Photo rules and camera tips
Standard tours of Upper and Lower Antelope Canyon leave you with a phone or a camera in your hands and nothing more. Bags and tripods stay behind. The rules shift a little from one outfitter to the next, and the light inside is harder to photograph than it looks. This guide covers the bans first, then the settings guides use.
What you can carry in
Every standard tour bans bags of any kind. That covers camera bags and hydration packs too. Tripods and monopods stay in the car with selfie sticks and gimbals. Flash is not allowed either. Beyond that, each listing adds its own twist.
- AACT in Upper. A strict no-bag policy, with advice for photographers to bring a cover for the camera against blowing sand;
- National Park Express Upper ticket. Phones are fine, and so are standard cameras. Large camera gear is not;
- Ken's Tours in Lower. Phones are welcome, but the standard tour turns away big cameras, and the small-group version allows one camera per person;
- Dixie's in Lower. No bags at all, which some reviewers say extends even to water;
- Canyon X. No professional cameras, and no tripods outside the photo option.
Put spare batteries and a lens cloth in your pockets, because there is nowhere else to keep them.
Video and drones
Plan on stills. National Park Express's Upper ticket lists video recording as not allowed, and Lower listings ban filming too. Tse Bighanilini turns away GoPros and other action cameras, and camcorders with them. Drones are banned on every listing that mentions them, from Ken's to Canyon X and Deer Spring. If a short clip matters to you, read the rules of the exact option before you book, and ask the guide before you press record.
Your phone and your guide
Most visitors shoot on a phone, and the guides plan for it. Reviewers on almost every listing describe guides taking each phone in turn, switching it to a vivid or warm mode and pointing it at the spot that works. Guides also know the famous shapes in the rock, and AACT reviewers mention being shown an angel and a dragon in the walls. On a crowded day that help counts for more than any lens, so stay near the front of your group and hand your phone over when the guide offers.
Group shots come free on most tours, since the guide takes them at the best spots. A tip at the end is customary, and what Antelope Canyon tours cost lists what the outfitters suggest.
Exposure in a dark slot
The canyon walls light each other. Sun hits the upper rock and bounces down, and the color fades from orange through violet to near black at your feet. That range fools cameras. Expose for the brightest wall, not the shadows. On a phone, tap the brightest area, then drag the exposure slider down until the color comes back. Keep HDR switched on.
Shoot upward into the reflected light, where the curving walls glow, and keep the slice of sky small in the frame, since it burns out to white. With a camera, choose a wide lens with a high ISO rather than a slow shutter, because you cannot stop long and you cannot use a tripod. For the beams themselves, expose for the shaft. Let the walls go dark; when to see the light beams gives the months and hours.
Sand on the lens
Fine sand gets everywhere. In Upper it blows down from the rim. Guides throw it into the beams on purpose, and by the end of the walk it has settled on every lens. Blow grit off before you wipe, so you do not grind it into the glass, then use a clean microfiber cloth. If you bring a camera, fit the lens before you leave the car and keep it on, since changing lenses inside invites dust onto the sensor.
A shower cap or a clear plastic cover over the camera body keeps most sand out. AACT recommends a cover, though one Upper listing names plastic bags among the banned items, so ask your outfitter whether a fitted cover passes.
Lower, where the glow lasts all day
Dixie's guides are known for setting up phones and taking photos, and Lower's light holds from morning to afternoon. From ~$94 with every fee included on Viator, or as the Dixie's option inside National Park Express's Lower listing on GetYourGuide. Both refund in full until 24 hours before.
Tripods and dedicated photo tours
Daytime photo tours that allow a tripod in Upper do exist on the outfitters' own websites. Neither booking site sold one for Upper when we compared. AACT does list a night photography tour in Upper on Viator, at about $285 for adults with tripods required, but it had barely any reviews.
Taadidiin sells a photo option at Canyon X through some resellers' listings, about three hours with a tripod and one camera bag allowed. The standard ticket in the guide to the quieter slots is not that option. Deer Spring's Viator listing names no camera limits for Secret Antelope, and its own photos show a tripod set up inside, while its GetYourGuide page bans bags and selfie sticks. Ask before you pack one.
For serious gear, AACT's three-canyon photography tour, from ~$385, spends about an hour each in Rattlesnake and Owl canyons, with Mountain Sheep as the third. Groups stay at six and tripods are welcome. The catch is the price, about four times a standard Upper walk. The record is thin as well, with no reviews on GetYourGuide yet and only a handful elsewhere.
Which canyon for which picture
Upper gives the beams, but only near midday in the warm months, with the biggest crowds in your frame. Lower gives more varied shapes at any hour, with ladders between the chambers; our Upper and Lower comparison sets the two walks side by side. Canyon X and Secret Antelope give emptier frames. To see the canyon from the water, read the guide to kayaks and boats, which covers the paddle into the lake end, where the outfitters suggest a dry bag for your phone.