The Terra Galleria Blog – QT Luong

The May 20 2012 solar eclipse was to be an “annular eclipse”, which occurs when the Moon passes directly in front of the sun, but the lunar disk is too far from the earth to cover the entire sun. This leaves a “ring of fire” with the full brightness of the sun around the black circle formed by the moon. Although not as impressive as a total eclipse, in which the moon covers the entire surface of the sun, it is still a pretty impressive and rare event. Last time it happened over the USA was 18 years ago.

The “annularity path” in which the moon passes entirely in front of the sun, creating a ring, was a strip of about 300km wide, starting in Asia, and ending near Lubbock, in Western Texas. Only right on the center of the path is the moon perfectly centered over the sun at the eclipse’s maximum. Outside the path, the eclipse is partial, resulting in a crescent sun. I was initially planning to photograph the eclipse in Lassen National Park, which is almost perfectly centered, and a reasonable driving distance from San Jose.

However, a few days before the event, as I began to do more research, I realized that Lassen National Park would not work for the images that I had pre-visualized. Although the photographs would be made in a National Park, they would fall short of my goal to create landscape images that include the eclipse, rather than astronomical images. Using the NASA mapping tool, I noticed that the sun would be quite high (20 degrees elevation) and bright in the sky, as the maximum of the eclipse there would be at 6:30, two hours before sunset.

Observing the sun that high, you have to take serious precautions to protect your eyes (and cameras). You basically need a neutral density filter of about 14 f-stops which can absorb IR as well. After doing a quick test with such a filter – actually a stack of a Lee Big Stopper (10 f-stop) and a Hi-Tech (4 f-stop) – at 6:30 pm in San Jose, I found that the brightest exposure which did not overexpose the sun to be f8.0 1/250 at 100 ISO. At such an exposure, the sky is pitch black. It is underexposed by a massive 12 f-stops. So even in a composition with a silhouetted landmark – forget about trying to get detail in the landscape – would require a considerable amount of compositing and processing just to un-merge the silhouette from the sky. One could try HDR but at 12 EV difference and with the sun high in the sky, there is no real connection between the foreground and the sun, so you might as well clone in the sun, which results in an image which, no matter how interesting it would be, screams artificiality to me.

The solution for was to travel to West Texas, where the maximum of the eclipse would occur shortly before sunset,so it can be exposed properly while retaining color in the sky. At that time, the sun is much less bright. Equally important, it is closer to landforms, which make it possible to photograph the sun together with land using a telephoto lens, which fills more of the frame with the sun. In keeping with the project that’s occupied me for almost twenty year, I wanted to photograph in a National Park. Grand Canyon was in the annularity path, but the sun would be at a fairly high 10 degrees elevation, and the Canyon landforms are in a hole in the ground, rather than sticking out in the sky. I settled on Guadalupe Mountains National Park, although it is about 50 miles south of the annularity area. This meant that I settled down for a strange crescent rather than the “ring of fire”. Booking airfare on a short notice can be very expensive, but I was able to redeem air miles on United Airlines for a flight to El Paso, Texas.

After packing past midnight, I caught an early morning flight. Because I had to walk more than a mile with more than 40lbs of camera gear – fortunately airlines don’t weight carry-on bags in the US – during the connection in Phoenix International Aiport, I didn’t have time to buy a sandwich there. After getting one in El Paso, since I was eating while driving, to save time I declined to stop for groceries in town, thinking that on the 130 miles to Guadalupe Mountains National Park, I’d find some. It turned out that the area was more remote than I remembered from my last visit a decade ago. I had to make a significant detour to Dell City – there is no food in the Park – but there I found only a tiny store with not much provisions suitable for a vegetarian. I bought the last pack of cheese available. They didn’t even have bananas. I arrived in the Park in the late afternoon, one day before the eclipse, and started to scout.

I had envisioned images of the sun setting near the profile of El Capitan, this prominent landmark of West Texas, however I immediately understood that working from Hwy 62/180 east of the park would not do. The road was too close to El Capitan (therefore preventing the use of a telephoto), and also too low to catch the setting sun. The main difficulty was that El Capitan has a fairly broad shoulder on its south side, which would block the sunset unless one would stand several miles away. Near sunset time, I hiked to a high viewpoint, and from there observed which points of the surrounding rugged land caught the last light. The next day, I hiked to the most promising of those points for the whole morning, following industrial dirt roads before scrambling on outcrops. For each of them, I mapped the location on a topographic map using my GPS, then used the Photographer’s Ephemeris App to predict where the sun would set, which allowed me to calculate the longest focal length that I could use to include both the eclipse and the profile of El Capitan. As it was getting hot and my water supplies were almost depleted, I returned to the car and drove to White City (“City” is another misnomer) to look for food and continue planning in the shade.

The choice between the two top locations was difficult. One of them would allow me to work with a longer lens. I picked the other one, because the sun would set later from there. I had traveled all the way to West Texas so that the eclipse would occur near sunset ! I figured it out that I would make the best of the situation by setting up two time-lapse sequences, one with a wider view (65mm) including El Capitan (which would capture a longer portion of the eclipse), the other with a narrow view (400mm) focused on the setting sun, and a distant ridge. I loaded my backpack with three cameras, two tripods, and an assortment of lenses, and arrived on site half an hour before the start of the eclipse.

Close to sunset time, the sun at first glance may look like a crescent moon, but such a configuration is of course impossible with the moon. The contrast was low enough that some single-capture frames look good in video (and at web resolution), although I’ve yet to see if I can produce a smooth complete time-lapse movie. However, I wasn’t satisfied with them as stills, for which I wanted the potential to make prints. For the wide sequence, I didn’t get the optimal exposure, due the difficulty of adjusting for the considerably changing brightness of the sun over one hour as it went from blindingly bright to dim as approached the horizon, compounded by the distraction of juggling with two cameras. In the last minutes before the sun disappeared behind the ridge, the shutter speed was not high enough, which resulted in some blurring of the crescent’s edge. At that time the crescent was dim enough to easily observe directly with your own eyes, but the Canon 5D mk2/3 cameras have a much more limited dynamic range than eyes. Even with sky underexposure, there was no color detail left in the sun crescent, which was reduced to pure white. Moreover, brightening the sky by 1.5 f-stops resulted in annoying pattern noise, even at ISO 320, certainly a persistent weakness of Canon cameras – especially compared to Nikon that I’ve been eying since.

I decided to make a digital composite instead of adjusting a single-frame capture. For the landscape and sky, I used a frame taken just right after sunset with a better exposure. The sun was from a frame that I had captured a few minutes earlier using a different camera, and then scaled down and positioned to match the single-frame capture of that moment. Personally, I think that although it is a composite, it is truthful enough to what you’d see if standing on the edge of that plateau on the evening of May 20, 2012. What about you ? Would you have preferred the purity of the single-capture frame, or the better image quality of the digital composite ?

Part 1 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Using his technical mastery in the darkroom to create distinctively beautiful prints, Ansel Adams considered print quality to be the hallmark of his work. However, Adams also developed early in his career a great familiarity with other forms of photographic reproductions, working diligently with publishers to create books that would meet his standards. Not only his prints are amongst the most beautiful made in the chemical medium, his books feature also some of the highest quality reproductions of photography in ink produced at the time of their publication.

Ranked consistently as one of the most popular photographers of the 20th century, Adams reached most of his audience through books. By 1979, more than a million of them had been sold. Even without taking into account instructional books, there are still several dozens of books of his photography. In this post, I survey those books currently in print (as of 2012). The next post will survey Ansel Adams instructional & autobiographical books.

With the exception of the first two books, all these titles were published after Ansel Adams passing in 1984. Adams had found in the 1970s a commercial publisher whose printing standards he was at least pleased with, Little, Brown & Co. Consequently, they were given exclusivity, which is continued today by the Ansel Adams Publishing Rights Trust. Most of the books follow a well-proven format. The book opens with a critical introduction, often written by John Szarkowski, the most influential photography curator of recent times, by William Turnage, the man responsible for Adams success in the marketplace – which did not come until he reached his 70s, or another trustee such as collaborator Andrea Stillman. Adams own writings are then represented either by a preface from an older book, or some other selected writings relevant to the subject of the book. The book designs are classical and clean, with no image cut by the gutter, and text limited to captions or short Adams citations. Reproductions are consistently good, but yet some are still better than others.

Sierra Nevada: The John Muir Trail

Although released in 1938 in an edition of only 500 copies, it is one of the most important Adams books. Adams first landscape photography book, published at the peak of his creative powers, was called a “landmark” in photography mechanical reproduction by Szarkowski. It came to existence as Walter Starr, a wealthy businessman, underwrote its great costs as a memorial to his son, who had died in a mountaineering accident. I learned in the Ken Burns National Parks series of the role the book had in helping establish Kings Canyon National Park. Adams sent a copy to Interior Secretary Ickes, who showed it to Franklin Roosevelt. The president was so impressed that he decided to keep the book for himself. Because of his disability, that would be his only way to see the mostly roadless terrain of the park. This book is an economical reprint. There is also a limited edition reprint costing $1,200, whose reproductions I guess are superior – a slight downside of this edition.

The Portfolios of Ansel Adams

This book was first published in 1977, however, the second edition of 1981 improved reproduction quality significantly. It reproduces images by portfolios, which were the main method Adams had his original prints circulated. The book shows us Adams personal editing of his own work, in which he balances consistency and variety, including a broader amount of subject matter than the nature photography for which he is most admired. It is also interesting to follow Adams development through time, and see the original texts and even typefaces used for each portfolio.

The American Wilderness

Although first published in 1990, this was actually Adams last book, begun two years before his death at the suggestion of William Turnage, who was also the president of the Wilderness Society. His introduction, as well as the Adams quotes (printed on a paper stock different from the reproductions), focus on Adams important role in conservation. Of all the Adams books, this one is the largest in size (14×18 inches), which together with very high production values, definitively help convey the power and majesty of the photographs, mostly grand, dramatic landscapes made in National Parks. For this reason, and also for the quotes from the master, this book would be my first choice if you own only one Ansel Adams book.

Our National Parks *

In the 1940s, Adams received a National Park Service commission, and then a Guggenheim Fellowship to photograph the National Parks. If contemporary nature photographers are envious, they should remember that Adams was a nature photography pioneer, and nobody has rivaled him in his sustained practical efforts to support the National Parks. Witness the writings in this book which, besides reprints of the introduction to former books such as the seminal and rare “My camera in the National Parks”, include letters and memoranda to presidents and other major political figures. This book is part of a economical, softcover small format series which also includes Yosemite, and The Grand Canyon and the Southwest.

Yosemite and the High Sierra *

Ansel Adams is naturally associated with Yosemite. Since his first visit of the park at the age of fourteen, he would return every year throughout his life. It was there that he became a photographer, and made more photographs there than at any other place. He and his wife Virginia operated a gallery that continues to this day – the only one of its kind located inside a national park. Unsurprisingly, his best selling book was Yosemite and the Range of Light (1979). The first New York Graphic Society edition was a large book of 12×15 inches with more than 100 images which can be found at a bargain price on the used market. Its current successor is a medium-sized, more reasonably priced hardcover book, featuring 70 popular images. Following a somewhat predictable format, there are the Szarkowski introduction, Adams quotes, and selected writings consisting of introductions to older books from the same region from which images for this book were selected. Photographs of the Southwest complements this volume in a similar format.

California *

I was a bit hesitant to include this book because it is a bit of an oddity amongst the others surveyed here. It is more about its subject than Adams photography. As several books are already devoted to the Sierra Nevada landscapes, this one does a good job of surveying many other places in Adams home state, in the process including many lesser known images – architecture and portraits as well. Instead of writings about Adams, you get writings about California by famous authors. I am not fond of the design, which makes the book look more like a travel book than an art book. Unlike in other books, the writings are not clearly separated from the reproductions (which are of very good quality). The choice of a vertical format does not work well because most images are horizontal. As a result, many images are reproduced too small (surrounded by white paper), or across the gutter – unlike in the other books.

Ansel Adams at 100

Published in celebration of the 100th anniversary of Ansel Adams in 2001, this slipcased book is lavishly produced, extremely well printed on tritone. As a subjective attempt to “identify that work on which Adams’ claim as an important modern artist must rest”, this book concentrates almost exclusively on nature photography. However, within this limited scope, if you are familiar with Adams, you will discover a new facet of his work. First, although I am not sure if a centennial book is the right place, there was an effort to select seldom seen photographs, balancing landscapes and closer views, rather than emphasizing classic images – the most well-known are still there. Second, Szarkowski, also the curator for the exhibit from which the book is derived, often selected earlier prints where Adams used softer renditions than in his later (more well known) prints. This is illustrated by two examples of variations in the printing of Aspens and Denali. The Szarkowski essay is more reticent, controversial – and interesting – than the introductions he wrote for other books. However, see a brilliant and very critical review by Kenneth Brower of both the book and exhibit – Szarkowski’s response strikes me as unusually weak. Even though the trim is quite large, with the idea that small prints are reproduced smaller and large prints larger, many of the vintage reproductions end up quite small in the book (as they were in the exhibit). There is a considerably less expensive paperback version, but it is much smaller, which only compounds the problem. The hardcover would be a good choice for a second Ansel Adams book.

Ansel Adams: 400 Photographs *

Published in 2007, this is a great value, as it presents the largest selection of Adams images to date in a single book, encompassing all sorts of subject matter, organized chronologically from 1916 to the 60s, with good reproductions. All of his major work is here, as well as some images I had never seen before. The book is part of a new series in a compact, thick, hardcover, landscape format, edited by Andrea Stillman, who wrote notes on some selected photos, as well as one-page introductions for each of the five periods that structure the book.

Ansel Adams in Color *

This is a revised and expended edition (137 plates) of a 1993 book of the same title about a less known aspect of Adams work. The book includes essay by John Schaefer about the color work of Adams, and selected writings by Adams himself about color photography, which are interesting for the thoughts about the medium. The format and dimensions are the same as “400 photographs”. Note, however, that the book doesn’t disclose that although he began to photograph in color soon after Kodachrome film was invented in the mid 1930s, Adams did not consider his color work to be important nor expressive. According to Alinder’s bio of Adams he even explicitly forbade any exploitation of his color work.

Ansel Adams in the National Parks

The third book in a format started with with “400 photographs”, it continues the goal of the series, presenting more images (225 plates, three times as many as “Our National Parks”) of Adams work in the National Parks than other previously published books. Besides essays by Woodward and Turnage about conservation photography, the notes by Andrea Stillman include a few outtakes for some iconic photos, of which I would have liked to see more.

Tenth Anniversary Update (2022)

Ansel Adams in Yosemite Valley: Celebrating the Park at 150

An oversized book (12×14″) issued in 2014 on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the Yosemite Grant with 150 photographs edited and sequenced by Peter Galassi, former Chief Curator of Photography at The Museum of Modern Art, New York, whose introduction situates Adams’s photographs in the context of the history of photography in Yosemite.

Ansel Adams’ Yosemite: The Special Edition Prints

Prints made by Ansel Adams himself are expensive. So that visitors to Yosemite would have a chance to own an original print as a quality memento, in 1958 Adams selected six of his Yosemite images to be offered at affordable prices at his gallery in Yosemite Valley. The 8×10 prints would be made from the original negatives by an assistant and be printed in large batches. The collection turned out to be popular so that over the years Adams extended it to 30 images. Alan Ross, who contributes an essay in the book, has been printing the collection since 1975. Pete Souza’s qualification for writing the introduction is that his Obama: An Intimate Portrait is the best selling photography book in history.

Mike Mandel: Zone Eleven

The images are all by Ansel Adams, but his name doesn’t even appear on the cover. How is it possible? This is Mike Mandel’s book, in the vein of his and Larry Sultan’s groundbreaking Evidence (1977) where they gave a new meaning to found images from government agencies and tech corporations via curation and sequencing. Although William Turnage’s carefully crafted image of Ansel Adams as a photographer of iconic nature landscapes was instrumental to the financial success of his later years, Adams didn’t view himself that way. Mandel mined an archive of more than 50,000 images from Adams’s commercial and editorial assignments, resulting in an entirely unexpected view of his work. Ansel Adams’s Zone System ranged from Zone 0 (darkest black) to Zone 10 (brightest highlight).

Have I missed anything ? Which ones are your favorites ?

Part 1 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

Mui Ne‘s reputation as resort is growing, but besides the beach, there is also an interesting mix of natural and cultural elements, found north of the resort area.

Despite development in the resort area, the fishing village (Lang Chai) hasn’t changed much. I found the fishing beach particularly lively and active in the morning, when boats return from sea with fresh catch.

More specific to the area, I followed the Fairy Spring, a shallow stream flowing through interesting red rock formations, until a nice waterfall.

However, I came to Mui Ne mostly for the sand dunes. One of the most iconic subjects in Vietnamese photography consists of women with conical hats walking on those dunes carrying the two typical Vietnamese baskets on the shoulder pole, an intriguing mix of human interest and nature setting.

Those images don’t happen by chance. All the images are staged using cooperative models. I normally don’t stage images, nor hire models. In particular, when traveling in third world countries, I always make sure not to “tip” any children for posing. This may sound harmless, but a tip can be a significant amount of money compared to what parents earn the hard way, which could incite kids (with approval from their family) to skip school. On the other hand, it’s fair to pay adults for modeling, as this is a legitimate occupation for some in the West.

As I’ve seen many of those images in Vietnamese calendars – they seem relatively absent from travel photographers portfolios, though, maybe because it’s not that easy to make arrangements – I thought it would be fun to try my hand at photograph them. With the help of my cousin, who has spent much time in Mui Ne, we found a woman in the evening. We made appointments with motorbike drivers to pick her and me a dawn. The Vietnamese photographers often have women wearing the elegant Ao Dai, but I thought it would be more natural for her to wear everyday clothes. Since I am not used to directing models, even though I speak Vietnamese, the session felt a bit awkward at the beginning, but after a while, both of us got used to the situation. This type of shooting requires a good coordination with the model, since after you’ve stepped somewhere, the patch of sand is marred by footprints, so you get only one chance before you have to find a few one, with the appropriate ripples, orientation, and background.

The dunes are formed by red sand. The variations in color that you are seeing are due to the changing light color (sunrise is warmer) and angle. I kept the session short, as it is tough work to walk up and down sand, and the temperature was quickly rising after sunrise, yet it produced a large variety of images. I’m showing here only a selection of horizontal images.

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More images of Mui Ne

Interested in photographing Vietnam ? Join me for a photo tour this fall.

In this post, I am sharing my favorite high-country hike in Yosemite. On that rugged, but short Yosemite backcountry loop, you’ll reach the Sierra Crest, high above timberline, only a few hours after leaving your car, and enjoy a few days of solitude from there. You will roam cross-country – which is surprisingly easy here because you are above timberline, camp next to rarely visited lakes, and experience some of the most spectacular and varied mountain terrain in the park, concluding with the ascent of an extremely scenic peak.

To undertake this loop obviously requires some backpacking experience, as well as the skill to navigate cross-country in some class 2 terrain. The best time of the year is normally mid-to late summer, as snow can be a problem early in the season (not this year, though !). Despite backcountry quotas, I easily obtained a permit at the Tuolumne Meadows Wilderness Center on the morning of my start, in August. The loop can be done in three days. I hiked at a leisurely pace in four days (three nights). As an instance of taking my time, I arrived at the spot in the first image on the first afternoon. After sleeping at Upper McCabe Lake I climbed back the next day there, as the light is better in the morning, then explored the ridge up until the point where it turned to class 4, before backtracking and resuming the journey.

(click on map for larger version)

Take California Highway 120 (Tioga Pass Road) to about 2 miles east of the east entrance of Yosemite National Park, turn to Saddlebag Lake Road on north side, drive to the end and park at the Saddlebag Lake resort (10060 feet). From there go to the NW end of the lake, by hiking on either shore, or by a boat taxi, – which saves you 1.5 miles (every 1/2 hour, 7am-5pm).

Follow a trail heading towards Steelhead Lake skirting it on its East shore. The trail climbs and peters near the remains of the Hess mine, where a century ago miners toiled not too successfully for silver. For the next few days you’ll wander cross-country, and will share the mountains with only a few other hikers. Zig zag the steep slope, and soon you’ll straddle the Sierra crest, above 11,000 feet, with great views of North Peak and the enchanting Twenty Lakes Basin.

The other side consists of steep cliffs, but north of them, you’ll find a gully system that leads down to Upper McCabe Lake. At sunset, North Peak reflects beautifully in the lake.

Go around the lake clockwise. From its south shore, before reaching a small peninsula, you’ll see a pass between Sheep Peak and North Peak. Scramble up the talus and snowfields, then descend the gently slopping valley on the other side of the pass.

You’ll soon reach narrow Roosevelt Lake. Follow the east shore, then continue south.

After passing verdant meadows and clear streams, for the first time since the start of the trip, you’ll be passing below timberline and hiking in the forest. Track a contour line to reach Lower Young Lake, where you re-encounter people (I had met a single party around Upper McCabe Lake, and also Roosevelt Lake) as well as an established trail.

Follow it up to Upper Young Lake, after which it turns into an unmaintained climber’s trail. Continue up as you make your way back to the alpine world, arriving at the south slope of Mount Conness, passing on your way a high-altitude meadow doted with tarns.

Leave your backpack at the crest near the pass, and follow the class 2 trail to the summit (12,590 ft), first ascending a broad slope, then once on the plateau, following a thin ridge with a few exposed passages.

The highest peak in Sierra Nevada north of Tioga Pass Road, Mount Conness offers wonderful views of the high country granite domes, extending to Half-Dome, as well as a glimpse of the Northern Yosemite.

Back at the pass, descend steep slopes on the East side. The inclination is about 30 degrees and the slope is north facing, so in early season snow climbing gear (ice axe and/or crampons) may be useful, especially early in the day. Then follow the main drainage. When you reach the Carnegie Institute Experimental Station, you’ll see an established trail. You can either follow it to the Sawmill campground and then walk a mile up to road, or take a more direct off-trail shortcut to your car.

I planned this itinerary by just looking at a topo map, then confirming its feasibility at the wilderness center when I picked up the permit. Once you begin to venture out of the beaten path, you can create many itineraries as beautiful as this one. The possibilities in Yosemite are endless. Please share your favorite finds !

Part 6 of 6: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6

Check out my book: Spectacular Yosemite

For last winter’s trip to Alaska where I drove the Dalton Highway and photographed the Aurora Borealis, I didn’t pack light. I flew with two carry-on bags and two pieces of checked in luggage. In this post, I’ll discuss some of my equipment choices for that trip.

Clothing

I had a large assortment of hats and face covers (including a neoprene mask) as the head is the most critical body part to keep warm. For the upper body, in addition to the usual outdoor gear, I wore a vapor-barrier jacket and a down-filled parka (very effective when you are not moving much). Mine is the second warmest parka made by Feathered Friends (a Seattle-based company specializing in down gear). Warmer is always better, but this was adequate to -20F/-30F, the lowest temperatures we experienced on this trip. For the lower body, I brought thermals, synthetically-isolated pants, and shell pants, but this wasn’t sufficient as the wind tends to chill you at the junction of top and bottom. In my mountaineering days, I wore matching fleece and goretex bibs from The North Face but I couldn’t locate them and they don’t appear to be made anymore. I purchased in Fairbanks – great place to shop for arctic-grade gear – insulated, windproof bibs which made a big difference.

I brought the One Sport (now Millet) Everest boots – adequate for climbing Mt Everest as implied by the name – that had served me well almost two decades ago on Mt McKinley, but actually didn’t need them, which is as well, since they are quite rigid – too rigid to drive on a slippery road. Instead I wore Sorel Bear boots which are much more comfortable. On the coldest nights they were slightly marginal (OK with a foot warmer insole) so I next time I’ll buy the better Sorel Glacier boots as they can be found for $100, which is a surprisingly low price for -40F/C boots. Even for short hikes on snow, snowshoes were useful as the extreme cold keeps the Alaska snow deep.

The problem of keeping hands warm while maintaining sufficient dexterity remains unsolved. My massive mittens and gloves didn’t let me operate camera controls, so I ended up trying to work only with thinner gloves. Those would leave hands in pain, and useless from the cold after a few minutes out. I’d put them back in my pockets to warm them up, then repeat. Please let me know if you have found a better way to work. Maybe I will try to investigate electric liner gloves.

Camping

We slept in the car quite a few times, either because accommodations were not available nearby, or either because it was actually comfortable and convenient enough that we didn’t feel like spending money to get a room. The -25F rated Feathered Friends Peregrine sleeping bag kept me warm enough despite being two decades old. I supplemented it with a vapor barrier liner, as well as a fleece liner. Even for sleeping in the car, to have good insulation is essential. This was provided with a Thermarest Luxury, which uses proven closed-cell foam. In arctic weather, even if you don’t plan to sleep in the car, it would be a good idea to carry a sleeping bag in case you are stuck on the road.

It’s nice to be able to fix a hot meal while waiting for the aurora to appear. Although I didn’t expect it to work, I brought a butane stove because it is so tiny. Indeed, it provided almost no output – still wondering how come they are used in the Himalayas. We had two liquid-fuel stoves, a MSR Whisperlite and Dragonfly. The Whisperlite quit mysteriously in the middle of the trip. The Dragonfly provided much better output anyways. My friend’s two quart bottle worked better than my one-quart bottle to keep the water from freezing. He had the great idea to get insulated food jars, which are like small thermos. They keep foods and drinks warm for a few hours, whereas without them, your freeze-dried meal would get cold in the ten minutes it takes before it’s even ready to eat. Life in a freezer…

Photography

I carried most of the cameras, lenses, and electronics in one backpack and one shoulder bag. Fortunately in the US airlines do not weight carry-one because the total weight was close to 50 lbs.

I had my standard combination of wide, medium, and tele zooms and the 24 TSE, but most of the aurora photography was actually done with a single lens, the Canon 24mm f1.4L II. You want a wide-angle: further south, the aurora appears low on the horizon (in which cases the 50mm f1.4 or 85 f1.8 are useful) but at northern latitudes, during nice displays it fills up a large portion of the sky. You want a fast lens: shorter exposures reveal the shape and texture of aurora curtains, where longer exposures render them as a blur of color. In addition, like for other night sky photographs, a lens with a wide aperture will capture more stars, and allow the use of a lower ISO, therefore reducing digital noise. A 24mm f1.4 offers a great combination of wide angle and large aperture, letting in 4 times as much light as a f2.8 lens.

So why so much equipment ? On that trip, I was experimenting with shooting time-lapses (hence the motion-control dolly, which I packed in a ski bag for travel) as well as stereo (3D). Shooting stereo requires two exactly identical camera bodies and lenses. While a time-lapse is in progress, instead of doing nothing, which sounds like a pity when the aurora is dancing, I prefer to have a third camera to shoot stills. The 5D2s worked perfectly in temperatures down to -20F with battery life much less reduced than expected. So this seems to mean that cameras perform better in the cold than photographers – or at least photographers fingers !

Part 5 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

There are several hot springs around Fairbanks. They were discovered around the turn of the 19th century by miners seeking an escape from the cold. The most easily accessed is Chena Hot Springs, which is the terminus of its own highway (Chena Hot Springs Rd), 46 miles East of Fairbanks.

All water around Fairbanks is normally frozen solid, but the runoff of the hot springs provide water free of ice for those swans and ducks. Travelers can have the rare experience of soaking outdoors by temperatures well below 0F (-17C).

Arriving there in late afternoon, the light wasn’t great, with the pool in the shade and the sky and mountains quite bright. We had an hour waiting the more even light of dusk, with its interesting blue cast. We paid a small fee and jumped in the water (they rent towels and swimsuits). The water is plenty warm, but the tricky part is to get outside the building wearing nothing but a swimsuit. Fortunately, there are pools inside the bathhouse that one can use to store some heat, and the outside path (on the left of the picture) between the bathhouse and the outdoor pool is covered. After a few minutes, frost forms on your hair as it gets wet from the steam. Out of concern for condensation, I did not want to risk bringing the DSLR. I wished I had a waterproof camera to take pictures while soaking.

With air temperature that low, there was an abundance of steam coming from the pool. This, and the combination of twilight light and artificial light contributed to create unusual colors and atmosphere as the night fell.

A large resort is built around the hot springs, offering hotel-style as well as cabin accommodation. Despite the advertising, I think the displays of Northern Lights that can be seen while soaking in the springs must be rare, as the light surrounding the pool are quite bright. More generally, the light pollution caused by the resort probably makes it less than ideal for viewing the Northern Lights. Despite a predictions for a moderate (3) activity we saw nothing. However the resort offers a snowcoach ride up to the top of a surrounding mountain which is likely dark enough.

The hot water is also used to produce electricity, and to heat a number of greenhouses which provide fresh vegetable to the resort restaurant.

All the typical Alaskan activities are offered, including snowmobiling, scenic flights, a year-round ice sculpture museum housed in huge building refrigerated during the warm months.

The most interesting to watch and photograph were the dog sled rides. Those huskies zoom by you in no time. If you want to have a varied experience of Alaska in winter in full comfort, Chena Hot Springs would be a good choice.

Part 4 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

In South Korea, I had stayed at hostels and at a “love motel”. In the fishing village of Seongsang Ilchulbong, I was going to try a third category of accommodation, a “minbak”: room for rent in a private home. Arriving quite late after hiking Mt Halassan, disoriented after getting out of the bus, I called a taxi even though I knew that the Lonely Planet-listed minbak was only a few blocks away. It turned out to be full, but the driver motioned me by to follow an elderly women waiting nearby, who promptly and decisively proceeded to carry my tripod, talking to me volubly as if I could understand Korean. Since it was getting late, she suggested that I look for food, walking me to a restaurant. There, I pulled out a note written in Korean script which said that I am a vegetarian. For the first time since I arrived in Korea, I was out of luck: after some tricky exchanges, I understood that they had nothing but seafood. There were still a number of other open restaurants, but the result was the same. I went into a grocery, and bought a few bananas, crackers, and some tofu. When I came back, my host inspected the bag, and apparently concerned that this wasn’t a proper meal, insisted to sell me a bowl of pre-cooked noodles. We went upstairs and were going to prepare it, when her daughter came home. She didn’t know that I was a vegetarian and seemed concerned that my noodles weren’t tasty enough, so she exchanged them for something else, but I noticed in time that the wrapping had pictures of seafood. I ended up eating the original noodles, with my host peaking from time to time into the room to make sure everything was fine.

I woke up before dawn in order to climb the steep Ilchulbong plug volcano crater in time for sunrise at the top.

Despite the early hour, I wasn’t the only one with that idea, although it looks like I was the only foreigner there.

There was no sunrise. The morning was cloudy, so I decided to visit the caves.

I had visited lava tubes before, in Northern California and Hawaii, but Manjanggul – one of the world longest lava tube cave (13 km long) – was at a different scale, both in length and size.

The section open to the public is about 1km long, but takes more than half an hour to walk because of the rough floor (unlike the paved paths in US National Parks caves).

It finishes at a lava column of 7.6m high, which is the largest in the world.

I returned to Seongsang Ilchulbong in time to see more elderly women – and seafood. From what I read, Jeju Island is renown for its seafood, offering several delicacies not found anywhere else.

Seafood gathering is done by women, who unlike in most of Asia, are also head of family. “Haenyo” are the famous women divers of Jeju Island. They give a demonstration of their diving skills every day in a cove next to Ilchulbong.

They look so old, wrinkled, and bent, that it is amazing that they can free-dive down to a depth of 20m, using low-tech equipment and no tanks, holding their breath for up to two minutes. This is the last generation of those remarkable women divers, as their daughters prefer to work in less physically demanding jobs in the cities and tourism industry.

For my last night in Korea, I took the bus to the city of Seogwipo.

While on the upper slopes of Mt Hallasan were encrusted in rime ice, the seashore near Seogwipo had a tropical feeling, not unlike Hawaii.

In the morning, after seeing another waterfall, I hurried to visit Jeongbang Pokpo, only waterfall in Asia dropping into sea. After a brisk walk, a bus ride, two taxi rides, a domestic flight, a shuttle transfer, and the trans-pacific flight departing from Seoul in the afternoon, I arrived home.

More images of Jeju Island

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Watching a moonbow with your own eyes is an awesome experience. While the camera can capture colors that the eye doesn’t see (as explained in my previous blog post about moonbows), the way it works doesn’t capture the experience that well. A long moonlit exposure looks almost the same as a daylight exposure that one would be able to make with a strong neutral density filter. The image differs substantially only by the presence of stars in the sky, however on a full moon night, only the brightest stars are visible.

For this reason, I have found moonbows to be one of the subjects where a time-lapse movie is more compelling than a still image. The motion of the stars gives them a presence beyond sparse pinpoints. The displacement of the rainbow as the moon moves across the sky adds interest.

While with some effort it is sometimes possible to deal with the spray while making still images, in time-lapse photography one needs to take pictures continuously, for extended periods of time. This means no stopping even when spray is coming at you, and no downtime to wipe the lens. Under those circumstances, unless you can photograph from above the spray (as at Cascade Falls), the only way to get clear images is to use a rain deflector.

The rain deflector is not a piece of equipment you hear about in photography circles. It works by spinning a clear piece of glass in front of the lens at a high velocity (3000 rotations per minute). This creates a centrifugal effect and a vacuum effect which throws water out of the glass. It’s quite tricky to make because you want high velocity rotation, but you don’t want any vibration. There is only one commercially available spinning rain deflector, the Israel-made Spintec, imported in the US by InnoVision Optics, a company which sells highly specialized equipment to the movie industry. Not many units are sold, so they charge quite a premium for it – even a simple power cable costs $140.

After buying the deflector for $1725, you need to accessorize it, which isn’t as obvious as it seems. While one can mount it like a filter, I was wary of loading a lens with a relatively heavy accessory this way. Unless one uses a lens with a tripod mount, the weight would also be poorly distributed, certainly a potential source of vibration with long exposures. In addition, Steve Bumgardner (watch his behind the scenes video for “moonbows”) warned me that the filter mount can easily go out of alignment, causing a contact between the spinning glass and the lens. At 3000 RPM, this would instantly scratch the glass (a $300 custom Tiffen filter). Following his recommendations, I ended up mounting it using a movie-standard 15mm rod system based on the JAG35 baseplate. I replaced the stock rods with a pair of longer and lighter 9″ carbon fiber rods from Redrock Micro. Since all my cameras have quick-release plates, I added a B2 LLR II quick release clamp from Really Right Stuff. That clamp may look overkill, but I chose it because of its additional holes which I use to make sure that the assembly does not rotate out of alignment.

The deflector requires a 12V battery – a standard in the movie world – which isn’t included. You can buy ready-to-use cables for a variety of video batteries. Instead, I modified the power cable with stripped leads that comes standard. I attached it to a barrel jack (2.1mm x 5.5mm) compatible with two different batteries which serve other purposes as well. The Powerstream Universal lithium ion battery pack PST-MP3500 (also Tekkeon MP3450) offers 45WH, which is enough to run the rain deflector all night. In addition, its built-in multi-voltage capability means that I can also use it to power my cameras (the 5D2 and 5D3 require 7.5V) as well as other electronic devices. The battery sold by Dynamic Perception to power their Stage Zero dolly has a capability of 32WH, but being only a 12V battery, it is lighter (200g v 440g) and smaller.

Last, a rain cover is needed. For daytime use, it needs to be black, in order to block light from reflecting from the back of the filter. Its front opening has to be large enough to fit the rain deflector. Not too many rain covers satisfy both requirements. The Vortex Media Pro SLR Storm Jacket (medium size) worked for me.

I usually use the 16-35/2.8 lens with the rain deflector. By placing the front just a few millimeters away from the spinning glass, it is possible to zoom to 16mm without vignetting, although because of the mount flex I feel more comfortable with a bit more of a margin. The deflector itself weights about 750g. Mounting system and power add another 750g (using the lighter battery). The entire assembly remains light and small enough to be turned side ways (for verticals) and even used hand-held. I think that besides moonbows, it gives me the capability to work in a broad range of weather situations.

Besides producing a movie, using a time-lapse set-up is a convenient way to capture still images of variable phenomena. The first image below was created for a time-lapse. It was shot at 3am, so I was glad I didn’t have to be standing there all night in the cold. Instead, I could pick the best frame from the hundreds captured. The drawback is that for a time-lapse movie, you often want to frame wider in order to have latitude for moves, so you’d crop for the still image. For the second image, I didn’t really mean to produce a time-lapse movie. I was planning to shoot stills that night, but I just got too cold to hang around, so I set-up a time-lapse and went down to try to warm up. Both spots where the camera was placed were so wet that it would have been difficult even to take a still image without the rain deflector. The more mist, the better the rainbow, though ! Please let me know if you prefer original or cropped versions:

Original image for time-lapse movie

Cropped still image

Original image

Cropped still image

(click here if you don’t see link to vote)

A moonbow is a rainbow produced by moonlight, rather than direct sunlight. While observing a rainbow in the sky requires rare and unpredictable combination of conditions, it isn’t too difficult to predict the appearance of spray moonbows, which occur in the mist of waterfalls.

Yosemite moonbows have been known for some time. John Muir described the experience of seeing them. They’ve been photographed for at least 3 decades, but it’s only recently that they became a popular subject. Normally the light is too faint to excite the cone color receptors in human eyes, so they appear to the eye as a silvery arc. The camera has no trouble to capture the colors with a long exposure. However, during last May’s “supermoon” – which is the brightest one will see during our lifetime -, the light was bright enough to see the colors directly.

The moonbow is brightest on the night of a full moon, with the two days before and after the full moon also usable, making it a five day window per month when the water is flowing enough to produce mist. In Yosemite, this is usually April, May, and June, so this week-end will be your last chance for the year, even though this year it might not be great since the flow is already low due to small snowpack. Once you know when the moonbow rises on a given day, it is an easy matter to predict its timing for the other days: a moonbow will appear 50 minutes later each day from the same spot.

Any waterfall with a significant amount of mist front lit by the moon can produce a rainbow, but the easiest viewing is provided by Yosemite Falls. There are two classic locations for which Don Olson posts predictions, Lower Yosemite Fall seen from the bridge at its base, and Upper Yosemite Fall seen from Cook’s Meadow. Don’s predictions are for the base of the falls, where the mist is normally the thickest, but rainbows can appear higher at earlier times.

In recent years, the two “classic” locations have become extremely popular. On the week-end of May 5, 2012, there were hundreds of photographers at each location, and constant road traffic until mid-night, so expect a very “social” experience there ! While the meadow has plenty of room for people to spread out, the bridge is fairly cramped.

I avoided the crowds by moving to a spot much closer to Lower Fall, right against the cliff, which I had rediscovered (I’d seen it before in photos made by Carlton Watkins in the 19th century) in this great episode of Yosemite Nature Notes – a must-watch if you have any interest in Yosemite Moonbows. I like this view better than the classical one from the bridge because you get a glimpse of Upper Yosemite Fall in alignment. Needless to say, at that close range it was wet. Since the water comes from snowmelt, it was cold. The first night I made the mistake of wearing breathable-waterproof fabric. My top was the Alpinist jacket, the flagship Goretex shell from highly regarded Marmot and my bottom the PreCip pants, which although lighter, is still advertised as a waterproof rain pant. Soaked to the bone, exposed to the full force of the spray, I barely escaped hypothermia. Those fabrics are just not waterproof if constantly hit by water with any significant velocity. On subsequent nights, I wore rubber-coated fabrics, which despite partly suffering from de-lamination, actually kept me more dry.

On the night of Saturday, which I anticipated would be the most popular, I spent the night on the Yosemite Falls trail, away from the valley, to capture the moonbow on Upper Yosemite Fall and the iconic Half-Dome in the background. I was going to try a higher spot (see daytime view), but in the evening there was almost no wind. The upper part of the waterfall would have no mist and therefore no rainbow, so I set up at a slightly lower spot. It turned out that the wind picked up during the night, but I chose not to disturb the set-up for reasons which will be clear in the next post. The view isn’t as open, however, being closer to to the mist gave a double rainbow.

Using another set of cameras and tripod, I also photographed from the point where the trail turns the corner and you see Upper Yosemite Falls for the first time. Despite the very late hour – it was midnight, I was surprised to see quite a few folks up there, despite the 2 hour hike from the valley floor. It is well worth it, as Upper Yosemite Fall being so much taller than Lower Yosemite Fall, and plunging into an open bowl, produces a much more spectacular rainbow, which is much more impressive from here than from the distant meadow.

For those who’d like to try it yourself, here is some technical information.

• Gear You will need a camera capable of long exposures (a full-frame DSLR provides the best image quality) and a tripod, as the light is fairly faint. A way to lock the shutter for bulb exposures can be very useful. Even if you don’t shoot them wide-open, fast lenses will make it easier to see your composition.
• Exposure Light meters don’t work in such faint light, so you’ll have to use manual exposure. For a full moon, my basic is exposure is f/2.8, 30 seconds, ISO 640. With a locking cable release, you can try longer equivalent exposures either at lower ISO to minimize noise (such as f/2.8 45 seconds ISO 400, f/2.8 90 seconds ISO 200, f/2.8 3 minutes ISO 100) or at smaller apertures to improve lens resolution and depth of field (such as f/4 1 minute ISO 640, f/5.6 2 minutes ISO 640) or both. Don’t use too long of an exposure, though: above 5 minutes, some bands of color may merge together as the rainbow is moving during the exposure. With those exposure values, the image will look like a daytime shot – too bright to convey a night feeling, but you can darken it later, resulting in a less noisy image than one created directly with a night-like exposure. On the nights before and after full-moon, although it looks the same to the human eye, the light is actually significantly dimmer, so be sure to adjust exposure accordingly.
• Focus Autofocus doesn’t work in such faint light, and it is also quite difficult to focus manually. The best way to proceed is to focus the lens at infinity using the moon (or any other distant light source), and then tape your focus ring so that it doesn’t move. For instance I use my 24/1.4 lens almost exclusively for night photography, so I have tapped it semi-permanently with a wide patch of gaffer tape.
• Keeping the lens dry In many cases, you’ll be standing close to the rainbow-producing mist of the waterfall. The fine mist droplets do not ruin the images the same way as larger rain drops do, however they do add up. To get the clearest image, you’ll need to keep your lens dry. Bring plenty of lens tissue, and keep your lens cap on when not exposing. Remove it just before taking the picture. Once you feel the beginning of a breeze, which means more mist and a better rainbow, you’ll have a few seconds before the lens gets too wet. If you are standing very close to the mist – which yields the best rainbows – your lens will get wet instantly, so you’d need more sophisticated equipment that I’ll describe in the next post: using a rain deflector to photograph moonbows.

Good luck, and feel free to link to your own moonbow images !

View more Moonbow images

Winter lasts more than half of the year in Fairbanks. The snowpack is established by October and remains until May. From November to March, all the water is frozen solid.

Besides the fact that the month of March is the most favorable for photographing the Aurora in Alaska, another reason to visit Fairbanks at this time of the year is the ice carving competition called “Ice Alaska”, or formally “World Ice Art Championships”. If driving the Dalton Highway in winter is a bit more too adventurous, Ice Alaska, which takes place in Fairbanks, cannot be easier to attend.

The event takes place in a large open area, full of structures built of ice which form a family-friendly park. Kids – carted around by parents in sleds instead of strollers – climb animal-shaped sculptures and enjoy slides. There is also a building where you can buy some food and warm up for a while.

The main attraction for visitors, however, is the competition itself. Carving generally takes place around the first week of March, then prices are awarded and sculptures remain all the month. If you are there early in the month, you’ll see the teams working, whereas later in the month, you get to admire all the completed works.

I learned in the informational panels next to the sculptures that there is quite an international circuit for ice-carving artists. The most prestigious event of the circuit is the Fairbanks event. The Fairbanks ice is the best in the world for ice sculpture, because it is obtained from small pit ponds in which water is not subjected to currents (unlike rivers and lakes). This gives it a crystal clear purity since there are no bubbles or white streaks.

At night the character of the sculptures is dramatically improved by colored lights that help highlight the detail in three-dimensionality. An entrance ticket is valid for the whole day, so that it is easy to revisit in the evening if you arrived early. I suppose if you are lucky, you can see the Aurora dancing overhead, but we didn’t. (Low activity, 2).

The competition is divided into two categories, single-block and multi-block. The multi-block is certainly the most spectacular. 20 4-persons teams carve 12 blocks of ice measuring 4′ x 4′ x 3′. The resulting sculptures line up two sides of a large open area.

Multiblock lends itself to group of sculptures, but since ice artists can cut and piece ice in any way, so the resulting sculptures can be considerably larger than the block dimensions, such as this almost life-size locomotive. The sculptures are fenced, but you wouln’t want to stand beneath this one in any case !

The 2012 multiblock winner, “Prickly Reception” from Junichi Nakamura, Shinichi Sawamura, Satoru Mahoe and Takahiro Sueyosh, is a leopard stalking a crested porcupine carved with incredible intricacy.

In the single block competition, 40 2-person teams carve a single block of ice measuring 5′ x 8′ x 3′, and weighting nearly 8,000 pounds. The single-block sculptures were displayed in an easy-to miss wooded area next to the main space. The 2002 single-block winner is the mermaid sculpture “Treasure Hunt Blue Marine” from Junichi Nakamura and Victor Dagatan. I imagine that Victor Dagatan practices in a room-sized freezer (like another ice artist from Mexico to whom I talked) since he is from the Philippines.

If you enjoy cold weather, besides the Aurora, this unusual event is another good reason to visit Fairbanks in March. Here is the official Ice Alaska website. Be sure to bring a tripod for photographing the sculptures at night !

See more images of Fairbanks and Ice Alaska

Part 3 of 5: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5