The biological diversity of Panama is the stuff of legend. Standing as a bridge between the Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the isthmus of Panama is a place of immense beauty and a landscape where new species are still being discovered every year. Let it suffice to say that there is a very good reason the Smithsonian has no less than 9 different research facilities in this tiny little country. 

And it’s this extraordinary biological diversity that sits at the heart of the workshop.

Our workshop will span both coasts of this country, in order to offer participants an unparalleled wildlife photography experience in Panama.

Beginning in Panama City, Panama, we will spend our first day of the workshop in a classroom session where you will learn the skills necessary to take full advantage of your time in the rainforest. From lowlight photography, to birds in flight, to mastering flash, this classroom session will be critically important for preparing you for the unique styles of photography and challenges that lay ahead.

After our day in the city, we will transfer to the heart of the rainforest, where the calls of keel-billed toucans mix with the roars of howler monkeys around the lodge. This lodge will be our base of operations for the next couple days as we set off by boat each morning and afternoon to photograph everything from tiger herons to snail kites, Geoffry’s tamarin to white faced capuchins.

When it comes to photographing monkeys, you will be hard pressed to find a better place in Central and South America. After nearly a decade of traveling and photographing across the neotropics, the opportunities here to create frame filling and beautiful portraits of three different species of monkeys is beyond words.

After several days exploring this region, we will then transfer to the Caribbean islands along north coast of the country by plane where the rest of the workshop will be based. The archipelago is known as Bocas del Toro.

Named “Mouth of the Bull” by Cristopher Columbus upon stumbling across these islands in 1502, the archipelago is a labyrinth of lush islands covered in lowland rainforest surrounded by coral reefs and some of the most beautiful tropical waters you have ever seen. Thanks to the unique geological history of this archipelago, each island plays home to a suite of different species of wildlife. The diversity is so extreme here, that the Smithsonian refers to the whole of the place as the Galapagos of the Caribbean. 

Simply getting to our destinations is half the adventure. We will begin this  part of the trip on a prop plane flying over the mountains and up the coast to our islands. Once we land on Isla Colon, we still have a half hour boat ride to the island that our lodge is based on.

Due to the distance of some of these islands form the mainland, neither jaguars or harpy eagles have reached this area. What this means for us is that there is probably no better place on the planet to find and photograph sloths. If you have been to Costa Rica to photograph sloths, nothing you have experienced will have prepared you for the extraordinary abundance of these animals in this archipelago, where we will have not one, but two different species to photograph. 

It will also be here in the archipelago that we make trips out into the Caribbean to photograph red-billed tropic and magnificent frigate birds. The colony here offers up some of the most beautiful compositions you will ever find of these birds. From the moody and artistic chiaroscuro lighting to compositions of birds soaring above waves exploding on rocks, this place is one you have to experience in order to believe.

This workshop is 9 days of photography and adventure you will never forget.