In this paper, the application of laser speckle photography in study of convective heat transfer is presented in detail. Six kinds of experimental system of laser speckle photography and two methods of reconstruction of specklegram are proposed. The measurement principles and the formulas of experimental data processing for determination of two dimensional and axisymmetric temperature fields by using laser speckle photography are described. For illustration, the laser speckle photography has been used to study heat transfer of natural convection thermal boundary layer on a heated isothermal vertical flat plate and that between two heated vertical plates. The natural convection cooling of a heated vertical strip has also been studied by laser speckle photography. The experimental results are in good agreement with recognized theoretical analyses.