The recent trip I took to Svalbard was a great place to shoot many types of images. We did a landing one day on shore at an old marble mine. It was a great place to shoot old building as well as lots of rust. This image was made of an old crane used to load boats. I liked the rust as well as the color of the background. This was made with a Nikon D800E and a 24-70mm lens.
While in Svalbard, Norway we visited an old mining outpost. I was in heaven as there was rust galore. If you are a follower of my blog you’ll know how much I love rust. So, here is the first of a number of rusty images from Svalbard. Made with a Phase One IQ180.
While in Salvbard, Norway we landed our zodiacs in an area that used to be an old marble mine. I always love these abandoned areas as I travel around the world. I’ll find rust, decay and all sorts of cools things to shoot that are not necessarily and landscape but in reality are. There were several huts here and this image is the side of one hut with a table. I liked the two mention feel and balance of the table with the window. Shot with a Phase One IQ180.
I am going to switch things up a bit and move away from fall colors and head back north to Norway. This image was made this past August in Svalbard, Norway. It was shot from the ship while we were at anchor. I selected a square format and put very little land and water in the image as it was they sky that was so beautiful. Shot with a Nikon D800E and 8-400mm lens.
I saw this while we were cruising in Zodiacs along a face of a glacier in Svalbard, Norway. This shows sediments that over the ages has seeped into the glacier. I loved the stark contrast.
This shot was made in Svalbard Norway on my recent Arctic Adventure. we were cruising this bay where a few glaciers were ending. Also, we were searching for Polar Bears. When we cruised by tis piece of ice in our Zodiacs, I had to ask the driver to go around a time or two. I finally saw the image in my viewfinder and fired away. I think I captured the essence of the iceberg as well as the big glacier behind it with the kind of light that we were experiencing at the moment. I really like this one.
This is a shot from far away showing the from of the ice cover (ice Pack) on an Island of Svalbard. This is massive and goes all the way to the horizon. Look closely (click to enlarge) and see all the waterfalls coming off of the ice. Quite an amazing experience to see this.
What amazes me about both Polar regions is the amount of wildlife that lives there. In the Arctic we ran across walruses quite often. One of them even sunk one of our beached Zodiacs. These are animals that are giants. Best known for the tusks. This shot was a lucky one for me as I caught it right after it raised its head from the water. I love the water dripping off the tusks. Shot with A Nikon D7100 and 80-400 lens which turned out to be the ideal set up for this kind of shooting.
I am now back in Svalbard, Norway after 10 days at sea. No internet, email or cell phones. Lots of amazing things. I traveled to latitude 82.34 degrees on the MV Quest exploring the Arctic. I have come back with an amazing set of images and the above shot is the first of many that will grace my blog. One of the biggest experiences was going farther north in our ship than has ever been done before. This is because the ice pack is shrinking. You read all about it and yes when you are there you can see things are changing very rapidly. This image today symbolizes a lot of what I see happening. It’s putting the Polar Bear on the edge. They have no connection to land as the ice pack has moved so far north. Here is a bear literally at the edge of the ice pack. I think it sums it up very well. I’ll have more images over the coming days and weeks.