Dave Davis is a friend who has traveled on several tours with me.  He is an avid photographer and always seems to come up with some good photos.  Recently, he provided some handy hints on photography and archiving the digital images.  In the next few day, Dave is going to share some of his hints.
 
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Aren’t photographs a terrific way to refresh your memory of people, places, events and things?   And now with greater technology, it has never been so easy to produce a great photographic collection to memorialize a touring vacation.    I am going to share a few approaches that I have developed over the years that might just help make your photo collection more valuable to you.   It is really easy.   Just let your photo collection tell the story.

I often start a collection with the photos showing the trip location/destination and primary people.  Sometimes I use the tour brochure that led me to select the trip.   Sometimes I use a map or a picture of the destination airport or famous landmark that identifies the place.

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On a recent tour, I started my collection with a picture of David McGuffin, wearing his official tour shirt with bold letters displaying “IRELAND SCOTLAND” and with the backdrop being the Hogwarts Express viaduct memorialized in the Harry Potter stories.    I followed that with a picture of myself, my wife and our niece in front of the rock formation at Giants Causeway, and that was followed by a map of Scotland.  With just three pictures I have opened the story and set the stage.

DM-Hogwarts-TresselFrom there my collections are pretty much day by day. I often take a picture of a map of where the day would be spent, and sometimes one of his handouts that told more of the location. It is so helpful to my aging brain cells to have the city names (or sites) pop out from the map and be further detailed in the handouts. Then the pictures follow through the day.

When we arrive at a city, cathedral, castle, or another site, I take pictures that identify the subject. It could just be the entrance sign or anything else that tells where we are at. Display boards at the site are often good to use for identification and more detailed information on what is being visited. Then it’s the fun shots of whatever there is to see, but the long-term important thing is that the picture collection itself will present where that pictures are taken.

eilean-donan-signpostI find that it adds to the collection to not limit myself to taking pictures of the special places visited but also the more seemingly mundane things. Take a picture of the bus, inside (with passengers) and outside with the driver. Take a picture of the motel front, lobby, and grounds. Take a picture of your room. Take a picture of the restaurant name, its inside, the food/drink as it is being presented, fellow diners from the tour and even the waiter. And you must take pictures of some the “unique” European bathrooms! I don’t know if it is legal to do so, but I have also taken pictures of the money used in different countries.

Following these tips will make your collection more meaningful to you and to anyone you share it with.

-Dave Davis

 Jump to Dave’s second article: “Organizing Your Tour Photos”