Do you want to capture stunning travel and cityscape photos with a unique eye-catching look? If so, you’ve come to the right place, as an accomplished pro demonstrates an easy-to-master technique in barely six minutes.

Jeff Wiswell is an award-winning documentary photographer based in La Cross, WI and a really good instructor. Today’s episode demonstrates the power of shooting street scenes without any people in the frame.

Wiswell make this promise: “In this video I reveal my secrets to capturing breathtaking cityscape photos in bustling areas—transforming crowded scenes in compelling images.” This “magical” approach enables you to portray cities and iconic monuments in a way that’s rarely seen.

Tip #1 is to “forget the days of waking up and winging it.”  In other words, spend time scouting  locations before you go out to shoot. Wiswell says he meticulously scours Google Images, 500px, Pinterest and other online sources for images of the scenes he intends to shoot. He then plots them on a map in relation to his hotel and comes up with a logical plan for the following day.

Thinking about composition and estimating the position of the sun is also part of his pre-shoot strategy. Next on Wiswell’s list is thoughtful preparation. As he says, “the night before a photoshoot I have everything packed and ready to go; not just camera gear, but snacks, water, and comfortable shoes.” In short,, everything he needs for a smooth morning that begins just before dawn.

Getting out early means there are few, if any, tourists in sight so you can capture the serene beauty of wherever you happen to be. Another advantage is that “shooting during Blue Hour adds a mesmerizing quality to images because you get soft, ethereal light and vibrant colors in the sky.”

Of course popular locations tend to get busy later in the day, and Wiswell has some great advice for ridding images of distractions with thoughtful composition, appropriate camera settings, and an affordable accessory that’s small enough to carry in your bag.

The images you make will be significantly more impactful if you follow Wiswell’s advice. And even better is the fact that they won’t look the same as the photos from everyone else. After watching the video head over to Wiswell’s instructional YouTube channel for more helpful tips and techniques.

We also recommend watching last week’s tutorial from another top pro who demonstrates three simple editing hacks for outdoor photographs with the WOW factor.

“To hills of green and shadows cool,” wrote Rudyard Kipling in his poem A Coming May. And although green vegetation is always welcome after harsh winters, lively plants can complicate bird photography. Grass and leaves can sometimes be overpowering in their distracting randomness and in their crazy effects on background blur.

Photography is like farming. You can’t just enjoy the sweet fruits – if you want to harvest, you have to sow. For a wildlife photographer, this means getting to know the habits of nearby animals. One way to learn about them is to use a photo trap to study their behavior. This is one of the topics I am currently working on for you. And since I took my most recent photo this way, I’ll open this week’s photography news with a trail camera photo of a doe.

We’ve all experienced this frustrating problem, and it often occurs when shooting in the field: There’s a stubborn filter on your lens that refuses to come off no matter how hard you try. This experience is not only unnerving, but it makes it impossible to change filters when the light or other conditions change.

This dilemma is often caused by using too much muscle when mounting the filter, while other times you were careless and cross-threaded the filter—damaging it’s threads or those on the front of your lens. Even worse is when you drop the camera or bang the lens on a hard object, smashing the filter and the underlying lens mount.

Instead of freaking out when the foregoing occurs, all you have to do is remember the four tricks you’ll learn in today’s video from the Signature Edits YouTube channel— a great source of videos on image-editing, shooting techniques, and solutions to common gear problems. In this episode the founder of the channel Ryan demonstrates what he says are “the four easiest and safest ways to loosen a jammed filter no matter how tight it is.”

One trick works great when the filter is slightly too tight and you can’t get a great grip because of sweaty hands. Another is useful when the filter is super tight and works best when you’re at home. The third is a go-to option when you need even more force to get the job done. Method #4 involve taking a deep breath and doing a bit of surgery, and it’s reserved for those times when the other three fail.

The first trick is super effective when you’re at home and dealing with a filter that extremely tight or slightly damaged. The solution involves employing a soft, rubbery mousepad, but not in the way you might think. Instead of using the mousepad to get a better grip, here’s what you do: Leave the mousepad on your desk, hold the camera with the lens pointed down on the pad, and then press firmly while and rotating the camera to unscrew the filter.

The second approach  is pretty much foolproof when shooting in the field, and you just can’t get a good grip because your hands are wet, dirty or greasy. This simply requires that you pull a thick rubber band out of your bag and stretch it over the outer ring of the filter. Then a quick counterclockwise turn usually does the job.

The last two techniques are increasingly more aggressive but either one or will definitely remove filters that are broken or bent. Just follow Ryan’s advice  and you’ll be able to get the darn thing off without any further damage to the delicate front of the lens.

The very popular Signature Edits YouTube channel offers videos on a wide variety of popular photography topics, so be sure to pay a visit when you have time to explore.