Travelogue Creator

Putting on a great travel show presentation is the last and equally as important step to creating a memorable travelogue story experience. You want to get it right, after all those miles traveling and hours editing, don’t you?

At this point, the same way one would frame an art print on the wall and hang it in the appropriate place. So to are you going to play your travel show of your trip in the best possible way to entertain and do it justice. 

What I'm going to talk about this time around covers a lot of different types of travelogues. The two basic camps are hard copy (prints, photo album) and digital show file(s) (video or single images).

Either way you go, this advice applies to all circumstances to better the odds that your audience can enjoy whatever you are showing.

If you do have control of the show environment and delivery all the better to make it ideal and do it justice.

The audience has to be comfortable in a suitable venue where your travel show can play with proper video and sound quality.  Just look at how movie theatres are set up.

If you bring a photobook or pull out your phone/tablet at work, in a pub or on the subway,  pick the right moment. You want enough time to tell them about your trip with few distractions.

If you post your trip online, there is little you can do with your audience’s environment. You have no control on the setting. They may be looking at your Facebook travel album or playing your YouTube trip video just about anywhere.

It may be a little maddening that circumstances may not be as ideal as you wished. There may be screen glare, distractions or have the sound turned off as they watch your well crafted video in line at the bank.  

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I am really keen on bringing with me everywhere I travel a “sports, action, rugged” camera. This category of compact digital camera, are light, tough, water and dust proof. They are so handy for many occasions when my main DSLR or camera phone are at risk of getting damaged or drown at sea.

The last few years has brought on a ever growing collection of sport cameras from most manufacturers. Then the other favour of action camera are the smaller GoPros and  similar type that you wear or mount just about anywhere.

The concept is so well suited for traveling, how can you not agree. Often we are on holidays by the water, on the water, under the water, it’s raining, snowing or desert sands are a blowing….No Problem!

Stuff it in you pocket, tuck it in your backpack, parka at the ready, these camera are simple to use and go beyond the normal environment regular cameras can bare. Some are tiny little cubes you can mount in odd places for unique angles.

Often action cams can be controlled with smartphone apps. Not only can you fire the camera and change setting but you can also see the image live, so cool.

Which to pick? Well that requires a bit of research on your end to decide what this action cam has to do for you and the elements it has to endure. Search the internet and check out what strength it has as far as features and options

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The world is a big place with lots of beautiful scenery and cities for us to explore and take pictures and videos. As you prepare your next trip, you may be wondering how and where do I find those awesome photos and how do you seek them out?

I know many of us love to explore and find random surprises during our holidays to photograph. Now that's a great buzz when you chance to come across an unusual and interesting place to take a few pictures. It happens to me often, yet I also plan some of those chance photo occurrences and so should you.

You might think if you do some research and plan out a shoot list of locations you'd like to visit that the freeform spontaneity of the travel adventure is lost. But not at all; it'll happen anyway on top of going to planned locations. You will just have better odds of getting enough content for your travelogue slideshow/video or photo album.

With just an hour or two of photo research you can plan to find whatever type of content interests you on your holidays.

This kind of homework really is very easy and actually entertaining to leisurely browse websites, books, videos...

Before the internet I was often looking at coffee table books, maps and guide books on the country and locations I was to visit looking for clues and nice photos I could check out. A favorite trick was to browse through the stands of postcards upon arriving somewhere to see what other pro photographers had shot as famous landmarks of the area.

You can still do that these days though there are a lot fewer postcard stands around. Actually with the advent of the internet it has gotten so much better and easier to seek out those popular and hidden destinations online.

Study the images you find that appeal to your interests and shooting style. Figure what or where the camera position was and time of day/year. There are many clues in a picture to help you out.

But I encourage you to be yourself and not plagiarize the photographer. Find your own way of photographing the Eiffel Tower, Big Ben or the Pyramids. Iconic shots are hard to be different, and therein is the challenge. Discover a new and fresh way to show it.

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The fact most travelers have the capability to shoot video is an invitation for us to give it a try. Yet it seems we take very little on our vacations. Shooting video clips on our holidays seems to be an afterthought for most travellers. I want to change that, and make your travel videos stand out.

Well it’s time put video shooting in the spotlight, with the quality and convenience, taking a few holiday videos is so easy.

Every camera and smartphone now comes with a video mode. Plus there is the added experience of motion and sound definitely making your travelogue shows that much better.

Now I'll be the first one to admit as a veteran still photographer that video is always a secondary thought in my mind. I often wish I would have taken more videos during my holiday trips and I have to keep reminding myself to do so and I really should.

I am here to motivate and convince you to shoot more AND better video.

With trying to make travelogue shows of our trips, videos probably get us closer than anything else to actually being there. And this is the best reason to shoot some good video footage so that you can take your audience back with you on that great travel adventure story.

Right away I want all my amature travel videographer readers to stop waving their cameras around shooting aimlessly. . You know the type, standing there in the street panning around *looking for something good to capture. No one's going to look at all that junk, not even you! No more shotgun video.

From here on in we are only going to record and fill up hard drives with valuable footage that could be used in your edits, otherwise delete, delete, DELETE.

So with a little bit of planning every video clip shot will improve your odd of getting a good take.  Studying the scene for a moment will give you clues as to what angle to pick , how the lighting is working, what to crop out and leave in, where to pan (if at all) and when to capture the action.

First thing to remember is that video is shot in a horizontal format. Think horizontal flat screen TV. Yes even when smartphone cameras tend to be held vertically, they do not make useable video clips.

Yes indeed unfortunately you have to block off a little bit more time in your travels to get the proper coverage when shooting your video scenes. You may have to coral people to act/narrate in your clips. Plan to do more than one take if needed to get it right. Returning for a reshoot is highly unlikely.

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I had a chance to do an interview with Joanne, a sailor doing America’s Great Loop with her husband David and their dog.  She has been writing a travel blog since they left Parry Sound, Ontario, Canada many months ago.

Their journey took them across the Great Lakes to Chicago, where the mast was taken off and trucked down to the Gulf of Mexico. With too many low bridges, they did the route down to the mouth of Mississippi River by motorboat.

They have been sailing the Caribbean Seas for a few months living a dream. Plans are to put the boat up on dry dock during the hurricane season in Miami. They hope to return in the fall and to continue their trip down to Turks & Caicos Islands perhaps ...and within six months, who know where else?

Don't plan your vacation dreams too long....Just Do It!

I spoke to Joanne via a Skype phone call as she was docked in a marina with a good Wi-Fi signal in the Bahamas. I had been waiting a few weeks to get in touch with her. Because of high winds she was trapped in a bay unable to negotiate the waves and find an internet signal.

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For those of you wishing to create a travelogue of your holidays in a website blog format, here are the basic concepts to help you sort it out. This article covers what a beginner needs to know to decide if this is the method they prefer to post and share their travels with family, friends and the world. (It also can be applied to other blog and website projects)

This method of recording your vacation adventures is not the easiest way to share those stories. Certainly it can offer the most control and perhaps expand to a professional travel blog that could make you some money one day.

I have been doing all types of websites for the last 17 years and here is a general overview to help you make a choice.

I know when I started I had many questions; I think I can answer a few here.

• Site Name
• Web Hosting
• Build Site
• Post Content

So the first decision you need to make is, do you keep it simple or leave it open for expansion? Do you go with the free package route with its limitations, or pay ongoing fees to run your own independent travel blog?

Some sites offer a complete service of name,space, website template tools and away you go. That might be your best choice.  Another path is setting it up independently for more flexibility. It is impossible to get specific in this short article and I will leave you with a few leads to research further and mention more in future posts.

So will this travel blog be a quick fun thing, maybe for your European vacation, or the start of something grand?

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When I travel, there certainly is compromise in what I bring and how available that equipment is to capture what I see. A smartphone that fits in your pocket, that you can carry everywhere is a natural choice. They are not that complicated and the results are not bad for a lot of applications.  And that’s why everyone is out there are taking selfies and shooting tons of content -- it’s just so darn easy to do. I am not saying it was best quality, but that's another issue that needs plenty of discussion.

The beauty of a smartphone is that it's like an electronic Swiss army knife. Not only can you take still pictures, you can also shoot videos, and you can record sound.  You can also make notes about your travels and find photogenic locations with maps & GPS. The apps and tools are endless.

When traveling, taking all your “stuff” is always a compromise and a bother. So depending on many factors you could opt to just take a cell phone with you as your main media recorder. Friends of mine just left for a month to South Asia and all they are carrying is an iPhone and an old pocket camera.

Your phone is a conduit to all your friends and family back home and you can send them updates when encountering wonderful moments in real-time.  This really is the awesome thing about your cell phone, how you can connect and feel closer to people in the world.

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In the daytime, the sun would be a traveling photographer's main source of illumination. At night and indoors we encounter many types of artificial lights so even a fire pit could light your shot. You have little control over these light sources so here is how I work with what there is on my vacations.

Working with a mix of lighting to get natural, evenly exposed photos takes practice and a little bit of knowhow. Notice how I mentioned natural lighting as the goal. Unless you are going with a freaky effect, your lighting needs to blend naturally and not be noticed as something set up with studio lights.

The sun has been with us forever and we humans find this type of lighting to be the look we like and natural. Aim for that look.

Observe what the sun does as it moves across the sky during the day. Note how the light gets softer and the shadows fade away on overcast days. Be aware that your eyes adapt to colour casts from sunsets and light bulbs, whereas the camera shoots colour how it actually is. Also, a dark gloomy day may be much darker, even in the middle of the day for your camera ISO than you think.

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You are back from your trip and the photos are sitting there in memory on your home computer HD.  Make a slideshow! It’s easy and works well to build that travelogue story you have of your favourite holiday adventures.

Refrain from showing random shots, or everything you took. Boring!

There are many ways to put together a slideshow, from just showing a folder of pix to a full-blown production. (Including beer & popcorn)

Otherwise these days it has all gotten so much easier and better in every regard. Anyone can put together a slideshow. It depends how much time, and interest you have.

There are some professional slideshow programs out there that can blow your socks off. But for now I'm going to look at the most basic and elementary concepts of stringing together your best travel photos from your holiday.

Everyone should be at least doing something like this, not to bore and frustrate their captive audience. In turn, your friends will be asking to see future shows and you'll only get better at producing great vacation slideshows.

Audience:

• Your audience who is it? What are they going to expect?
• What photos should you show, which should you not?
• How long should this slideshow be? 5-10-15 minutes (Before people are bored and snoozing?)
• What pictures might be interesting for your audience?
• Do they want to be entertained or more informed?

Content:

• Pick horizontal formatted photos, verticals can work but are tricky to use.
• Variety - avoid 10 shots of the same sunset, even if they are great.
• WOW them by grouping pix on subjects of interest.
• Do you have any themes you can develop?
• Add people photos + ones of you and your traveling group in them.
• Use wide, medium and close-up shots to establish and close in on detail.
• Add maps, titles, signs, a soundtrack, narration.
• Aim to build a story, a mood, a feeling around your show.
• This is a travel slideshow keep it that way. Stay on topic.

Prep slides:

• Only show your best pictures, edit ruthlessly and when in doubt cut it out!
• Fix cropping, exposure, color balance and do retouching.
• Resize your photos down to a smaller slideshow size of 2000 pixels wide.
• Save as... in a new folder, copy show files
• Sort the order of photos to build your travel story (optional).
• Rename files numerically to keep show order (look for bulk renaming apps to make this easy).

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You are about to head out the door on a holiday, camera at the ready. So what does one take on a vacation? Well most of us shoot a collection of random photos and videos as we go along over the span of our trip.

Sometimes this works and when we arrive home there is a travelogue show we can cobble together, other times there is too much of one day and less of another. What is left to work with could be disjointed and may not produce a smooth coherent travel show.

Now you could just shotgun the trip with endless photo/video coverage of places, people and events but that is more work and less relaxing then anyone wants for a vacation.

The first thing to decide for a trip shooting schedule is whether to make your show a daily journal. I often do a chronological timeline of my trips but it has its shortcomings.

Showing what you did day after day can be very orderly and can be a great record of how the trip went when you look at it years later. Where is can have weak spots is on the days not much happens, the weather sucks or you felt lazy and left the camera back at the hotel room. Break away from this structured timeline.

Here is a simple way to better that effort. Typically we all gravitate to shooting content of things we like; be it flowers, architecture, birds, fishing, surfing, markets, street scenes….so on. So do more of that and be better at it!

What you need to do is commit to a few thematic subjects and be consistent with your coverage.

Documenting your interests and showing your personality through your photo/video content will add that special Zing (technical term) to your travelogue shows.

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