From the Vault

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From the Vault, Norway
Lonely Litmolla #2
August 30, 2010 | Permalink | 2 Comments

Here’s another 4×5 photo “from the vault.” This is Litlmolla island, near the town of Svolvær in the Lofoten Islands, just north of the Arctic Circle. Taken in August of last summer, during a six week trip through Norway.

#2, you ask? Here’s “#1.” When I first edited my photos after the trip, I chose to post #1 in my gallery, probably because I initially preferred the warmer light on the island and horizon. However, a year later as I look at the two again, this one here is clearly my favorite. I prefer its subtle tones and softer colors, and as a whole it has a lot more feeling to it. As an extra bonus, #2 was shot on large format film (#1 was from a much smaller resolution digital camera).

A photographer friend of mine Dave is traveling somewhere over there right now… I’m looking forward to seeing his photos after he gets back.
From the Vault, Wyoming
Teton Reflection
August 27, 2010 | Permalink | 3 Comments

Here’s a photo I just dug up from the archives, taken back in August 2006 during a 4 day backpacking loop hike in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. This photo was shot with the large format 4×5 film camera, with a 135mm lens. Seeing this makes me want to get back to Wyoming again for a summer backpacking trip!
Backpacking & Camping, Colorado, From the Vault
Smoky Wetterhorn
July 16, 2010 | Permalink | 1 Comment

I just “found” this photo from back in July 2006, when some friends and I hiked a circumnavigational route around Wetterhorn Peak, a 14er in the Uncompahgre Wilderness of the San Juans in southwest Colorado. For a portion of this day, smoke from a nearby forest fire filled the high alpine basin, obscuring the view of Wetterhorn in a blue haze.
Colorado, From the Vault
Snow Peak
March 5, 2010 | Permalink | 2 Comments

I just dug this photo from the dusty depths of my hard drive. I took this sunset shot of Snow Peak (13,024 ft.) way back in March 2004. I was living in Denver at the time, and took advantage of an unseasonably warm spell in March to go winter camping up on this high ridge in the Gore Range, just east of Vail.

One of the great things about the Gore Range is that on the west side of the range there are numerous high points and ridges that are relatively safely accessible in the winter, offering awesome panoramic views of the main spine of the range. Better yet, the west side of the range gets great sunset alpenglow light since there are no large ranges directly to the west. From a photography point of view, sunset shooting is always a bit easier since you don’t have to wake up early, and you can spend the afternoon casually scoping out photo possibilities. On this evening, I had a really fun photo shoot; there were so many photo possibilities in every direction, and the wind-sculpted sastrugi snow formations on the ridge provided lots of interesting foreground possibilities. You can see some more photos from this evening here, here, and here.
Colorado, From the Vault
Massive Sunset
February 9, 2010 | Permalink | 6 Comments

I just unearthed this photo taken back in February 2006. This is the view of Mt. Massive (center) and the Sawatch Range, as seen from the 14,440 foot summit of Mt. Elbert, the tallest mountain in Colorado.

I had hiked up Mount Elbert in the afternoon, knowing that the clear skies and full moon would provide plenty of light to make my way down at night. The evening turned out to be one of my most memorable summit experiences ever; the air was perfectly calm, I had warm clothes on, and I spent over three peaceful hours relaxing on the summit in the twilight and moonlight. During my time up there I also took what is perhaps my favorite photo to date, “Elbert’s Moonshadow”.

Both photos were taken with the 4×5 camera, with Provia film.
Colorado, From the Vault
Star Trails over Denver
January 12, 2010 | Permalink | 1 Comment

This was an early experiment with the 4×5 camera, taken back in January 2006 in the foothills above Boulder. I first exposed the film for a few minutes to record the city lights, then I covered up the bottom portion of the frame using a thin piece of cardboard cut to fit in my cokin filter holder. With the camera in the same position and the city lights blocked out to prevent overexposure, I left the lens open for several hours to capture the star trails.

It’s hard to see at web resolution, but on the center horizon are a bunch of light trails from airplanes taking off from Denver International Airport.
From the Vault, New Zealand
Lake Wakatipu
December 19, 2009 | Permalink | 4 Comments

Just to switch it up from all my recent snowy posts, here’s a photo from a gorgeous summer day last December at Lake Wakatipu, near Queenstown, New Zealand. I snapped this photo along the road on my way to hike up for a sunset vista of Mount Earnslaw, which is the glaciated peak at the upper right here.
From the Vault, New Zealand
Aspiring Moonlight
November 23, 2009 | Permalink | 1 Comment

Mt. Aspiring in the moonlight, shrouded in clouds, November 2008. Mount Aspiring National Park, New Zealand. More about this particular trip here. It’s hard to believe this was just a year ago… it seems like ages already!
From the Vault
Cerro Torre Reflection #2
November 20, 2009 | Permalink | 2 Comments

Here’s one more Patagonia photo from the vault. I’ve been on a roll lately digging these ones up. These last three photos I’ve posted are digital shots from the Ricoh GX100 camera. When I returned home from my month in Patagonia in 2007, I mostly forgot about all these since I was concentrated on editing and scanning my 4×5 film collection from the trip. So it has been fun to browse through these and find some forgotten gems.

This photo here is the famous Cerro Torre reflected in the glacier-fed Lago Torre. I took this shortly after an earlier, wideangle shot of the same scene with the 4×5 camera. That morning was one of the luckiest photo shoots I’ve ever had – to have this lake so calm in this notoriously windy place is extremely rare!

To add to my stoke after the shoot, this was only the second morning of a week-long outing. I was prepared to wait numerous days camping near this lake to hopefully score some good light conditions, so having it happen so soon freed me to continue on my trek to other valleys and adventures.
From the Vault
Enormous Objects
November 20, 2009 | Permalink | 1 Comment

This photo shows one of the best summit views I’ve ever experienced, from atop Cerro Madsen, with a front-and-center view of Monte Fitz Roy, near El Chaltén, Argentina. This photo requires a bit of contemplation to begin to comprehend the enormous scale here. Consider that I took this photo standing on a 1800m (~6,000ft.) summit, with glaciers flowing around and below me. Monte Fitz Roy is 3400m (~11,200ft.) tall. This means that I’m looking directly up at a rock monolith towering a vertical mile above me, when I’m already standing on a lofty summit!

I feel like whenever I talk about Patagonian mountains I always end up babbling numbers of vertical feet. I think that’s because these kinds of mountains do not fit inside our minds; our brains simply cannot grasp the enormity, even when we’re standing there seeing it with our own eyes. The only way to make sense of it is to assign numbers and compare with mountains we’re used to. For instance, for those of you familiar with Colorado, consider that if you were standing at Maroon Lake near Aspen, looking up at the famous Maroon Bells, it would be roughly equivalent of just the rock face here on Fitz Roy. That begins to explain the enormity of the Patagonian landscape.