Guilin Photography Tours & Workshops by Chinese Speaking British Photographer

I’m a Guilin-based photographer that speaks Chinese and has lived in Guilin China for ten years. I found China’s 1st and No.1 photo tour in China, Guilin Photography Tours™ GuilinPhotographyTour.com to offer the kind of guiding service I needed as a photographer.

When not behind a camera, leading photography tours, guiding workshops, I’m a digital consultant for international travel firms and a tourism consultant to large Chinese tour operators and a director at Gatsby Travel.

Guilin Photography Tours

Despite consulting in tourism, living in Guilin for years, and being well-connect to Guilin’s and China’s best tour operators, there was no tour, driver, or guide I could hire to get me the kind of places and people I wanted to see. No one offered Guilin photography tours. They were tours, but not photo tours. No one truly understood a photographer or was willing to provide the hours of service we need, and the drivers from Guilin city didn’t even know these places or roads. Even local friends in tourism, some starting to learn photography, had not been to what I consider now the most beautiful places in Guilin.

Therefore, my wife Mia and I started Guilin Photography Tours, and it’s become well known throughout China as an example in tour service excellence.

Guilin photography tour has served famous photographers such as Trey Ratcliff, Jim Harmer, Rick Sammon, Ken Koskela, Nick Page, diplomats, National Geographic photographers, and even run trips for select photo tour companies. We’ve guided Nikon, Canon, Fuji, and Olympus ambassadors, CEO’s, including some famous US social media founders.

What’s a Guilin Tour with Us Like?

Nick Page lead a workshop with us in Guilin, he’s a US-based workshop instructor and podcast host of Tripod, the best landscape photography podcasts on the planet! You can view his awesome photography here. When Nick returned home he surprised us by posting a synopsis of his Guilin trip on Youtube.

Nick’s video is a wonderful way to see and understand what a tour with us is like, be sure to give it a thumbs up and please thank Nick in the comments if you found it useful, I’m sure you will.

Nick was not paid, incentivized, upgraded, for this video.
Thanks so much for your time making the video Nick!

What Kind of People Take Our Photo Tours?

Our awards and focus on excellence, plus the fact all the pros hire us has caused many people to email us and ask, questions like… “I don’t have a tripod can I still take a tour with you?” or “I don’t have a DSLR, is that ok?”, and that’s totally fine!

Our photo guides are super friendly, picked for their character too. Our photo guides have lead everyone from top travel photographers to camera clubs,  from amazing workshop leaders like Jim Harmer to novices, including non-photographer travelers who just prefer to visit people and places that tourist seldom reach.

We have 3 types of photo guide level in China, so you can be sure you’ll to be matched with the best guide for your trip.

I’ll explain this shortly.

The Difference

Since starting our service just about every Chinese travel site has seemed to have knocked up a page about ‘Guilin photography tours’. Even camera carrying independent guides have popped up overnight as ‘pro‘ photographers, copying most of our site,  or using the name GPT, and lifting Mia’s writing, which she loves 😉

Our images, text, meta, have even been stolen by competitors. Even last week an image was put up on large Chinese tour operators website, as they create a ‘Guilin photography tour’, a tour they probably can’t operate, as a Beijing travel agent hiring local standard tour guides. Welcome to China, fake it until you make it sort off.

So a big thank you to everyone that’s taken the time to review us, blog, or share us on social media. It really helps people understand the difference in our service, heart, and passion for our client’s success.

Here’s what pros, enthusiasts, photo club leaders, and novices say about us…

Testimonials from the Worlds Top Photographers

Trey Ratcliff of Stuck In Customs 
“These guys are awesome, understand cameras and know all the cool places.”

Jim Harmer the founder of Improve Photography 
“I’ve worked with photo guides all over the world, but these guys are the best I’ve ever worked with!”

Rick Sammon “The Godfather of Photography” and author of 40 books
I can honestly say that Andy and Mia produce perhaps the best organized – and most fun – photo workshops I’ve seen in 30 years of traveling the planet. People want to know how much you care – before they care how much you know. From the moment Andy and Mia picked up our workshop group, it was evident that this dynamic knew their stuff – and cared, very much, about everyone meeting his or her goals. Their Guilin workshop was the best ever.”

Beyond Guilin

Today, Mia and I guide private photography tours and 1-1 and mini-workshops in Guilin, Yangshuo and the Longji Rice Terraces. We design and run China photography tours for individual clients, photo clubs, overseas photo tour operators, and the world’s leading photographers throughout China.

Our service, although it varies in photo guide types and levels, extends to China’s most photogenic places, such as Zhangjiajie and it’s Avatar inspired needle mountains, Yunnan’s tribes and rice terraces in the South West, and beyond to the mudflats of Xiapu.

Two years ago we also founded Gatsby Travel, a tour operator exclusively focused on photography tours. Today Gatsby is starting to offer trips to Myanmar, China, Vietnam, Mongolia and beyond.

Integrity

We have never given incentives or discounts for reviews, mentions or links. Every review, mention or video about our tours is organic, truthful and published because people were genuinely overwhelmed by our service.

Photo Tours for Social Exposure?

We get lots of requests for discounts if an Instagrammer, YouTuber, or blogger comes and travels with us, writes about us, however, we are a little crazy… and probably the only company we know that turns social exposure for discount away. Bloggers, social media moguls, and the world’s top photographers are full paying clients.

Why? So when you watch a video or read a review about Guilin Photography Tour, you can fully trust it.