Scale Models

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How can you expect people to help save endangered species if they're afraid of them?

That's why photography plays such an important role in reptile and amphibian conservation: It helps folks see how naturally beautiful these creatures are. Their colors, textures, and patterns are amazing, yet often unappreciated. I like to show that it's possible to get up close without fear.

Try it yourself using a good macro lens, a flash system, trips to your local zoo and/or pet store, patience, and a few key tips.

Many zoos have an area dedicated to herpetology, and most cities have pet stores specializing in reptiles and amphibians (call to ensure they allow photos). Or attend a meeting of a herpetology club and speak with collectors, who may provide access to their animals in exchange for artistic shots.

Here are my top pointers:

1Shoot at the animal's eye level. This is easier done in the studio than in the field, especially for smaller creatures. This perspective shows off your subject's personality much better then a top-down shot.

2Focus on the eye. If the eyes aren't sharp, it's much more difficult for viewers to get a visual fix on the picture. You can let the rest of the body blur with limited depth of field.

3Fill the frame. Their beauty is largely in the fine detail -- scale and color patterns -- revealed when the animal fills the frame. Given the small size of many of them, macro focusing (preferably with a dedicated macro lens) is a must.

4Manage depth of field. The great challenge of macro work is the extremely shallow plane of focus. Stopping down your aperture helps, but most likely still won't get the whole animal in focus. One simple though useful trick is to align your subject to your focal plane. Or, letting the focus fall off as the image moves from the primary point of interest can be a very effective pictorial style.

5Make your subject pop. Simplicity increases a photo's impact, and backgrounds can make or break an image. In the studio, I use a dark, nonreflective backdrop. In the wild, I either blur out the background by reducing depth of field with a wider aperture or use flash with an aperture small enough to darken the ambient exposure beyond the reach of the flash. Much of this also can be done in digital postprocessing: Shoot for maximum data capture, then blur or darken the background with imaging software.

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