The Quest Begins

Saturday was the start of the Yukon Quest dogsled race in downtown Fairbanks. For those of us who care about such things it is kind of like the superbowl of the local mushing scene. The Quest is a much more difficult race than more famous Iditarod. The lengths are about the same but the Quest has less support, less checkpoints, less of about everything except wilderness.

The start (and thus finish) alternate each year between Fairbanks and Whitehorse Canada. This year the start was in Fairbanks and the mushers will cross the finish line in Whitehorse after crossing 1000 miles of snowy and cold wilderness.

The start is also great fun to photograph. Some years I get a press pass for the backstage view, which is usually a much better option, but this year, I forgot about it until it was too late so was relegated to watching from the crowd side of thing. This allowed me to get a few different perspectives on the race. I got a few, like the one above, that is typical of mushing races. Though a fine shot it doesn't really tell much about the scene.

This second image was taken from the pedestrian bridge over the frozen Chena River. This perspective allows a different angle on the scene. It shows some of the crowd and, importantly, the sign indicating the start line. This one makes for an acceptable stock image, but again, isn't terribly unique.

This last image is my favorite from the morning and was completely serendipitous. I was trying to inch in and get some shots similar to the first one, when this woman in a bright red parka stepped right in front of me and raised her point and shoot to snap an image. I made lemonade from the situation, turned my focus on her camera and snapped this image.

Any thoughts?

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.

What?

Photography is often considered truth. What ends up in the image must have been in front of the camera, right? Well of course, digital photography has entirely changed that. But what happens when the image shows only the reality the photographer chose to portray, or the subject is unknown to the viewer? For example, is this image and the one below, a moonscape? A lava flow? Death Valley? A landscape from space? Or something else entirely?


My point is that truth is subjective. Common subjects can be hidden in their details and the truth can be hidden behind layers of unknowns.

So what are these images? Any one have any guesses?