6 Nights / 7 Days : Mon 12 Oct – Sun 18 Oct 2026
This tour is focused on exploring and photographing some of the largely untouched backcountry of Canterbury, Mackenzie and Otago. There is a raw beauty in this landscape of mountains, high country lakes and vast valleys all back-dropped by the Southern Alps.
We venture into less traveled area’s to find locations off-the-beaten-track. The stunning scenery of South Island is famous the world over and we get you to the best of it on this amazing Photography Tour.
The South Island is an absolute heaven for any landscape photographer and we have designed this tour to capture the best of it. With hands on tuition and such epic scenery this is an experience that will inspire your landscape photography like no other.
Our Photography Tours are an immersive hands on experience where you will be putting your newly acquired knowledge to use in-the-field. We believe in giving you sound knowledge and developing new skills in landscape photography, and then putting these to practice in some of the best landscapes in the world.
Depart Christchurch
Finish Queenstown
During this photography tour we are up and on location before dawn and aim to stay out till after sunset – taking advantage of what can often be magical dawn and dusk light. We never rush locations and make sure that everyone is capturing the images they want. Often we are the only people at these amazing locations.
We believe in giving you sound knowledge and developing new skills in landscape photography, and then putting these to practice in some of New Zealand’s best landscapes.
The South Island is renowned for it’s incredible scenery and this photography tour has been designed to get you to some of the best of it.
Over this tour our photography will include:
The precise order of locations we visit is determined by the conditions – we allow for flexibility in our schedule and aim to be in the best locations at the right time. We have learnt that sometimes the best photographs are captured when you ‘follow the light’.
We meet mid-morning in Christchurch. After introductions we will have a debrief of the tour, including running through equipment (camera’s, lenses, filters etc), weather conditions and answer any questions.
We then set off for the magical Ashburton Lakes for the next couple of days. Located in the back country of Canterbury this raw and largely untouched landscape is simply stunning and we will explore and photograph the best of it.
The Southern Alps are the backdrop to the stunning lakes which we will be photographing. However we will also venture further into the vast back country to some high country stations and locations of very famous movies.
This is a very special region and a landscape photographers dream.
We then set off for Twizel our base for the next two nights. Twizel is well located to allow us to explore Mount Cook/Aoraki National Park, the Southern Alps and the Mackenzie Basin. There are so many great locations we will be out both evenings and mornings in stunning scenery.
Alongside the big-shots there is also the opportunity for us to capture the subtle essence of the Mackenzie Region and surrounding district. There are so many gems around this area we really are spoiled for choice.
We then settle into the high-altitude and sparsely populated area of Maniototo where we have many gems on our doorstep. From vast tussock grasslands, historic huts and sheds and a stunning mountain range as a back drop this is a region ideal for capturing landscape photography.
From here we also venture into Nevis, a remote valley of dramatic landscape scattered with gold mining remains and abandoned mining huts.
