I am finishing up 2019 with my top 9 posts on Instagram! I selected these photographs based on both Instagram popularity and my own personal reasons for why they were my best. But I wanted to make it a little more special by sharing the stories behind the photographs and why these moments were so special to me:

Capturing this waterfall has been a dream of mine for years, but this particular shot surprised me as it wasn’t the grandiose shot I had intended – although I did get that shot and it just barely didn’t make this list as a top shot. This image instead was a great lesson that I need to keep exploring more intimate scenes and work more with my zoom lens than always focusing on the wide-angle scene. It definitely takes more developing your eye to begin to see these more minimalistic scenes, so I hope I can continue to grow in this in 2020.

About midway through the year, I started to gain a true confidence with my self-portraits, and even better, I started to have fun with them. It has been a new and exciting challenge to figure out how to get the focus right, how to center or frame myself up without anyone else’s guidance, how to post, and how to interact with the environment in an authentic way. On top of it all, it’s hard to keep confident around crowds or when anyone else is around and you feel strange taking tripod selfies. In this shot, I’m pretty sure I was laughing at all of the people watching, because I was absolutely without a care and finally in my element.

This image is technically a shot I took in 2018, but I had not yet edited or posted it until 2019. I didn’t realize what I true gem it was until I put a few hours into editing it to this final shot. One of the highlights of this year has been seeing how far my editing has come – I don’t know that I could have created this shot in 2018. I am truly proud of the end result here and I am so excited to see how my skills will develop in 2020.

On the theme of road trips (my favorite style of travel), I did a California coast road trip at the start of the summer, which began in the city of San Francisco, where I had visited a few times previously. I had done all the classic tourist things on prior trips and was never the biggest fan, so I was shocked that I would end up absolutely loving shooting city scenes here – San Francisco stole my heart! It was just such an interesting blend of nature and city, of ocean and architecture. This shot came after I had run into some friends who convinced me to stay after a lackluster sunset – leading to this stormy capture as the bridge lights came on and darkness approached.

This was a scene I had dreamed of for a while, having seen a few shots of this location floating around on social media. It seemed so unreal though, or like some ancient landscape where the river perfectly lined up with a captivating peak. Finally seeing this view in person was an experience I’ll never forget, and I got to share the view with my parents during a road trip I took them on, which made it extra special. At first it didn’t look like there would be any color to the sky, but in the last sunset rays, the sky lit up and the glow on the distant canyon peak was jaw dropping.

The incredible blues of Canada made this my favorite trip of the year. I also took this shot, which was my absolute favorite self-portrait of the year. But beyond that, this shot represented overcoming hardship, as I got lost on this particular trail the night before and had to hike up the mountain twice, the second time in the dark, just to finally get this. It wasn’t a spectacular sunrise, but looking out over these incredible views made the entire struggle worth it, and I stayed for hours just taking it all in.

This was my personal favorite shot from this past year, and you guys all loved it too. It was from that same winter road trip, and it was the culmination of a shot I had planned, scouted, and dreamed up come to reality – just sheer perfection. Earlier in the week, I had scouted this location but the foreground was a sad, desolate yellow from winter. I dreamed of snow blanketing the ground while the mountain lit up with a golden glow, a beautiful winter contrast. When the conditions finally lined up, I could barely believe just how breathtaking the final shot would be.

My 2020 Travel & Photography Bucket List

Winter Road Trip Adventures in the National Parks of California – Yosemite, Sequoia, & Death Valley

12 Ways to Improve Your Photography This Year