Landscape Photos, Pictures, Prints

Gesellschaft Deutscher Tierfotografen 2010 Interview

Posted on July 14, 2010 February 8, 2018

I was recently interviewed by the Gesellschaft Deutscher Tierfotografen (Society of German Nature Photographers). Previously interviewed photographers include Andy Rouse, George and Verena Popp, Norbert Rosing, and Kevin Schafer. My interview is currently featured in their triannual magazine Forum Naturfotografie. It spans 14 pages and showcases 12 of my favorite photographs. The double page opener is my image “East Pond Vent 1”, taken in Volcanoes National Park in Hawaii. You can view the entire article here, however, it is in German.

Be social and share.

Jokulsarlon Icebergs Sunrise 5

Posted on July 12, 2010 December 8, 2012

My regular readers will have noticed that I am a big fan of shooting wide-angle landscape images and seldom use a telephoto lens other than for wildlife photography. I enjoy discovering patterns in nature with a medium telephoto lens, but I prefer to shoot grand and dramatic scenes. I also think that it is technically more challenging. This iceberg detail and reflection picture from Jokulsarlon is a notable recent exception. The blue color of the ice comes from the density of the ice absorbing all the colors of the spectrum, except blue which is reflected. Photographing blue ice is best in overcast conditions, of which I had plenty.

Be social and share.

Jokulsarlon Icebergs Sunrise 2

Posted on July 8, 2010 December 8, 2012

During my trip to Iceland, I visited the spectacular Jokulsarlon 5 different nights over 2 weeks hoping to photograph an epic midnight sunset. On the night that I finally created this image, the magic light had threatened to overwhelm the clouds for several hours. I don’t remember how I occupied my time for the next hour, but by 2:45am I was set up and ready to photograph the sunrise light when it briefly radiated underneath the heavy clouds and illuminated the mountains above the iceberg choked lagoon.

Be social and share.

Seattle Met June 2010 Hiking Opener

Posted on July 8, 2010 December 8, 2012

My image “Spray Park Wildflowers 1” is featured as the double page opener of the hiking feature in the June 2010 issue of Seattle Met. Spray Park is my favorite alpine location at Mount Rainier National Park and is the closest side of the mountain to my home in Seattle. During the brief summer hiking season, I depart my house in the early afternoon, drive for about 3 hours, and hike the 3 miles up to the wildflower meadows to photograph the sunset. It is both a blessing and a curse if the wind is not blowing, a blessing because the fields of lupine and paintbrush are not blowing around in the wind, but a curse because of the swarms of blood-thirsty mosquitoes that rival any that I have seen in Alaska or Canada. Spray Park is higher than Paradise on the south side of the mountain, so the wildflowers peak about 1 week later, typically mid-August. Based on the cold summer that we are having, I estimate that the wildflowers are going to be a little late this year, which is similar to the year that I created this image during the last week of August.

Be social and share.

Brennisteinsalda Steam Vents 1

Posted on July 7, 2010 December 8, 2012

I’ve been editing my images from my trip to Iceland the last few days. My regular readers might recall that I was complaining about the dreary weather the entire trip. Just because the conditions are miserable does not mean that there weren’t any photos to be had. Due to my years of photographing Alaska, I am adept at shooting in cloudy conditions. While the general public is happy with blue skies (as I am about to enjoy myself this afternoon), the light that I need to create dramatic photographs requires being willing to work in less than inspiring conditions. For example, consider this image of the Brennisteinsalda steam vents. I created it at the end of a cloudy day in Landmannalaugar when there was no sunset light. I experimented by taking over 200 images of the steam emanating from the ground in order to capture the steam pattern and dark clouds in this the decisive moment.

Be social and share.

Blahnukur Sunset 9

Posted on June 30, 2010 December 8, 2012

As my regular readers will note, I experienced mostly gloomy weather during my trip to Iceland. While the bad weather did nothing to overcome my Seasonal Affective Disorder, it did provide me with some incredible lighting conditions for landscape photography. The highlight of my trip was camping and shooting for 4 days at Landmannalaugar. I was disappointed that the colorful hills were covered in ash from the recent eruption of Eyjafjallajökull, but their was still plenty of spectacular scenery to shoot everywhere I looked. I explored the main hiking trails from the campground and became particularly enchanted with the geothermal steam vents at the base of Brennisteinsalda. I returned to this surreal location 2 nights in a row and was rewarded with this dramatic image when the clouds parted and the sun illuminated the summit of Blahnukur in golden light.

Be social and share.

Barmur Sunset 5

Posted on June 29, 2010 December 8, 2012

Before I went to Iceland, I researched some of the locations that I intended to shoot, but had not paid that much attention to Landmannalaugar (pronounced Land-mann-a-loi-ger). This fantastic location, 4 hours from Rekjavik in the interior of Iceland, was a pleasant surprise. Fortunately, the 4WD road had just opened the week before my visit. After driving the final 40 off-road kilometers, two shallow river beds (with a rental car!) were the final obstacles between me and the scenic beauty that I was about to experience. I always try to get to a new location early enough to scout the area because I don’t like to be rushed, but it was definitely time to shoot once the car was parked. The sky was full of perfect cotton-candy clouds and the sun danced across the jaw-dropping scenery. I grabbed my camera gear and quickly set out to explore the river bed to the east of the campground. Within a half-hour of my arrival, I focused my attention on this composition to create this image.

Be social and share.

Jokulsarlon Beach Sunset 2

Posted on June 28, 2010 December 8, 2012

I’ve been intending to add some new images from my trip to Iceland, but have had a lot going on the last week. I was pretty underwhelmed by the photos that I’d seen of icebergs stranded on the beach in front of Jokulsarlon before my trip, so this location was not a priority for me to shoot. I scouted this location a few times in the middle of the night, but the clouds and light were terrible. I either did not shoot any pictures or deleted most of them once I got home. However, I created this surprisingly beautiful photograph at 12:30am on my last night at Jokulsarlon. I love the color that the clouds reflected from the midnight sun. This translucent piece of ice made a nice foreground, as well as the repetition patterns of the larger icebergs behind it. This was also as dark as it got during my entire 15 day visit, which was great for shooting but not for sleeping.

Be social and share.

Jokulsarlon Icebergs Sunrise 1

Posted on June 16, 2010 December 8, 2012

My regular readers know that I just returned from my 2nd trip to the beautiful but stark country of Iceland. I had previously visited Iceland in 2001 when I was beginning my photography career but had not yet mastered the camera. I had several regrets from that 1st trip, so it was nice to put them to rest. Shooting conditions where incredibly difficult due to the constant cloudy weather. Also, because it is summer in the Arctic, the sun barely dipped below the horizon between 12-3am. This made for long nights of shooting, which required me to sleep during the day. I started to appreciate the demanding schedule of vampires. One of the locations that I was determined to photograph was Jokulsarlon. This spectacular lagoon is choked with icebergs that have calved off of the Breidamerkurjokull glacier. Is is an abstract photographer’s dream. I created this atmospheric image when the sunrise light briefly illuminated the tops of the thin layer of clouds at 3am.

Be social and share.

Alaska Airlines June 2010 Cover

Posted on May 28, 2010 December 8, 2012

I am pleased to share my latest publishing accomplishment. My “Paradise Wildflowers” image from Mount Rainier National Park is the June 2010 cover on Alaska Airlines! This is also my 2nd cover with them this year. This picture is my all-time most successful art print and has been licensed numerous times since I created it in 2003. Most of my regular readers will know that I shot all of my landscape images up until last year with a Pentax 67 system. One of the challenges of that system was that I had limited depth-of-field compared to a 35mm system. In order to overcome that limitation, I created this image with Toyo 4×5 view camera, a Rodenstock 65mm large format lens, and a Horseman 6×9 roll film back. (Did I lose you, yet?) With the large format camera, I tilted the lens so that the flowers would be close to the camera while keeping the summit of Mount Rainier in focus. I also used my Singh-Ray Warming Polarizer and 2-stop Hard Graduated Neutral Density filter with Fuji Velvia film. I think that the exposure was about 10 seconds at f32, which is a life-time when waiting for a slight breeze to stop rustling the wildflowers. Now when I photograph flower landscapes like this, I use my Canon 5DmkII with a wide-angle lens with camera settings more like f16, 1/4 second, and 200 ISO. Since this was the first image that I ever took with my 4×5, I was still learning how to use it that morning. I mentioned that I used a 6×9 roll film back. All of my images that I shot were the 6×9 format except for 1 frame that overlapped the frame before it. That image perfectly cropped itself in the camera to 6×7 which is my favorite photo that you see here. Beginners luck?

Be social and share.