Tag: Photo Tours

Barter Island Polar Bears 8

Barter Island Polar Bears 8

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This is another one of my favorite photos from my recent Polar Bear Photography Tour. I was standing next to the boat with my local Inupiat guide when this mom and cub came over to have a closer look at us. We very quickly got back in the boat, but not before I fired off a few pictures at 10fps with the Canon 1DmkIV that I borrowed from Canon Professional Services. The light was absolutely spectacular and for a moment these bears walked side by side allowing me to create this striking image. I hand-held the camera with my Canon 400mm f4 DO IS lens attached and used a right-angle view finder to get the camera as close to the ground as possible while kneeling. It is a single-exposure which was slightly cropped from the original and required minimal processing using Aperture 3 and Photoshop CS5.

Barter Island Polar Bears 1

Barter Island Polar Bears 1

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I have just returned from co-leading my first Polar Bear Photography Tour in Alaska. It was an incredible success! I created some fantastic images, but more importantly, so did my clients. I can’t wait to do it again next year. I’ll be updating my website this fall with information about next year’s tours, but if anyone is still interested in photographing the polar bears this year, my partner Steve Kazlowski is available in Alaska for clients. Please email me at for more information.

This was my first time photographing polar bears. I now understand how addictive photographing them can be. On the last day of my tour, I was able to photograph this mother and cub wrestling in the snow for an hour. It was incredible watching the cub continuously jump on or slide under it’s mom. Check out those mischievous little eyes staring at it’s mom right before it pounces. I was initially frustrated that they were farther away than I would normally like to shoot, but I pulled out all of my equipment in order to get in as tight as possible. I was on a boat which required me to hand-hold my Canon 7D with my 500mm f4 IS lens plus 1.4X tele-extender. That is equivalent to an 1120mm lens! I was able to freeze the action at 1/1000 second by setting my camera to ISO 800. This image is a single-exposure which was slightly cropped and required minimal processing using Aperture 3 and Photoshop CS5.

Humpback Whale Breach 103

Humpback Whale Photography Tour

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I’m teaming up with renowned underwater photographer Tony Wu to offer the ULTIMATE humpback whale photography adventure in 2012. The first half of our tour will begin in Southeast Alaska, where I have spent 5 years photographing humpback whales, followed by a two week break, and then finishing in the Kingdom of Tonga, where Tony has spent over 10 years photographing humpbacks. This is a unique, immersive experience to witness and photograph a wide range of humpback whale behaviors in two hemispheres.

Starting in Juneau, Alaska, we will use our expedition yacht and inflatable boats to photograph northern hemisphere humpback whales bubble-net feeding, breaching, and other behaviors. After our short break, we will regroup in Tonga for in-water encounters with southern hemisphere humpbacks where we’ll be looking for mothers with babies, singers, heat runs, mating, and other calving-related activities. Seeing the whales with your own eyes beats watching a TV documentary!

This trip is for a small, exclusive group of 6 guests who will be able to travel to both locations with guides Jon Cornforth and Tony Wu to photograph a wide range of humpback whale behaviors. Our core idea is to share a once-in-a-lifetime experience with the same 6 guests in order to provide the most comprehensive humpback whale photography opportunities. If someone is interested in only one part of this combined trip, we will automatically put them on our waitlist, but we will only fill single slots after we have prioritized spaces for guests interested in both trips.

For more information, please visit my Humpback Whale Photography Tour page.

Barter Island Polar Bears 8

Polar Bear Photography Tour

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This fall, renowned wildlife photographer Steve Kazlowski and I will be leading a polar bear photography tour in Arctic Alaska. Steve has been successfully photographing polar bears in this location for the past 13 years. His images have been published by Time and National Geographic and he is the author of The Last Polar Bear: Facing the Truth of a Warming World.

We will spend 3.5 days photographing polar bears during each of our tours. We will use locally-rented trucks to photograph the bears and there will be an optional boat adventure available working with local guides. We will have a maximum of 3 guests per vehicle. Our small group size will allow us to observe the bears and remain highly mobile. Plus, Steve & I will be able to provide personal photography advice that is impossible in larger tour groups. Our goal will be to photograph classic polar bear portraits and behaviors. At night, we will continue to photograph polar bears, but there is a possibility that we will also photograph the aurora borealis. This is an exciting trip that will allow the discerning photographer an incredible opportunity to photograph polar bears in Alaska.

For more information, please visit my Polar Bear Photography Tour page.

Laguna de los Tres Sunrise Clouds 3

Laguna de los Tres Sunrise Clouds 3

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During my recent trip to Patagonia, I was only able to see and photograph the amazing granite spires a few days due to the notorious weather. Most of my trip involved sitting around camp waiting for better conditions. It was not the most productive photography trip. However, when the weather was nice, it was amazing! In order to get to this fantastic viewpoint in time for sunrise, I had to hike over 2 miles and 1600′ vertical feet in the dark. On the morning that I photographed this scene, I could tell when I woke up at 3am that it was clear on the eastern horizon and discerned the silhouette of Mount Fitz Roy above camp to the west. Anticipation of an epic sunrise provided me with extra motivation during the hike up to Laguna de los Tres. I was not disappointed, because the clouds lit up with dramatic color while Mount Fitz Roy was bathed in alpenglow. This image was created using my Canon 5DmkII and Singh-Ray 3-stop Hard Graduated Neutral Density filter on a Carl Zeiss 21mm f2.8 ZE lens that Zeiss USA was kind enough to loan me for my trip. This image required minimal processing using Aperture 3.

Stovepipe Dunes Mud Sunset 1

Stovepipe Dunes Mud Sunset 1

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I just returned from leading a private photography tour in Death Valley National Park. I’ve spent a lot of time in this dramatic but desolate park the last few years, so it was nice to return to a place that I know so well. It was especially nice seeing the sun while missing the lousy weather back home in Seattle. I did not take a lot of photos during this trip because the shooting conditions never got epic, plus my attention was focused on working with my clients. What is important is that they had a great time and learned a lot from me. Most of my photography tours are done on a private basis, and include as much instruction as I can cram into a trip. The cost of working with me is higher per person compared to an instructor who leads a dozen people at a time, but my clients have me all to themselves. Please consider working with me if you are interested in pushing your photography to a new level.

This image is my favorite from the trip. My regular readers and fans might wonder, “why is this not some epic-light, wide-angle shot from some far off destination like Jon typically shoots?” I occasionally photograph abstract details and patterns, but they never sell or license compared to the “bigger” images that I am know for. Even though the clouds did not light up as I had hoped for at sunset, I used the twilight glow to add some red color to this intricate mosaic pattern of mud. I created this image using my Canon 5DmkII body and Carl Zeiss 50mm f1.4 ZE lens. It required minimal processing using Aperture 3.

Laguna Torre Cloudy Reflection 1

Laguna Torre Cloudy Reflection 1

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Each year, the summit of Cerro Torre eludes climbers from around the world mostly due to the atrocious weather. They most often spend weeks or even months tent-bound patiently waiting for the weather to clear, but it rarely does. My own experience trying to photograph Cerro Torre has been equally challenging. Between my first visit in 2007 and 2 visits during my recent trip, I’ve spent 8 days attempting to photograph it. If I had been at the lake the day before I created this image, I might now be sharing a sunrise picture of the mountain surrounded by beautiful orange clouds and a calm reflection. However, I hesitate to say that my recent attempts were totally unsuccessful, because I created this mysterious image. Though I could not see the summit at sunrise, an hour later the clouds became thin enough to allow the summit to peak through a hole while Laguna Torre was almost a perfect reflection. This image captures the drama of the typical conditions beneath this impossible spire more so than any image that I might have originally hoped to create. I am sure I will someday return to photograph Cerro Torre during a more ideal sunrise, but do I need to? I created this image with my Canon 5DmkII, Carl Zeiss 35mm f2 ZE lens, Singh-Ray 4-stop Soft Graduated Neutral Density filter, and tripod. It required minimal processing using Aperture 3.

Laguna de los Tres Sunrise 5

Laguna de los Tres Sunrise 5

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Located in the Southern Andes Mountains of Argentina and Chile, Patagonia boasts some of the most dramatic mountains on Earth, including Mount Fitz Roy, Cerro Torre, and the Torres del Paine. Unfortunately, Patagonia also receives some of the world’s worst weather. Clouds obscure the mountains for weeks or even months at a time. This consistently awful weather makes photography in the region a lesson in monotonous boredom and disciplined patience. One of my old climbing partners from Alaska was down there the entire month of January and never got a good weather window long enough to climb anything significant. Over the course of my own 3 week trip, I was only able to see the summits at sunrise on 4 days, 2 of which I did not shoot because I was exhausted and frustrated back in town for the night rather than camping close to my objectives.

I visited Patagonia for the first time in March of 2007. During that trip, I experienced my only major camera failure in 10 years as a professional photographer. I had been shooting startrails the night before walking up to Laguna de los Tres with my old Pentax 67II and had drained the batteries. I was not worried because I always carry a spare set of batteries with me, but after 1 weeks of waiting patiently for a clear sunrise, I discovered that my spare set was also dead! That camera failure haunted me for the last 4 years. Knowing how few opportunities I would have because of the weather, I made photographing Mount Fitz Roy from Laguna de los Tres my main objective for my recent trip.

From the town of El Chalten, I backpacked up to Campemento Poincenot and established my basecamp 3 different times. From there, I walked uphill over 2 miles and 1500′ in elevation each morning to this spectacular viewpoint. I camped a total of 7 nights, waiting for the right conditions. Most of the mornings the weather was windy, cold, and wet, but I still dragged my butt up hill 4 times. This is probably my favorite image from my trip. I really like how the dark clouds above the summits intensified the alpenglow illuminating the mountains. The light only lasted for about 12 minutes, which meant I finally had 12 minutes for photography after 1 week of travel! I created this image using my Canon 5DmkII and Singh-Ray 3-stop Hard Graduated Neutral Density filter on a Carl Zeiss 21mm f2.8 ZE lens that Zeiss USA was kind enough to loan me for my trip. This image required minimal processing using Aperture 3.

Chilkat Bald Eagle 227

Chilkat Bald Eagle 227

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“Whadya lookin’ at?” That is surely what this majestic bald eagle was thinking when it looked at me like this. The low-angle sunlight perfectly illuminated its breast while perched on this log, while the forest in the distance rendered as fantastic orange bokeh. Magnificent! Over the course of our time together, I photographed the occasional glare in my direction, but this picture with the curious tilt of the head was the most compelling. Notice how I left enough empty space above the eagle’s head so that a publisher could use this as a potential cover? I have to resist the urge to fill the entire frame. I used my Canon 7D and 500mm f4 IS lens to create this image.

Chilkat Bald Eagle 242

Chilkat Bald Eagle 242

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What my recent trip to Alaska lacked in eagles in action was more than made up for by cooperative eagles in beautiful light. I photographed hundreds of images of eagles waiting for a decisive moment to unleash a glaring stare or unrestrained call. Most of my best new images involve direct eye contact. I mostly deleted my images where the eagles were simply too complacent. This image resonated with me because the eagle’s stand-up attention made it appear noble and proud. However, this common anthropomorphization does not necessarily agree with their lazy and opportunistic nature. I created this image with my Canon 7D and 500mm f4 IS lens using minimal digital processing. For this photo, I precisely positioned my camera so as to render the distant snow-capped mountain, forest, and bushes as pleasing bokeh. I always advise photographers that, when using a long telephoto lens, what is behind the subject is just as important as the subject.