How do you spice up your travel photography, stimulate your creativity and practice various photo techniques at the same time? Start your day with a photographic self assignment! Focusing on one single idea or task at a time will be your guide, will make you more disciplined and will get you to think outside the box. And beside this, you will end up with a great series of photos that you can share with your friends and family, or maybe even enter a photo contest! Here are 5 ideas of self assignments for better travel photos.

Each year at the end of August, several streets in northern Paris explode in one of the biggest, loudest and most colourful festivities: the Ganesha Festival. Streets bursting with colours, traditional Indian music from every corner, the smell of incense and jasmin flowers, smiling people dressed in their best clothes - everything blends together in the atmosphere of celebration! If you are ready for one the most flamboyant sides of the City of Light, grab your camera and join me for an unforgettable walk among the worshipers of Ganesha.

We continue the series of interviews with photographers at Better Travel Photos who share their knowledge and passion for photography with our participants in both Paris and London. This time we are excited to introduce you to our photographer Elena Usacheva!

As a journalist and photographer, Elena traveled all the way from Yakutsk in Siberia, Russia, to pursue her dream and continue her studies in the City of Light. Her sunny and easy-going personality shines through the photos she takes: a portrait session with Elena is always romantic and fun. When guiding Photo Tours, she combines both her creative vision and technical instruction in the most inspiring way. Let's ask Elena a few questions, as she has many stories to tell...

Dust spots and blobs are often an inevitable part of our travel images. They will inevitably appear even after the most thorough sensor cleaning as we change lenses or simply zoom in and out (check our previous article on how to clean your camera's sensor at home). Luckily, Lightroom 5 provides a great tool for getting rid of those "dust bunnies" from your best travel and landscape shots. In this tutorial we will guide you through 4 easy steps to make your images impeccably clean with the help of Lightroom's Spot Removal tool.

Cultural life never stops in Paris, even in August, when almost all Parisians pack their suitcase, grab a hat and a camera and head towards the seaside. For those who come to visit the French capital in August, La Maison Européenne de la Photographie prepared a very special treat: photography exhibit "Lartigue, la vie en couleur" ("Lartigue, life in colour") by the famous French photographer Jacques Henri Lartigue. Presented as a "genuine discovery for the general public", the show features about a hundred previously unseen colour photographs taken over the course of the XX century.

We all love photographing famous landmarks, stunning landscapes and vibrant sunsets. We try to find a different angle, a new take on the well-known view, we wait for the right moment. As a result we get a great photo that looks nothing less than a quality postcard. It is a relatively easy and pleasant task to photograph something that looks good - a nice photo is almost guaranteed. But can we do the same thing in our everyday surroundings? With the mundane little things that we see every day? Will we come up with interesting photos by taking the unexplored path during our travels? Sounds challenging, right? And yet, this is where photography becomes more interesting. Here are 5 reasons why pointing your camera at ordinary things will help you become a better photographer.

Sunsets are among some of the favourite photographers' subjects. When the sky turns red and orange and everything around seems magic, even the most worldly-wise photographer finds it hard to resist taking a photo or two. For truly captivating photos of sunset some preparation is needed: this is where the notions of "golden hour", "blue hour", "civil twilight" and "nautical twilight" come into play. I recently had a chance to witness a spectacular sunset from the top of the Dom Luis I bridge in Porto, Portugal, and here is what came out of it...

Light is the essential element and instrument in photography. For a travel photographer, light stalking is one of the main occupations on the road to powerful image. Learning to see, distinguishing and using different types of light is therefore crucial for a photographer. One can have full control over the light by setting it up in the studio. Travel photographers, however, use natural outdoor light. Let's look at examples of different types of natural light and some suggestions on how to deal with each one.

Almost every little European town has its own secret. So does Oostduinkerke in Belgium, where I was recently to see and photograph a unique Shrimp festival that included a demonstration of traditional shrimp fishing on horseback, a shrimp parade, a fishing contest, a folklore market and of course the tasting of local dishes made of shrimps. While traveling towards the seaside with the festival program in hand, I could not even imagine what fishing on horseback might look like... And eventually the whole day on the beach of Oostduinkerke among horses, fishermen, seagulls and of course shrimps turned out into a wonderful photographic surprise!

Our activities at Better Travel Photos are not only about learning photography, getting more comfortable with your camera, and discovering new locations along the way, but also about people guiding the Photo tours. As photography instructors and guides, we do our best to teach you new photography skills and to make sure you enjoy this experience in our company. So if you are curious to know more about those people with cameras welcoming you in Paris and London, please meet one of our team members,  photographer Brian Jannsen!

Every city has its secrets: hundreds of years of history unfold in front of you as you scout the streets in search of the best images. Knowing the background of a building in front of you may fuel a great deal of inspiration and help you compose a stronger image with a story. One of the ways to get to know the location better is to take a walking tour with an experienced local guide. You may find, however, that during such a guided walking tour there is not enough time for a proper photographic exploration as the group moves quickly from one location to another. Not all is lost though. Here are 9 tips on how to make the most of a guided tour and get some great architecture photos along the way.

What image comes to your mind first when you think of Paris? Let me guess... I am quite sure it's the Eiffel tower, the Louvre, the cafés, maybe even the white Sacré Coeur Basilica at the top of Montmartre. Paris, however, is a big city with many different corners and some of them are so untypical that you may easily forget you are in the French capital. While you may of course want to photograph all the iconic sights on your first visit, there is more to this city to explore through your lens. So let's get off the beaten path, get a camera and travel within Paris to discover La Mouzaïa, a charming residential area in the North-East of the city.