Not My Image: Patrick Endres

Patrick Endres is one of my favorite photographers of the Alaskan landscape. Add to that, he is a prolific Fairbanks local whose images, rich in color and depth, pop up all over the place. Though a generalist nature photographer, shooting everything from wildlife to people to landscapes, it is my opinion that Patrick does his best work when shooting dramatic mountain scenery. The image above is one of my favorites of his. He made it while shooting quickly in Prince William Sound. (Read his blog entry detailing the shot HERE).

I like the image because of the limited color. It primarily consists of tones of gray and blue. The image has excellent depth and most importantly tells a great story of the stark post-glacial landscape. It seems this shot could have been made in almost any year of earth's history, and I like that.

Additionally Patrick has a great blog where he discusses everything about Alaska photography, if you want to learn something from one of the best of Alaska's photographers, I encourage you to check it out HERE.

I'm looking forward to gleaning what I can from his this winter as we both work as guides on a Cheeseman's Ecology Safaris trip to Antarctica and the Southern Ocean. I'll be headed that direction shortly after Christmas.

Skiing Shoot

Canon EOS 7D, 500mm f4L, f4.0, 1/500th second, ISO 400, Exposure compensation: +0.17, tripod mounted.

An acquaintance of mine, an Olympic hopeful in cross-country skiing asked me to take some photos of him this weekend. He was looking for some decent looking action shots to send to his sponsors and get printed into posters to hand out at races. As it turns out, there is a lot more to going for the Olympics than just training and being fast on skis. There is a lot networking, and creating buzz.

So I met Tyson Flaharty and his wive Davya on Saturday afternoon. It was overcast which made for less than dramatic lighting, but at least the exposure was easy to judge without the sunlight creating too much contrast. There are a few hurdles to this kind of work. First it was reasonably cold, with the mercury sitting right around zero. That means that my batteries would not hold their charge nearly as long as on a warm day. To compensate for that I often pulled the battery out of the camera and put it in my pocket when we were moving from spot to spot, or as I was waiting for Tyson to get ready for another shoot.

The second issue with the cold is that, once outside, I couldn't take my equipment back indoors until the end of the shoot. Why? you ask. Simple: condensation. Just like a cold glass of beer sweating in a hot room, had I taken my cold camera and lenses indoors they would have fogged up and frosted over like an ice cube. (Tip: You can put your equipment in a plastic ziplock bags to keep this from happening, if you ever need to go in and out a lot during a cold shoot).

The last hurdle was the shoot itself. As I already mentioned the lighting was flat, but easy to expose for. I pushed the exposure about a stop to bring the snow to near white, but retaining texture and keeping texture in Tyson's black clothes. I nailed almost every exposure, it was easy. I shot primarily two lenses, my 70-200 f2.8L, and my 500mm f4L. We were shooting on forested ski trails so making Tyson pop out from the background required a very shallow depth of field. I shot wide open at ISO 400. I think I had better success with the 500 because of its extremely narrow depth of field. the background in the image above blurs nicely. It retains enough information to see that it is forest, but not enough to distract from Tyson.

Skiing, as any fast-paced sport is tough to shoot. Focus distances are constantly shifting and getting sharp images requires a fast autofocus and/or perfect timing. The 7D did well in this regard, it kept up with Tyson as he accelerated toward me and most shots are sharp. The image quality at ISO 400 suffered somewhat, a bit noisy which reduced some sharpness, but the results are acceptable.

As winter is here with a vengeance (it is now -22F as I write this) there will likely be more of this kind of thing to come. Mushing and ski season are underway!

Not My Image: NASA- (the merging of science and art)

Image by NASA of the center of the Milky Way Galaxy compiling photos from the Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes and the Chandra Observatory

I found this image today on one of my favorite non-photography blogs: "Bad Astronomy" written by Dr. Phil Plait. I'm not really much of an astronomy buff, (though I do like to stare at the night sky for long periods of time), but Dr. Plait's blog is an excellent and highly readable mix of skepticism, science and trivia.

I selected this image for today's Not My Image feature because, I mean, really, like....wow. Soooo cool. This is a photo composite of the center of our milky way taken by three very different telescopes: the Hubble, Spitzer and Chandra. I won't go through the details, if you are curious about them you can read all about it on Bad Astronomy right HERE.

I will tell you what I like about it. Most importantly is what I mentioned in the title: It is a true merging of art and science. This image will be as interesting to a single-minded scientist with hardly a neuron firing on the right side of his brain as it will be to an artist, writer or photographer. The photo is full of mystery and questions, history and future, violence and incredible beauty, and... {stutters to a stop}.

I mean, really, like...wow...

Another Moose Image

Canon 7D, 70-200 f2.8L IS @ 200mm, 1/100th sec, f2.8, ISO 800, +.25 Exposure Compensation

I mean really, can you actually have too many images of a moose?

This is another from the series made a while back. It is a bit different perspective, though I was still trying to tell the same story as the image I previously posted. In short: Moose live in dense brush and are surprisingly hidden for huge animals. I also like the clearly winter aspect of the scene. One thing I prefer about this image is that the animal is not facing me directly. In wildlife photography, a little eye contact can create some visual tension which is good, but what it means is that the animal was aware of you, and more importantly, paying attention to you. That, is not good. In the previous image, I was a obtrusive and influencing the animal's natural behavior which is generally to be avoided. This image shows the moose paying me no mind, merely looking around its habitat (at the other moose that was there actually). In this shot, there is no evidence aside from the image itself that I was even there. Wildlife photographers should be that way, invisible except for our vision of the scene.

Katmai Bear Fight

Canon 40D, 500mm f4L IS, 1/1000th @ f4.5, ISO 100, -2/3 exposure compensation.

I've been meaning to post this image for some time, but just haven't gotten around to it. This is one of my favorite shots from this past summer. I made it during a National Geographic Expeditions trip I was leading in July. The highlight of the trip (at least for me) is a short day trip out to Brooks Falls in Katmai National Park. Brooks is THE place to watch bears, which also, and unfortunately, makes it a very popular place. There are lots of tourists and people management instead of wildlife management seems to be the main chore of the park rangers. Nonetheless, it is a great place for photography. If your timing is right, the bears are plentiful, close, and very easy to photograph. I've seen point-and-shooters emerge from Brooks Falls with enviable images. Visit if you get the chance, it won't be a solitary experience, but you'll enjoy it.

I made this image from the lower platform at the falls. This is the spill-over platform and is usually much less crowded. I actually prefer it to the upper platform for photography because the perspective is lower and behavior is easier observe. These two sub-adult bears were bickering over a fishing spot and my location provided a great angle on the action. None of the photogs lining the railing on the upper platform could get this kind of shot.

I'd like to say this took some huge amount of skill to attain, but really it didn't. It was a matter of being in the right place at the right time and knowing my camera well enough to focus and compose quickly. In fact, let that be today's lesson:

Know Your Camera: To work fast in changing light or action, you must know the controls of your camera backwards and forwards and in the dark (literally). You should be able to operate all you camera's settings without removing your eye from the view-finder. Can you change the ISO, the f-stop and shutter speed without looking at your fingers? If not, spend some time with your camera learning where everything is located. It will speed you up when you need it, because in wildlife, portrait, and even to a certain extent, landscape photography, things move quickly. You must too.

Not My Image: Alex Badyaev

Today, I launch a new feature here on the Wild Imagination Journal. I'm going to call it simply: Not My Image. That way there will be no mistaking these for mine, not that I think you'll be confused. The purpose of these occasional posts will be to share work of some of the photographers whom I admire and take inspiration.

I can think of no photographer I'd rather honor with this first post than Alex Badyaev. He is, in my opinion, one of the finest wildlife photographers...period. His work is absolutely beautiful, simultaneously showing behavior and place, combined with exquisite composition. He is an evolutionary biologist by trade, a professor of biology at the University of Arizona. And that makes his work even more outstanding: Photography isn't even his job! His expertise and knowledge about wildlife allow him a perspective rarely found in images of animals. Alex's technical expertise is also out of this world, incredible light, depth of field, composition, and focus. Take a few minutes, or longer, to browse his mind-blowing galleries and you'll understand what I'm talking about.

Find his site here: Ten Best Photos.

Return of the Night

Canon 7d, Sigma 30mm f1.4, 56 seconds, f1.4, (Bulb setting) ISO 400

I captured this image a few weeks ago on my very first night with Canon 7D. Night imagery is tricky in the digital world because the longer the shutter speed the more noise is generated. This image at 56 seconds is pushing it, but with acceptable results. The haze is from approaching clouds which were catching the lights of Fairbanks a few miles to the south of where I made the image on my property.

Winter is a difficult time of year for photography in Alaska. Conditions can be brutally cold, which is hard on equipment, hands and the rest of us. But the rewards can be great. Even close to Fairbanks we have superb sky watching, some of the best in fact. The aurora can rise in green curtains without warning and disappear just as quickly. I have relatively few images of the aurora, and once again, on the night I made this image it was absent yet again. I'll continue to keep my eyes on the sky this winter, and hopefully I come up with some images to share.

Oh, it's clear, full moon and -5 out as I write this. Welcome winter!