Ira Estin - Professional Photographer
209-966-7262
  • Home
  • About Ira
  • Photo Tours
  • YOSEMITE
  • ALASKA
  • MACRO
  • CRITTERS
  • SOUTHWEST

 Ira Estin, award winning photographer
specializing in photographs of the Pacific Northwest

Ira Estin is available for private photograph tours of Yosemite or other destinations. 
His award winning work is available for sale in fine photography galleries
Picture
Ira’s Bio

I began  my outdoor experiences when my parents took me camping in Yosemite at age one.  Later I was active in the Boy Scouts for many years hiking most of the John Muir Trail and doing many backpacks throughout the Sierra Nevada. There were two important side benefit of my college days at UCLA. First was my participating in many adventures with the UCLA Mountaineering Club, where I learned & greatly improved many of my mountaineering skills.  Second, I became interested in photographing my many outdoor adventures.  Although graduating with a degree in engineering and working on the Apollo Space Program, my love of the outdoors and photography always kept me coming back to nature. Those interests eventually put an end on my engineering career so I could develop my photography skills. I published articles in magazines and did a lot of advertising photography along with wedding and portrait photography, but my real interest was always  nature photography.

My big break was getting hired to teach  at the college levels with UC Santa Cruz and UC Santa Barbara, conducting many outdoor nature photography classes.  I have enjoyed mountaineering pursuits involving backpacking, cave exploring,  whitewater rafting and kayaking  in many locations of Mexico, Canada,  Alaska, Asia, and South America.  My love of outdoor adventure photography has lead me  to a career of offering my services as a tour guide  and photography instructor where I share my knowledge and experiences with people .  I have made my home in the Yosemite area (Mariposa) for all of the last Thirteen  years, teaching nature photography, as an outdoor wedding photographer, and as a tour guide of the western states and Canada during these years.

 My time is now spent almost exclusively between my search for beautiful photographic images in nature and taking people on tours. I get tremendous rewards by sharing my knowledge of nature and Yosemite with people while conducting tours whether scenic or photographic in nature 

While spending most of my career using film cameras including 4x5, 6x7 and 35 mm, I have made the change to digital very easily.  With film, I needed to wait days or weeks before seeing the results and  then having to spend many hours in the darkroom with chemicals and having to take meticulous notes so I could repeat prints at a later time.  Now, with a digital darkroom on my computer, I find  I get perfect prints  with a lot less  stress and without  the messy and time consuming chemicals.  

  Ira Estin, photographer, teacher,  tour guide



Photo Restoration

Button Text

Portraiture

Picture

Portraiture

    Contact me to arrange a private photo tour or to purchase one of my prints
    Ira Estin 209-966-7262

Submit

Location

​What Our Clients Are Saying

"We had a great time on  a two day tour in Yosemite with Ira!  We saw all of the highlights, created some memorable photographs and had a terrific time!  Our 11 year old son was charmed and entertained with scientific challenges and games.  Traveling with a local was the way to go and Ira made our experience memorable, fun and exciting."  
Ruth F. 2007

Contact Us

Join our tours today!
​209-966-7262