Yellowstone Photography: The Shots, the Light and the Workshops

Yellowstone Photography: The Shots, the Light and the Workshops

The shots, and when to take them

• Grand Prismatic Spring. From the Fairy Falls trail overlook, a 1.2 mile walk from the Fairy Falls trailhead, not from the boardwalk. Go between 11am and 2pm on a clear day. The colours need direct overhead sun, and a cold morning fills the basin with steam that hides everything.
• Lower Falls, 308 feet. Artist Point on the south rim for the classic view, best in morning light. Lookout Point on the north rim for a different angle. A rainbow forms in the spray from mid morning in summer.
• Lamar Valley wildlife. First light and last light, every time. Bison year round, wolves in winter and early spring, bears on the slopes in May and June.
• Mammoth Hot Springs terraces. Overcast days are better than sun here, because the white travertine blows out easily.
• Old Faithful. The predicted eruption times are posted. Backlit at sunset with the crowd in silhouette is more interesting than the standard daylight frame.

Kit

• A long lens for wildlife. 400mm is the practical minimum and 600mm is better. Legal distances are 25 yards from most animals and 100 yards from bears and wolves, and those are the reason you need the reach.
• A wide lens for the basins. 16 to 35mm covers the geyser landscapes and the night sky.
• A polariser to cut glare off the thermal pools, which makes more difference here than almost anywhere.
• A tripod for dawn wildlife and for the falls.
• Spare batteries, and in winter keep them against your body. Cold halves their life.

Workshops and tours

Multi day photography workshops run year round, and the serious ones are in winter. The reason is access: with the interior roads closed to cars, a workshop with snowcoach transport puts you at the geyser basins at first light with nobody else there, which is impossible to arrange yourself. Summer workshops tend to focus on Lamar Valley wildlife and run out of Gardiner and Cooke City. See Yellowstone in winter for how oversnow access works.

The rules that are actually enforced

Stay on boardwalks in thermal areas, without exception. Keep 25 yards from bison and elk and 100 yards from bears and wolves, and understand that approaching for a photograph is the most common way people get hurt here. Drones are banned throughout the park. Tripods are fine on boardwalks provided you are not blocking them.

For night work, see our northern lights guide.

Yellowstone Photographs: Where Each Classic Shot Is Taken

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone has two rim roads, and the shot you have seen depends on which one you stood on. Artist Point, on the South Rim Drive, has a paved sidewalk out to the main viewing area and is the source of the classic postcard framing of the Lower Falls. On the North Rim Drive, Lookout Point and Grand View give a straighter look down the canyon, and Inspiration Point pushes the view further out.

For the falls themselves rather than the canyon, the Brink of the Lower Falls trail descends about 0.8 miles and 265 feet to stand at the lip of the drop, and Red Rock Point is a similarly steep switchback descent off the North Rim Trail, neither one accessible by wheelchair.

Grand Prismatic Spring works the same way: the boardwalk gets you close but shows mostly steam, while the overlook trail off the Fairy Falls trailhead climbs about 105 feet over a 1.2 mile round trip to the hillside view that shows the actual rings of colour. Park at the Fairy Falls trailhead lot, not the Midway Geyser Basin lot across the road, which fills first and does not connect to the overlook path.