Ron Leach

Dirty camera sensors are a common source of degraded image quality, resulting in tedious post-processing work to clean up the photograph. This problem is the bane of those who shoot outdoors in dusty conditions, and is particularly acute when using small aperture settings that tend to exaggerate imperfections.

If you want to make photographs with impact, it’s important that they tell a story, and “speak” to the viewer. No matter how beautiful an image appears, if it doesn’t provoke an emotional response, you haven’t quite finished the job.

After all the excitement of spring and summer macro photography, when insects begin to disappear and plants start to wither, it's not uncommon for photographers to stash their close-up lens in the back of their cabinet. That's a real shame because winter provides a bunch of great opportunities if you take a different approach.

This is a great time of year to photograph our feathered friends, and as you’ll see in this comprehensive tutorial, with the proper skill you needn’t travel further than your own backyard to make some truly spectacular images.