I came across this interesting video in which a frustrated photographer examines the issue of too many people and impolite behavior making landscape photography difficult at beautiful locations. It’s definitely an issue that deserves to be addressed, and his take on it is worth hearing. 

Brendan van Son recently posted this video in which he asks if photographers are ruining photography for other photographers after finding himself frustrated by both the number of people and their behavior at a beautiful mountain lake. Personally, I think the issue is more complicated than simply photographers ruining life for other photographers, and I also don’t think it’s as extreme as he asserts. Nonetheless, the rise of social media has highlighted locations that once took a good deal of committed research to find, while travel has become more affordable. On the same token, as cameras get better and better and the price of entry for a decent kit continues to decrease, we’ve seen a proliferation of tourists who aren’t really photographers, but enjoy the pursuit of it enough to spend time in these locations shooting. I’ve certainly had my share of shots ruined by an intruder, but I often remind myself that out of the person standing in a river with a camera and someone walking along a trail, I’m probably the odd one. In other words, photographers have no more right to be in these places than anyone else, but as the masses continue to flock to them, we might see paradigms shifts in what landscape and travel photographers shoot and how they shoot it. Have you dealt with this? How do you handle it?