Wichita Wildlight Photographic Society

The best wildlife photographs can happen when the weather is at its worst. After more than two decades photographing wildlife in snow, mud, rain, and storms, I’ve learned that challenging conditions are often where the most rewarding images are created. Blue skies and perfect sunshine may seem like ideal photography conditions, but they rarely produce the most memorable wildlife images. Some of the strongest photographs are created when the weather becomes part of the story. Snow can transform a landscape into a minimalist scene while isolating subjects against a clean background. Fog adds mystery and depth, rain brings movement and texture, and dramatic storms create an atmosphere that simply cannot be replicated on a clear day.

Lessons From 20 Years Photographing Wildlife in Extreme Weather Discover how to use rain, snow, fog, and extreme weather to create powerful wildlife photographs.

Over the last two decades, polar bears have become a popular symbol for climate change. To evaluate the threat, let's consider that the scientific community has reached a consensus: if we continue our current consumption and emission patterns, certain polar bear subpopulations will very likely reach a point of no return as early as the 2030s to 2040s. Subsequently, most polar bear populations will likely reach reproductive failure by the beginning of the next century. I work with the Western Hudson Bay polar bear population in Churchill, Canada, and we've seen a population decline of nearly 50% since the mid-1980s. To short-circuit the predictable debate, certainly many polar bear images have been taken out of context; however, these charismatic bears remain one of the most frequent tokens for the end of the world. Can photography help save these bears, and maybe ourselves, from such a precipitous slide toward extinction?

Polar Bear Biology and Their Environment
I spoke with Flavio Lehner, Chief Climate Scientist for Polar Bears International and Assistant Professor in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences at Cornell University. Dr. Lehner explained that polar bears require the high-caloric fat content from seals to maintain a healthy weight. But what does that have to do with photography and climate change?

Can Photography Save Polar Bears? | Fstoppers How wildlife photographers have shaped polar bear conservation for 50 years. Explores the science behind Arctic decline and photography's role in climate action through Polar Bears International.

RAW processing software offers various ways to adjust contrast, with three popular tools being the Contrast slider, Levels, and Curves. As I’ll demonstrate below, these tools don’t simply adjust contrast but also impact color fidelity. Today, I’ll compare them and show why I often prefer using Curves. Contrast Slider vs Levels vs Luma Curves

The most obvious way to adjust contrast during RAW file editing is the Contrast slider, found in the exposure panel of most software. It brightens highlights and darkens shadows non-selectively, while simultaneously modifying the three Red, Green, and Blue channels. The fundamental problem is that increasing the contrast slider inherently boosts saturation and alters the original colors.

Why I Prefer Using Curves to Adjust Contrast RAW processing software offers various ways to adjust contrast, with three popular tools being the Contrast slider, Levels, and Curves. As I'll demonstrate below, these tools don't simply adjust contrast but also impact color fidelity. Today, I'll compare them and show why I often prefer using Curve...

Unlike the aforementioned Frankenstein this particular portrait project doesn’t require you to scour mortuaries or dig up body parts from the local cemetery. All the facial elements are coming from the same person, but once assembled will produce something as weird or wonderful (but mainly weird) as you like. There are different ways of capturing each feature, as well, but the basic plan is to take a head and shoulders shot with a portrait lens, or 50-100mm focal length lens. You can go with a wide aperture and completely throw the background out of focus, but also soften features in front of or further back from the focal point. Or, you can use an f/8 aperture and try to get the base image all in focus.

My technique for creating bizarre portraits will have your people pics looking like a Picasso Channel your inner Pablo Picasso (or Dr Frankenstein) by assembling a portrait made from a mishmash of body parts

Next Meeting Information

Thursday, August 13th , 2026 - 6:30 PM

Meetings and programs are free and open to the public without obligation.

LOCATION: Meetings are held at the Old Carnegie Library Building at 5th & B Ave, 425 SW B Ave, Lawton. Enter through the “tunnel” on the Southeast corner of the building at ground level, near the bus stop. The gate is locked, so press the doorbell button. Someone will buzz open the lock so you can get in. For a photo of the building and entrance, click here
For more information, email: [email protected]
1. PROGRAM:
PhotoPills App with Dave McGowen
Join Dave McGowen for an in-depth exploration of the PhotoPills app and discover how it can elevate your photography by helping you plan the perfect shoot.
Whether you're a landscape photographer, an astrophotographer, or simply trying to capture the perfect sunset behind a local landmark, PhotoPills takes the guesswork out of planning and helps you make the most of every outing.
Learn how to use PhotoPills to calculate depth of field (DOF), subject distance, hyperfocal distance, and the direction of sunrise and sunset. You'll also explore its powerful Augmented Reality (AR) tools, which let you visualize the night sky, making it easier than ever to plan stunning Milky Way and other astrophotography images.
2. PHOTO SHOW AND TELL:
If you’d like to share a few of your photos for the group to enjoy, please email them to [email protected] no later than two days before the meeting. Don’t forget a title for each photo. Send your photos as .jpg files, if possible, and be sure to include the word SHOW & TELL in the subject line—otherwise, we might miss your email!

Your camera decides how bright to make a photo by measuring the light in the scene, and it gives you a choice of how much of the frame to measure. Most of the time it reads almost the whole frame and evaluates the scene as a whole, which works well for ordinary, evenly lit scenes. But some scenes fool that approach badly, and that is where spot metering comes in. It is the mode that tells the camera to ignore everything except one tiny patch and expose for that. Knowing what it does, and the handful of situations where you should reach for it, will rescue a lot of shots that would otherwise come out as silhouettes or muddy gray.

What Spot Metering Actually Does
Your camera's light meter can read the frame in a few different patterns. The default on most cameras, called evaluative or matrix metering, reads the entire scene in zones and tries to interpret the brightness pattern intelligently, often weighting faces, the focus point, or recognized subjects rather than simply averaging everything. Center-weighted metering reads most of the frame but pays the most attention to the middle. Spot metering does something far more selective: it measures a very small circle, usually somewhere between 1 and 5 percent of the frame, and bases the exposure on that tiny area alone, completely ignoring the brightness of everything around it.

Spot Metering: When and How to Use It | Fstoppers Spot metering measures a tiny portion of your frame to expose for specific subjects. Understand middle gray, exposure compensation, and how your camera's spot location works to rescue backlit shots and high-contrast scenes.

Scientists have warned that the increasing use of AI editing tools by wildlife photographers seeking the perfect image could threaten the reliability of bird research.

According to a report by The Guardian, researchers are urging wildlife photographers to be cautious when using AI to edit images shared on birding platforms and online forums. Scientists fear that the AI-enhanced photos could undermine the credibility of widely used citizen science databases, including iNaturalist and the Macaulay Library, which help researchers track species distributions and changes in habitats.

In a recent commentary published in the science journal Nature and cited by The Guardian, researchers warned that hundreds of fake images have already been identified on popular species-recording databases. However, they say that the full extent of the problem remains unclear, as many altered images may not be detected and could affect records collected by members of the public.

Scientists Warn Wildlife Photographers’ AI-Enhanced Bird Photos Could Threaten Research 'Wildlife photographers can be quite obsessed with getting a beautiful photo.'

White balance is one of the most important camera settings for achieving accurate, natural-looking colours in your photos. It tells your camera how to interpret the colour of the light in a scene, ensuring that white objects appear white whether you’re shooting under daylight, tungsten bulbs or fluorescent lighting.

Alongside aperture, shutter speed and ISO, understanding white balance will help you take more consistent photographs and reduce the amount of colour correction needed during editing. In this guide, we’ll explain what white balance is, how colour temperature works, how to use Kelvin settings, and when to choose Auto White Balance or manual white balance.

What Is White Balance in Photography? Understanding Color Temperature and Kelvin White balance is one of the most important camera settings for achieving accurate, natural-looking colours in your photos. It tells your camera how to interpret...

I’ve always liked enthusiast compacts: relatively small cameras with built-in lenses and a decent level of direct control. A camera I can travel with but still enjoy using. But, following a halcyon period in the early 2010s, the available options dwindled to the point that it became almost impossible to buy one.

However, things seem to have moved on since CP+ 2025, when we received relatively little enthusiasm from the manufacturers we asked about the prospects of a compact camera revival. The first flicker had already come the year before, from a slightly unexpected quarter, when Leica announced the D-Lux 8, a refreshed version of the enthusiast model last updated 6 years prior.

Is the camera industry waking up to enthusiast demand? | DPReview | Photography News, Gear Reviews & Community After a nearly decade-long absence, we're starting to see a revival of enthusiast compacts

Noise is one of the biggest challenges photographers face, especially when shooting in low light or at high ISO settings. Traditional noise reduction often comes with a frustrating tradeoff: cleaner images, but softer details.

Modern AI-powered tools have changed that.

Denoise Max is designed to intelligently distinguish between real photographic detail and unwanted image noise. Instead of applying the same blur across the entire image, it analyzes the scene, recognizes objects and textures, and selectively removes noise while preserving fine details.

Stop Letting Noise Ruin Your Photos - PictureCorrect Noise is one of the biggest challenges photographers face, especially when shooting in low light or at high ISO settings. Traditional noise reduction often comes with a frustrating tradeoff: cleaner images, but softer details. Modern AI-powered tools have changed that. Denoise Max is designed to int...