What Is the Favourite Season of a Woodland Photographer?

As a UK woodland photographer, I’m often asked a deceptively simple question: what is your favourite season for woodland photography?

It’s a bit like my children accusing me of having a favourite child whenever I’m refereeing a domestic meltdown. The answer, of course, is that I don’t have a favourite – unless one of them happens to be calling me a dickhead, in which case all bets are temporarily off.

Tenuously, Woodland photography works in much the same way. Every season brings something different, and while I may lean one way or another depending on the month, the truth is that each part of the year offers its own rewards – particularly here in the UK, where conditions are rarely predictable and often damp.

Based in the South West of England, my experience of woodland photography is rooted firmly in a temperate Northern Hemisphere climate. Broadly speaking, this means spring is wet, summer is slightly warmer but still wet, autumn is wet and windy, and winter is best approached with ark-building materials to hand.

That said, the UK does offer one major advantage for woodland photographers: fog. Whether it’s true mist or just low cloud slipping through the trees, atmospheric conditions can transform even familiar woods into something quietly magical.

With that in mind, here’s my case for each season of UK woodland photography.

Spring Woodland Photography in the UK

For a woodland photographer in the UK, spring is defined by fresh greens, lengthening days, and the promise (not always the delivery) of warmer weather. It’s also the season most associated with flowers, particularly bluebells, which dominate large parts of the British woodland photography scene each year.

Spring is when I can start photographing before work again, thanks to earlier dawns. That usually means 5am alarm calls – worthwhile when the conditions align, and utterly demoralising when they don’t and you’re left facing a full working day on three hours’ sleep.

I’ll admit to having focused too heavily on bluebells in recent years, sometimes at the expense of other woodland opportunities. However, with foggy mornings in short supply, it often feels sensible to maximise your chances while everything is briefly alive and luminous again.

The downside, of course, is saturation. Social media fills rapidly with bluebell images, and while that’s lovely for fellow enthusiasts, it can dull the impact for a wider audience – even when the photographs themselves deserve attention.

In Dorset the Bluebell woods in Spring are hard to beat

When the light hits it can create amazing moments - you have to get up early though!

It's not always spring greens at this time of year - young oaks can be orange and yellow too

Even with the conditions, composition is important to maximise your shots

Mist makes spring photography much easier and allows compositions even when there is little foliage

When there isn't mist light is essential for strong images

While I prefer the chaos of an oak woodland - beech forests work well in spring

Guilty of focussing on Bluebells too much, other spring scenes are available

Summer Woodland Photography: An Unfashionable Opinion

Many photographers will tell you that summer is the worst season for woodland photography. The foliage is overwhelmingly green, contrast can be difficult to manage, and truly atmospheric conditions feel rare.

In my experience, however, summer woodland photography in the UK is undervalued. If you’re prepared to get up early and ignore pessimistic forecasts, mist can still appear – often briefly, but if you move quickly you can fill your boots.

When conditions do work, summer light can be very tasty indeed. Dense foliage allows you to exclude the sky more easily, creating those intimate woodland scenes we all crave.

Summer is also when my real life workload peaks, which limits how far I can travel. As a result, I tend to focus on local woods. Familiarity can breed creative blindness, but revisiting images later often reveals photographs that quietly become personal favourites – even if they never gain much traction online.

An oak that I visit each season - it took some time to get it in summer because of the early starts!

In summer you have to maximise the opportunities while you can - early alarms and all!

The thick canopy helped limit the sky in the background and drew focus to the light beams

Scenes I normally walk past become fair game in summer as the fog is less dense

Seasonal challenges can be cool - I try to capture this scene at different times of year

Another scene really only possible in summer because of the thicker foliage

Summer light when controlled can create interesting scenes

With light and colour, even managed forests can shine in summer

Autumn: The Classic Season for Woodland Photography

Ask most people to name their favourite season for woodland photography, and autumn is usually the answer. For good reason.

Autumn in UK woodlands brings a richer colour palette, more frequent atmospheric conditions, and mercifully later mornings. The window for good conditions is often longer than in spring, but autumn has its own enemy: wind. A single storm can strip colour overnight and derail weeks of anticipation.

Choosing the right woodland at the right time becomes critical, and photographic frustration sets in quickly when you get it wrong. When it works, though, autumn woodland photography remains hard to beat.

Light at any time should be valued, but autum light hits different!

Another example of Autumn light - fleeting but memorable

An early foray into autumn photography - some autumns the colours are almost unreal

Shooting towards the sun in autumn can really bring out the colour of the foliage

Looking for character trees in autumn is a good idea for memorable images

Autumnal images can be tricky to edit, especially when the colours are intense

Autumn hits at different times in different woodlands and can be tricky to predict

Knowledge of an area helps you predict where the best colour might be

Winter Woodland Photography in the UK

Until recently, I would have argued that winter was a season best avoided for woodland photography. I’ve since changed my mind – with caveats.

Winter woodlands work best when the right trees and conditions align. Without leaves, structure becomes everything. Twisted trunks, clean lines, and strong shapes take centre stage, and frost or snow can elevate a scene dramatically if you’re willing to endure the elements.

Winter light has a subtle quality of its own, assuming the near-constant drizzle ever gives you a break. Composition becomes more challenging, and protecting camera equipment in cold, wet conditions is essential – a lesson I’ve learned the hard way more than once.

So, What Is the Best Season for Woodland Photography?

After all that, which season is my favourite?

The honest answer is that it depends. When it’s spring, I favour spring. When it’s autumn, I’ll say autumn. Summer and winter rarely get the same public endorsement from me, even if they deserve more credit than they receive.

Looking back through my portfolio as a UK woodland photographer, the period when people are unsure if it's Summer or Autumn (late September/early October) is when I have been most productive. I like it when the greens are still in the trees, but the undergrowth has started to change. The fear of wind stripping the leaves hasn't yet kicked in, and some early turning trees start to put on a display. Fingers can still operate cameras fairly comfortably without fear of frostbite, and I still have a slight summer tan!

So actually, that's my answer - my favourite season is not really a season at all. Maybe I am a dickhead after all...

-------------------------

Author Bio

In an attempt to increase how many people see my website one of the suggestions was to include an author bio, so while I'm off to be sick I used ChatGPT to trawl the web for some suitable sentences;

David Shaw is a UK woodland photographer based in the South West of England, dashingly handsome and specialising in atmospheric woodland photography, particularly in mist, fog, and low light conditions. Using his giant brain and strong arms, his work focuses on British woodlands throughout the seasons, with an emphasis on quiet compositions, natural structure, and the subtle changes brought by weather and time. Time is not something that affects David Shaw, and he looks the same as he did at 21 - he even still fits into his wedding suit from 10 years ago! Through his photography and writing, he explores the realities of woodland photography in the UK rather than idealised conditions. Pets love him.