ZION FALL PHOTOGRAPHY WORKSHOPS
2025 ZION FALL FOLIAGE WORKSHOP FOR COUPLES
DATES: November 4 - 7, 2025 (Limited to 3 couples with one person as a photographer, and their significant other as a tag along guest) Spaces for 2 couples remain
PRICING: $2,100 plus tax per couple
WHAT IS THIS WORKSHOP: This is a unique photography workshop offering. Throughout my years of guiding and teaching photography in the Zion area, I’ve seen many couples where one is an avid photographer, and their spouse is not, yet loves to travel and enjoy nature with their loved one. This workshop is designed to accommodate this dynamic. On this workshop, we will be going out daily, pretty much all day to photograph and enjoy the beauty of Zion National Park. For you photographers, you will receive-one-on one instruction for anyone who can benefit from such, will receive recommendations on composition, use of filters and tips and tricks that I’ve learned throughout the years of photographing Zion. For your non-photographer guest, they can join for any and all of our outings, which will include some short hikes. With that being said, if they need a break from standing around in one area for too long while we photograph, they can skip any session and enjoy some leisure in the town of Springdale, or head out for their own experience since each couple will have their own vehicles.
HOW TO REGISTER: Send an email to me at info@zion-photography.com with your interest in joining. At that point I will send over a questionnaire, will build your reservation in the calendar and will send you an invoice. A deposit of $750 is required at the time of booking. The remaining balance is due 90 days prior to the workshop.
CANCELLATION POLICY:
- 90 days out or more from the workshop start date - Full refund of the deposit minus $400
- Cancellation within 90 days to 30 days before the workshop, you will receive a $750 refund. In the event that we can fill your spot with another participant, you will receive a full refund minus $400.
- Cancellation within 30 days of the workshop is non-refundable unless we can fill that spot. If we can, you will receive a full refund minus $400.
Transportation is provided to our shooting locations throughout the workshop, however airport pickup transportation and transportation to lodging arrangements are not included. Most people will rent a vehicle in Vegas (the best airport option) and we more or less caravan throughout (with some people sharing or jumping in my vehicle).
WHAT PHOTOGRAPHY EXPERIENCE LEVEL DO I NEED FOR THIS WORKSHOP: This workshop is open to and is appropriate for every level of photographer. With Seth’s 10years of teaching landscape photography daily in the Zion area to small groups, he is well adapted to working with a wide demographic of photographers at the same time, and one-on-one.
Workshop leader and instructor
Seth Hamel - Founder and owner of Enlighten Photography
Seth has been guiding and teaching landscape photography full-time in the Zion and Bryce National Parks area for over 10 years. As an avid adventurer and explorer, he has discovered numerous locations throughout these areas that are well known, as well as those overlooked. Understanding the light in Zion is one of the greatest challenges for visiting photographers. Seth has become well versed in this aspect of shooting Zion while living in Zion Canyon for the past 12 years.
With teaching and guiding many hundreds of people throughout his career, he has developed methods of assessing and approaching different photographers, their learning styles and ability levels. The rewards of seeing individuals find joy through photography is his favorite part working with individuals with that shared passion.
TIMING PEAK FALL FOLIAGE IN ZION
The timing of the change in foliage can vary from year to year. Being local residents to the area, we've found that the first and seconds weeks in November create the best odds for photographers to obtain opportunities to capture the magnificence of this special event that lasts for only a couple weeks out of the year in the main canyon. We’ve been running this workshop for the past 8 years, and fortunately (fingers crossed) we’ve always had good fortune with peak or very close to peak colors during the workshop.
ITINERARY
DAY 1: We will meet at Zion Adventure Company in Springdale, UT at 1PM. We will meet everyone on the workshop and head out for a casual stroll through Zion's scenic canyon. Along the way we will photograph the magnificent colors of the fremont cottonwood trees that line the Virgin River. As many know, typically mid-day light is not the most desirable for landscape photography. With the sun hanging lower in the sky during this time of the year, in combination with the multitude of colors we are able to shoot beautiful images using back-lighting and the reflected light on the canyon walls.
Then onto Sunset. We will photograph a beautiful view of the canyon, which for some reason or another seems to be overlooked by many so we will likely have very few other photographers in this area.
DAY 2: Today we will arise early to catch sunrise in the park. After shooting early light in the canyon, we will return to Springdale in order to grab breakfast and take a short break. After food and a cat nap, we will travel the scenic and we will be working with mid-day light so it is not the best time of the day for shooting the grand landscape of Zion. Rather, we will use this time to find small intimate scenes using reflected light from the canyon walls which produce a soothing warm glowing light on our small scenes. Towards the end of the day we will exit the scenic canyon and will photograph sunset along the Virgin River.
DAY 3: Arise and photograph inside of Zion National Park. After sunrise we will take short break for breakfast, following which we will head out into Zion for a day of exploring during the mid-day hours. This is a great time of the day to photograph smaller more intimate scenes in the park. I love this approach of mid-day shooting in Zion during the fall season as we get to shoot at a relaxed pace, finding our own unique pieces of art that inspire us, while enjoying some of the most pleasant days of the year in Zion. We will shoot all the way through sunset on this day in Zion.
DAY 4: One more sunrise in Zion. On this final day, we will sit together after the light gets too harsh to work on production of the images we photographed throughout the workshop. The program that we will process in will be the most up-to-date version of Adobe Lightroom.
