Trogon Photo Tours History
Nate Chappell was interested in animals and birds from a very young age. He was exposed to photography at an early age through his father, Dr. James Chappell, who was an accomplished amateur photographer – at one point Dr. Chappell won the Tacoma News Tribune photo contest 5 years in a row. However, Nate was a bird watcher for many years before he became serious about photography. Before his first trip to Namibia in 1999 he bought his first SLR and telephoto zoom lens. From that point on he was hooked and took many bird photo trips to Thailand, Australia, other international locations and in the US.
During his first trip bird photo trip to South America in 2004 he met Angie in the Quito, Ecuador airport. They were married 9 months later and after taking a few more trips to Ecuador they decided to start Trogon Photo Tours to share their love of photography, nature and Ecuador with others. Trogon Photo Tours first nature photo tour was to Ecuador in December 2007 and their first bird photo workshop in the US was to Green Valley, Arizona in May 2008. Since that time Trogon Tours has led many tours to Ecuador, South Africa and other parts of the world and numerous photo workshops in the US. When we are not leading tours we are often scouting locations for possible new tours and workshops. Nate and Angie were blessed with the birth of a beautiful daughter, Natalie in August 2010.
Mission Statement – Trogon Photo Tours mission is to lead high quality photographic tours and workshops at reasonable prices. One of the ways our commitment to this principle is shown is that if we limit our US workshops to a maximum of 5 photographers and our overseas photo tours to a maximum of 6 photographers. This ensures you get enough personal attention. Each tour or workshop will have at least 1 photographic guide who has spent a lot of time in the country or area that we are visiting. On all of our US workshops and on many of our overseas photo tours we will have a photography leader who is an award winning photographer who can help you improve your photography. If it’s an area that we haven’t been to we will be honest about that and call it an “exploratory” trip in the trip description. On our private photo tours we work with the best local photographic guides all of whom Nate has previously met and worked with before. A testament to the value we deliver our customers is that well over 50% of our customers are repeat customers.
Tour Leaders
Nate Chappell is one of the top bird and wildlife photographers leading photography tours and workshops. He is an expert at most aspects of avian photography including flight photography, using flash and multi-flash for hummingbirds. Nate enjoys teaching bird and wildlife photography and he is known for being able to simplify complicated topics. His photography is currently represented by several top stock agencies including Minden Pictures, VIREO and Birdimagency.
Ken Archer has been a professional wildlife photographer for the last 25 years. His work is widely published and he is a former first place category winner in Nature’s Best Photo Contest and an overall winner of the Wyoming Wildlife Photo Contest. He has spent a great deal of time photographing wildlife in the American West. Ken uses Canon. His work can be viewed at www.kenarcherphotos.com
Charles Gangas is a full time nature photographer residing in Stowe, Vermont where he is a staff photographer for the Vermont Center for Ecostudies. Chuck’s images have been used in the popular IBird applications. He was an award winner in the 2019 NANPA photo contest. Chuck has traveled and photographed extensively throughout Asia and Latin America. Chuck uses Nikon.
Guilherme Battistuzzo is a full time nature photographer, birding guide and biologist living and working out of Sao Paulo, Brazil. He is regularly near the top of the list each year for number of birds seen in Brazil and in 2016 he was named one of the top 15 bird photographers to follow on Instagram by Audubon magazine.
Javier Zurita is a full time nature photographer and tour leader from Quito, Ecuador. Javier has been leading tours in Ecuador and Colombia the past several years. He built the excellent photo blinds at Sachatamia Lodge in Ecuador. He is an excellent photographer who is using flash in innovative ways.
Jure Novak is a full time nature photographer, tour leader and filmmaker from Slovenia. His work is widely published in Slovenia and he is one of the filmmakers of “Wild Slovenia”, a motion picture. Jure is an excellent birder and bird guide in addition to being a very talented photographer. He uses Sony gear.
Stojan Mihoric is a full time professional photographer and nature guide from Slovenia. He especially loves photographing mammals, owls and woodpeckers.
Melody Lytle is a retired biologist and bird photographer living in the Texas Hill Country. She is a Canon photographer and of all the instructors working with Trogon Photo Tours she is the most skilled at photoshop techniques.
Jose is a full time photography and birding tour leader from Cusco, Peru. In addition to being a very good photographer and excellent birder, Jose is accredited as a cultural guide as well. Jose is known for his excellent sense of humor.