The other day it snowed and of course I made sure I was somewhere to snap some pictures and by “made sure” I was luckily persuaded to be some place where pictures would work out.

One note, those batteries in your camera seem to run down faster on cold days because they do. They don’t function as well in cold weather and will run out quicker. Keep that in mind when using your camera in the snow or bring extra batteries to your cold weather shoot. Also, you can always line your camera with a plastic bag if you don’t have any weather covers to protect it from the snow. Alternatively, you can always just wait for it stop snowing.

Anyway, always keep in mind that a lot is usually going on when it snows. Kids go sledding, dogs get confused, and most wild animals become easier to spot (unless you are someplace with polar bears). You get some very unique behaviors going on so constantly be looking around to see who is doing what when you are on scene photographing. For sledding, I find waiting until the very last second you can get out of the way to get out of the way works well. For dogs the trick is still to get down to their level. For wild animals, well that’s not my primary photography focus so it’s still luck for me and honestly a telephoto lens does help there.

Also keep in mind that the snow will make your sensor all sorts of wacky. It really helps to have photo processing tools to fall back on or at least an understanding of how to work the white balance in your camera.