It’s eye-opening to experience how my relation to Iceland evolves over time. I’m here for the fifth time, now spending the entire summer in the country, but haven’t seen the island for a decade. And it has changed a lot. And I also changed a lot.

It was hard to forget the Iceland I had in my fond memories and let myself see what’s in front of me. But once I began to free myself from the past, image making started to get rewarding again.

And the island is still capable of delivering great scenery, just in slightly different ways. Just like the one below.

Layers

This image was captured at a nice geothermal area – well, it was much better ten years ago, before an explosion wiped most of the features. But this time we went there chasing the reddish glow on the horizon, not the geothermal stuff.

Taken with the Canon 5DS R and Zeiss Apo Sonnar T* 2/135.

It’s not over until it’s over – this is a golden truth in photography. We were driving the whole afternoon for nothing. It rained, and the waterfall at our original destination wasn’t in its top shape. But on the way home we literally ran into this majestic scene. Took roughly 50 frames, exploring different compositions, and couldn’t be happier with the results.

Dark Mountains

Captured with the Canon 5DS R with the Zeiss Apo Sonnar T* 2/135 lens. Yes, one must bring a telephoto to Iceland.

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

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.

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.

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.