Death Valley: Desert Photo Adventure
December 10th-14th (2025)
Location: Death Valley National Park, California
Dates: December 10-14 (2025)
Tuition: $1899.00
Instructors: Dusty Doddridge and Josh Merrill
Tour Overview:
Death Valley National Park represents one of the most unique and photogenic wilderness destinations in the Lower 48. You'll photograph the stark, yet beautiful, playas in the desert valleys along with dramatic sand dune locations. We’ll explore a wide variety of types of scenes. Badlands formations provide colors and textures to explore a unique desert palette. We’ll photograph otherworldly salty basins, fascinating mud cracks, curving sand dunes, and desert playas. We’ll chase fantastic desert light during the day, and as the sun goes down on these wild environs we’ll have opportunities to capture the brilliance of the clear night skies.
Death Valley provides photographers with an assortment of landscapes both big and small. We’ll photograph grand scenics, and we’ll capture otherworldly abstracts. Death Valley National Park is one of the best places in the world to hone one’s ability to put together a scene using elements of 2-dimensional design. To take the lines, curves, textures, patterns, and color, and create a compelling and creative composition. We’ll practice these skills, all the while, taking in the incredible and unique beauty of this wild place. We hope you’ll join us on this educational photo adventure!
Topics:
All of our instructional workshops will cover two key areas: Craft and Creativity
Professional Craft for Landscape Photography:
• Getting fluent with your gear and developing a consistent workflow in the field
• Achieving an optimal exposure
• Managing depth of field
• Capture for multiple exposure blending
• Capture for panoramic stitching
• Using filters effectively
Creativity in the Landscape:
• Core compositional elements in the landscape
• Creative use of depth of field
• Long exposure techniques
• Learning and practicing new compositions
And we'll also do at least one image review session and share some advanced digital darkroom workflow techniques.
Tour Includes:
• Instruction in the field: craft and creative strategies for landscape photography
• Image reviews
• Instruction on digital darkroom workflow
Not Included:
• Food and Lodging
• Transportation to and from the workshop
• Participants are encouraged to carpool.
Fitness Level:
You'll need a moderate level of fitness to tackle some of the hiking and challenging weather conditions of the region. None of our hikes will go beyond 3 miles round trip but you'll need moderate fitness and experience hiking in difficult terrain to manage this tour safely.
Suggested Equipment:
• Digital SLR Camera
• Tripod with Cable Release
• Wide Angle Lens and Telephoto Zoom Lens (We use the 16-35mm and 70-200)
• Filters: Circular Polarizer
• Lots of Memory Cards
• Extra Camera Batteries
• Micro-fiber Cloths
• Camera Bag/Backpack for Gear and Food/Water
Clothing for a variety of weather conditions from 25F to 70F
• Rain Jacket and Pants
• Down Layer
• Trail Shoes or Hiking Boots
• Gloves and Hat
• Plenty of Wool Socks
• Moisture Wicking Base Layer
Lodging:
Our base of operations will be within Death Valley National Park, which allows easy exploration to key locations in the park. Lodging in the Furnace Creek and Stovepipe Wells areas of the park, will be close our primary photographic locations. Blocks of discounted rooms will be secured for convenience, but as always, participants are free to make their own lodging choices.
Cancellation Schedule:
90 days or prior to day 1 of tour = Refund of all registration fees and deposits
89 days or less prior to day 1 of tour = Josh Merrill Photography will retain full tour tuition
We strongly recommend that you purchase trip insurance if you need to cancel your tour and are unable to complete the tour for any reason.
We also reserves the right to cancel the photo tour for any reason including low enrollment in the tour.
Payment:
All you need to do is contact me via the form below and tell us which tour you'd like to attend. We'll e-mail you an invoice that allows you to pay online by credit card. If it's 90 days or less prior to the start of the tour, the full tuition amount will be due in order to complete your registration. Prior to 90 days out, we'll invoice you for a deposit of 30% of the total tuition to hold your spot. We'll then invoice you again for the balance prior to the 60 day point when the full amount is due.
Contact Us
We’re excited that you’re interested in our workshop. If you are ready to register, you may click on the link above.. If you just have some additional questions, this form to the right will put you in touch me.
