Glacier Hiding

Glaciers are almost always surrounded by clouds. Is it because the water vapor entering the air when ice melts? I think so. Nevertheless, parts of the mountains and ice revealed though holes in the clouds look mysterious and majestic at the same time.

This glacier lies some 20 minutes walk from the parking lot. Guess what? No tourists. This tells a lot about the contemporary tourism in Iceland. But I’m glad that we were finally alone.

Glacier Hiding

Glacier Hiding

Photographed with the Canon 5DS R and the Zeiss Apo Sonnar T* 2/135 using Kuuvik Capture. Yes, I lug a heavy backpack, a tripod and a 11″ MacBook Air with me all the time. Even if it’s a few kilometers walk. But since setting up a shot takes several minutes, it’s a must to pre-visualize what I’m going to do. Fortunately I have an app for that: the Mark II Artist’s Viewfinder.

Cloudy Highland Evening

Weather is ever changing in Iceland. The forecast said partly cloudy (my favorite) for the highlands, but during the two hours it takes to drive from Reykjavík to the southern end of Kjalvegur it had changed completely. So much that we had two drive literally in the clouds on the way back. Fortunately the cloudy weather combined with the rugged mountains could present some great photographic opportunities.

Cloudy Highland Evening

Cloudy Highland Evening

These kind of images with huge open sky over the landscape work really well with the immense resolution the Canon 5DS R and the Zeiss Otus 1.4/55 can deliver. Especially when printed large. While the eye can explore pleasing detail in the mountains, the large sky improves the feeling of being there. This is something I was unable to achieve with lower resolution images.

It was quite windy out there, so initial composition was made with the Mark II Artist’s Viewfinder from the comfort of the car. Focusing and exposure was done with Kuuvik Capture, and the car was used as a wind breaker. But despite this, I had to make several exposures since the fluctuating air can reduce sharpness when photographing distant objects with such a high resolution equipment.

Geysir – In a Different Way

I prefer to be alone (or with a few friends at most) when photographing. Which gets increasingly hard in Iceland. The number of tourists had already reached questionable levels, and the vast, empty land, one that you can roam for days without bumping to anyone seems to be a thing of the past. This really depresses me, so I might dedicate an entire post for the issue someday.

But a short-term mitigation is to go away from the crowd, simply acknowledging that some beauties of the country had been lost, and try to find those that escape the attention of the selfie-stick wielding masses.

Case in point. We spent the better part of the dawn at Geysir after the coolant leak discovery, and despite the early time of the day, quite a few real photographers (you know, the tripod-carrying type) and a dozen selfie-stick knights were surrounding Strokkur (the geyser that erupts every 10 minutes or so). So I walked around the colorful pools on the hillside, and wandered towards the geyser after which all other geysers in the world are named: Geysir. I’ve seen it erupting once 10 years ago, so who knows.

Geysír is Silent Now

Geysir is Silent Now

There was no eruption this time, but found something, a hidden treasure, that all others there at that morning blissfully ignored. It was kind of funny to see that I’m aiming my camera at the exact opposite direction of everyone else, a good 50m from the crowd… Maybe this is the key to survive photographically at this place at this time.

At the end, I’m very happy with this image of the sleeping giant. Made with the Canon 5DS R and Zeiss Apo Sonnar T* 2/135. Composition and focusing done in Kuuvik Capture.

Timeless Mountains

Mountains exist on a different time scale than we humans live our fleeting lives. Only if they could tell all those things they witnessed. Maybe that would be too much beauty and too much horror for us, and it’s better that they silently keep the planet’s secrets.

Timeless Mountains

Timeless Mountains

I wanted to wash away the lovely clouds to amplify the sense of timelessness, so I used a total of 16 stops of ND filtering: a LEE Big Stopper and a LEE Little Stopper stacked together (and sealed on the edge with gaffer tape to avoid light leaks and hot spots). It was a long trial and error to get enough sunlight on the mountain with the quickly changing cloud layers casting unwanted shadows here and there. I played for almost an hour, and the above image is the best one.

Taken with the Canon 5DS R and Zeiss Otus 1.4/28. Kuuvik Capture was used to control the long exposures.