Heading Back To The Palouse — Another Happy Place
As everyone who follows PhotoPXL and I know, I am a fan of the Palouse. The Palouse is an area in southeast Washington state that has some of the most incredible landscapes outside of our national parks. I have been traveling to the Palouse once or twice a year since 2004.
I am running two back-to-back workshops in the Palouse starting on June 13 and June 20. Unlike many workshops that comprise a dozen people or so driving around the Palouse in a carpool, we are only four attendees in a big SUV. With a 4WD, we go where others can’t, thus making our workshop experience special.
Information on the workshop can be found at Rockhopper Workshops. We base our workshops out of the Holiday Inn in Pullman, Washington. This is a central location in a town with good restaurants and a nice hotel. Everyone gets their own room. All transportation for the workshop is provided with pickups and drop-offs from Spokane Airport.
We don’t waste any time diving into photography. After a pickup at the airport, I treat our group to a BBQ lunch, where we do introductions and an overview of what we will be doing over the next 4.5 days. As you can see, my GPS tracking map below shows that we will be covering a lot of miles each day and photographing a lot of locations.
Our days will be determined by weather, clouds, and forecasts. After nearly 20 years of traveling the Palouse, I know the special spots, where to be at certain times of the day, and the weather conditions to give you the best photographs.
I have conducted workshops early on for the Phase One PODAS workshop with up to 30 people and that was just way too many participants. Even with five other instructors, it was crazy. Although it was a fun time, I have now slowed things down and prefer intimate workshops like what we are doing now. With only four people, we travel together, eat together and photograph together. Plus, we talk about photography and share all our talents and knowledge while we are in the car. Attendees will come back with amazing images and many new skills.
Previous Palouse Articles
The Gear
Shooting in the Palouse is easy. It doesn’t take a ton of gear and lenses. I am traveling this year like I did last year with a Sony a7R IV, Sony a1, as well as 16-35mm, 24-70mm, and 100-400mm lenses. Except for sunrise and sunset shots, I’ll shoot most of the time without a tripod. My tripod is a Really Right Stuff 24L. I’ll have ND and Polarizing filters also.
I’ll also have my Sony RX100 VII camera with me all the time for candids and other quick shots. In addition, I am increasingly taking images with my iPhone on these trips. I shoot in RAW format and bring the RAWs into Capture One for editing. The quality of these RAWs is quite impressive. I also shoot with the Hipstamatic app using my own lens and film combo for a cool look.
I have also found the iPhone a great teaching tool. It can take an image and share it with the group, showing how I determine and perceive the composition. Think of it like a polaroid. I also use the viewfinder Mark II app, which allows me to look at a scene and determine what lens would be best.
I will bring along my drone for some images, especially for looking for patterns in the field of grain or getting a different perspective.
My laptop will travel with me. Each evening, I will download the images shot during the day and do initial ratings and editing. I also back up each session for the day while I am sleeping to two external SanDisk 2 TB SSD drives.
My Pictures
I know everyone loves photos — after all, this is a photography site. I am sharing a lot of images below. These were images taken primarily from last year’s trip and a few from previous trips. Some of these are straight images, while others are images that I have played with in different apps along the way.
I have made folios, folio tins, and numerous wall prints from photos shot during my Palouse adventures. Many times, I enjoy loading my favorites on the iPad and using apps like Snapseed, Distressed FX, and a few other apps to try out different looks. Basically, I am totally hooked on photography and playing with images, and doing different things.
In Distressed FX, I sometimes add birds to the image. It’s part of a long-term project I am playing with called Pesky Birds. Like all things photography, I find hours of joy and happiness not only in taking the photo but with post-processing the images I have created. You may like some of these while disliking others. Either way, by sharing these, I hope you find some inspiration and take some liberties and work on your images as well as experiment with different looks. No one will see them but you and the people you share them with.
Join Me
Every summer in June, I run two back-to-back Palouse workshops. I’ll announce the 2023 workshops sometime in July. Keep your eyes out and jump on board next year’s trip. I assure you that you will have a great time, eat well and come home with a ton of images you’ll be proud of.
Enjoy My Images Below
Remember, if you are a Silver or Gold member, you can click on an image to see the images in a bigger size.
Kevin Raber
June 2022
Kevin Raber
Indianapolis, IN
Photography is my passion and has been for 50 plus years. My career in photography has allowed me to travel the world, meet some of the most interesting people on the planet and see things I could never have dreamed of. My goal is to share the passion of picture taking through photographs and teaching with as many people as I can, hoping it brings them as much joy and happiness as it has me. I do this through photoPXL.com, this site, as well as Rockhopper Workshops, and other projects, as well as teaching as Artist In Residence at the Indianapolis Art Center.
