I arrived last night in the biggest little city in the world – Reno, Nevada.

Every year the North American Nature Photography Association hosts a week-long convention of workshops, inspirational speakers, social gatherings, and much more dedicated to the nature community at large. You can find out more at nanpa.org.

NANPA is a relatively new organization, only 16 years old. And, as a member of only three years, I am new to the organization. I jumped right (the story of my life) by becoming a College Scholarship committee member in my first year with NANPA. Through a scholarship NANPA brings 12 college students from North America to each summit. They come to network with some of the biggest names in the business. One of the highlights of their experience here is a one-day field workshop where they shoot side-by-side with top pros. In the past this field workshop was just for the fun of it. This is the first year where we are trying something different. In addition to shooting for the fun of it, we're orchestrating the photo shoot to revolve around a conservation issue in the area where the Summit is being held, and at the end of the Summit we will give a presentation to the entire Summit audience. This year the Summit is in Reno. And for our first conservation project we're photographing the restoration of the Truckee River, which starts in the nearby Sierra Nevada Mountains and flows through Reno to Pyramid Lake. The Nature Conservancy has partnered with dozens of local stakeholders to enhance the preservation value of the Truckee River from source to mouth. Near Reno, those efforts are in the form of a massive restoration project that is meant to restore habitat and species that existed along the river bank before settlement in the early 20th century. You can learn more here.

All week I will blog about my time at the 2010 NANPA Summit, including uploading photos (and hopefully video to my YouTube channel). Stay tuned.

Yesterday a friend of mine, Mary Kelly Hoppe, pointed out a photograph on my Facebook page. It's of my friend, Tom Hart, in one of the notches formed by Double Arch, a fantastic twin span of sandstone in Utah's Arches National Park. Mary loves redrock country, and the sense of scale in the image blew her away.

Sometimes the photos I've made end up on Facebook and not on my Web site. This is such the case. So I thought I'd relive a little slice of history and my lust for adventure in wild places by writing this short blog post honoring that great moment in life, below the colossal span of Double Arch with my best friend. We were half way through a 14,000 mile road trip. I was 21 years old. He was 20. What an adventure!! Cheers to you Tommy!

Carlton Ward Jr. is a great photographer and leader in the conservation photography movement. He runs a successful photography business from his home in Tampa. He also founded the non-profit Legacy Institute for Nature and Culture (LINC), which is dedicated to using the communication arts and strategic partnerships to educate Floridians about conservation issues in their home state. He is a member of the International League of Conservation Photographers (iLCP). We've known each other since 2001 when we both took an international journalism class at the University of Florida.

I work as a contractor for LINC on several projects and thus was recently in Tampa. Carlton and I went out onto Hillsborough Bay to photograph birds. We found a huge flock of white pelicans, one of the largest birds in the world. We had two choices: photograph the pelicans against a natural backdrop or against a backdrop of buildings and industry. Although we shot both, the second choice was the more story-telling image. Being conservation-minded nature photographers, we did not shy away from showing the "ugly" side of what nature must endure at the hands of man.

Here are a few images of Carlton and I and few images I shot:

Flying against a smoke stack of some kind of industrial plant.

Pelicans and terns rest on a sand bar with downtown Tampa in the background. By this image, it appears that animals and man live together in harmony. That is true, but only to an extent. In general I would argue against that point of view. The mere fact that these birds exist in an environment that has been so altered by man is not necessarily evidence they live in harmony with man. I wish I used more depth of field shooting this photograph so the buildings were  more clear.

Looking for something different, I decided to focus on a flock of white pelicans flying in the distance, blurring the pelicans in the foreground. Focusing further in the distance allowed the buildings be appear more clearly without increasing my depth of field.

The buildings in this image are so out of focus they are almost non-existent.

This scene of white ibis and white pelicans give the illusion that they are living in an all-natural environment.

©Carlton Ward

Carlton shot this image of me. That's John Moran's 500mm lens. John is another great photographer friend, someone who has helped me a great deal to advance my career. Thanks John for lending me the lens!!! (www.johnmoranphoto.com)

 I shot this of Carlton Ward Jr. using a touch of fill flash on rear-curtain sync. Carlton's Web site is www.carltonward.com.

Every year I work with the Legacy Institute for Nature and Culture to produce a calendar. But this isn't just any pretty picture calendar. It's a calendar that works toward the conservation of Florida's most imperiled landscapes and helps to save of some of Florida's most endangered wildlife. This is the Florida Forever Conservation Photography Calendar.

Starting last year LINC partnered with the Flickr group Florida Conservation Photographers to host a contest that would allow an avenue for all the great conservation-minded photographers across the state to get directly involved in Florida conservation efforts, publish a photograph with the likes of Clyde Butcher, John Moran, Jeff Ripple and many others, and win $250.

LINC has turned this into an annual contest. We've posted the rules for the 2011 calendar. You must be a member of the Florida Conservation Photographer's Flickr group to be eligible for the contest. Once you've joined FCP, you can then post your images to the Florida Forever Flickr group for judging. Contest ends April 1, 2010. Here are the links you'll need:

Florida Conservation Photographers Flickr Group

Florida Forever Flickr Group

See the 2010 calendar

Feel free to email me with any questions regarding the contest. Check out the images below to see examples of various images that I photographed of Florida Forever landscapes. These are similar to the images that could be eligible for the contest.

Caber Coastal Connector – Levy County

Wacissa-Aucilla River Sinks – Jefferson and Taylor counties

South Goethe – Levy County

Goethe State Forest – Levy County (This photo was taken adjacent to the South Goethe Project.)

Annutteliga Hammock – Citrus and Hernando counties

In light of yesterday's blog post, I am posting more images photographed this morning that follow the same idea as Defining Moments, the idea to consider different view points when photographing the same scene.

With record cold temperatures in Florida persisting through today, this morning was my last chance to get out on the Santa Fe River and photograph good quality steam fog rising from the river. Upon arriving the sun had just broke the horizon and the steam fog rising from the river was palpable. I noticed across the river sunlight blasting through trees, which were enveloped in steam fog. So I grabbed my 18-200 mm and 100-400mm lens and, using almost the entire focal range of these two lenses, proceeded to make photographs.

The images below are a great visual example of what goes through my mind when photograph one subject. This sequence of 12 images starts wide then narrows to what is my favorite image. Sure, I like a lot of the in-between images. But, as is often the case, we photographers work toward the best shot, starting with the safe shot, the sure bet, then playing with, moving, and testing our vision, before we end up with the shot we like the most. The best shot may not come at the end, but it rarely comes at the beginning. By viewing these images you can almost "see" the progression of my thoughts. When viewing these images, consider how the mind's eye of the photographer works in the manner I just described.

Again, the teachable moment here is to challenge yourself to see your subject in different ways, to notice the differences between each moment in time. In this case, for example, the thickness of the steam fog rising from the river and wafting into the trees constantly changed moment to moment, affecting the quality of light. Seeing these differences in each moment and in the composition of your subject before you, whether it's through using different lenses or moving to a different view point, will help you become a better photographer.