September 2022

Autumn is approaching, the best season for woodland photography. Time for those moody shots again, time to refresh or extend your knowledge, time for workshops and time for updating your apps or other tools.

So a great season for photography is starting soon, but to find the right spot in combination with the right conditions can be tricky. The good news is this has become way easier now. Bastian Werner started a while ago a great project to develop an app called Viewfindr that provides you with lots of useful information to make the planning of your next stunner shot way easier. It was an honor to also contribute to this project by testing and by providing Bastian with feedback on what could be improved and what kind of information I would like to have for planning my photo trips.

So what is so great about this project?

It's nice to see that in Viewfindr relevant weather parameters are provided in a very easy way specifically for photography. This is something really great as I know that in the past people felt they first need to do a workshop for interpreting meteo data, for example to be able to predict when there will be a nice afterglow. And it's true: when you don't know what how to interpret meteo data, it can be challenging when you can expect a beautiful sunrise or sunset. And in the past, a workshop to learn about this could be useful. Well, that's not needed anymore! Viewfindr can show you when and where to expect a great sunrise or sunset.

Predicting where you can experience a beautiful afterglow is just one of the few options that has been developed in this project of Bastian. Of course fog is another weather parameter that can be displayed. Great for me and my kind of photography. 😅 See the screenshots in the article to find out all the weather parameters can be displayed. Tutorials have been made to explain the information displayed in Viewfindr and to make things even easier. 

And not only weather parameters can be displayed, but also photography spots are included. So there is also no need anymore to buy those maps with photography spots (in case you ever did that). And the nice thing is that the more people will use Viewfindr, the more spots will be added by people. One remark on this: before you share locations with other people, always first think about the possible consequences of sharing your locations. My advice would be not to share vulnerable locations. 

You got interested in this project?

So in summary: Viewfindr is one of those few projects that can make photographers really happy. At least, it makes me really happy. And people who know me a bit better, know that that I only speak positive about projects or products when I only mean it. 😊 If you want to give Viewfindr a try, download it here.