography spots you’ve scouted earlier in the week.
9. You Owe It To Yourself to book a photography trip!
Compromise is great and all, but if you haven’t ever been on a photography-centric holiday, then I would highly recommend it. I’ve been on two so far. I went to the Faroe Islands with my dad, and we just nerded out for a whole 10 days, and everything was all about the photos we wanted to take. Bliss! The second time was my Kenya Safari, which was also like 8 hours a day pew pew pewing. It really is so refreshing and liberating to just be “selfish” and concentrate on the joy that photography brings. I highly recommend you try it one day.
All the photos in this blog were edited with my custom presets. If you like my style, then purchasing my presets (they start from just £9.99) is a great way to support my channel and keep this content coming. Thanks so much for reading! I’m aiming to blog a lot more going forward, It’s a medium I’ve missed dearly, to be honest. I love writing. So expect more content here soon!