It’s 11 days until I head back to Iceland to run our annual winter workshop with Daniel Bergmann. So, thought I would post an Iceland image today. A lot of people shoot this image as it is at a well know overlook. I couldn’t help myself though as I post mine.
Ok, I’m not one for the iconic image of a place but I must confess I shot it. It was crazy when taking this photo. It was made from a bridge just a short walk from the hotel – cabins we were staying in. The bridge must have had 50 photographers on it all shooting the same things. I absolutely hate that. i don’t like being where there are other photographers. It disturbs to no end. Seems everyone wants the same shot and here I was just as bad as them. So, enjoy the photo but know I feel bad about putting up an image so many other have done.
As you can probably tell I really enjoyed Lofoten except for the fact that there were too many other photographers there. Everyone that I encountered were trying to make iconic images as they must have seen on websites. except for a few instances, I wanted to see things differently. Thus I tried a lot of long exposure and I looked for patterns and things in the landscape. This image was made to show depth of field in the foreground with small details and to then allow the rocks and surf to become part of the image too. I used a new filter system by Wine Country to handle the ND filters I used. I’ll be doing a review on this system in the next few weeks. Hope you enjoy this image.
One of the things every photographer hopes for when visiting the northern latitudes is the opportunity to see the Northern Lights. I was fortunate enough to have a few great opportunities on my recent Lofoten Norway trip. These lights are tricky to shoot. If you are a photographer you’ll find that first, you need to set your lens to infinity. This is not easy with most of today’s lenses. I use a 14mm Rokinon lens that has an infinity stop. I know just how far to back off the infinity mark to get a sharp image. If you are using a lens that doesn’t have an infinity stop you’ll need to manually focus it on infinity then tape the lens down so the focus ring doesn’t move. You’ll set the camera’s ISO to 3200 and the widest f-stop. No depth of field needed when shooting something at infinity. I start my first exposure at 8 seconds and I turn on noise reduction. This adds an additional 8 seconds after the exposure is made but assures a cleaner image. You can’t use a histogram so you’ll have to make a judgment call from the screen on the back of the camera to determine if you need more or less exposure. If is too dark raise your ISO. Don’t shoot over 8 seconds if you can help it. I find an exposure of 4-8 seconds to be great for most lights. You’ll get the hang of it pretty quickly. Then all you do do is shoot away as the sky puts on a show that will amaze you.
I just returned from nearly two weeks in Lofoten, Norway. It was an interesting trip. I was an instructor along with Art Wolfe and Ignacio Palacios with 18 photographers. The weather was challenging and even more challenging were all the other photographers. I am really re-thinking how I do my workshops in the future as there are so many photographers offering workshops these days and all of them are going to the same places. I am asking myself why. I used to have a spot to myself and now there can literally be 50 plus photographers all trying to get to one position. Add on to that the boom in Asian tourists who have no clue and walk right into the shots and it’s not getting to be any fun anymore. In any case, I walked away with a series of images that are different than most and then again like the image above iconic like everyone else. So over the coming days look for more Lofoten images.
I discovered a new place in April of 2016 while running a workshop with Art Wolfe and Ignacio Palacios. In northern Chile on the border with Bolivia, there is a region of great beauty called the Atacama. It’s got some incredible landscapes and great skies. We photographed both in Chile and Bolivia, sometimes at altitudes of 16,000 feet. This is one from the series of images I made. More to come.
One of my favorite places to photograph in America is the Palouse. It’s not crowded with tourists and it is all about the landscape and big sky. The landscapes are big and broad and many time can be shot with a long lens like this shot. As the sun peeks around the clouds interesting shadows are cast and as the sun gets lower at the end of the day you get these beuatiful defining shadows of the gentle rolling hillsides. I am doing 2 private 4 person workshops there this summer.
Patagonia is all it is said to be. I wasn’t expecting such beautiful mountains. Throw in amazing light for every day we were there and you can’t walk off without making great images. I will most likely lead a workshop to this region again in 2018. Stay tuned.
I was in Iceland shoot a very big waterfall. I love waterfalls and I am sure by now you know how much I love Iceland. After I shot the bigger waterfall I but my long lens on the Fuji-Xt2. It has the reach of a 600mm lens on a full frame camera. I started to explore at the longest focal lengths different parts of the waterfall. I used a 1/2 to 1-second exposure to shoot what I found. This was one of those shots.
I use many tools when I travel. One of these is the in air app. At the end of each year, they send me a video that shows all my air travel. I watch this and remember all the flights, delays, airports and once I got there the fun.