Friday Photo #273- Ryten Ski

Friday Photo #273 - Ryten Topptur

Photo: Ski tour till Ryten with Kvalvika in the background, Moskenesøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. April 2, 2017. 10:27

Between Monday and Friday I made 4 ski tours to the summit of Ryten. The weather was and light pretty dramatic some of the days, not sunny like this photo from last year. I actually wish I had brought my camera, but me skiing and photographing is not a safe combination yet.

Overall though, compared to making a similar amount of trips last year, I’m amazed at the amount of people on the mountain, both skiers and hikers. On Wednesday alone, I probably passed over 40 people on the mountain, and that was just in a 2 hour round trip. Only 3-4 years ago, I don’t think many people visited this mountain in winter at all. So now even in winter, there are issues with parking! And Kvalvika has been even more busy by appearance.

If you are heading out to the mountains of lofoten right now, make sure you are prepared. The Islands have quite a high avalanche risk at the moment: you can check the forecast at www.varsom.no. And fresh snow is falling every day, so all footprints will be erased by morning. And still below the snow, remains a lot of ice.

Camera Info:
Nikon D800
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
16mm
ISO 160
f 9
1/500 second
WB Daylight

New Winter 2019 Lofoten Photo Workshop Dates

With my winter 2018 workshop season just having come to an end, I’m happy to announce some dates for winter 2019.

Lofoten and Senja with Marc Muench of Muench Workshops – January 19 – 28, 2019

Lofoten Islands with Skarpi Thrainsson of Arctic Exposure Workshops – February 4 – 11, 2019. Icelandic and English speaking guides

Lofoten Islands with Jenny Brühlmann of Amazing Views Tours – Feburary 25 – March 3, 2019. German and English speaking guides.

Head over to my Photo Tours page for more info.

Friday Photo #272- Unstad Aurora

Unstad Aurora - Friday Photo #272

Photo: Northern lights over Unstad beach, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. March 14, 2018. 22:44

My final photo workshop of the winter season ended early Monday morning, it what was probably the worst weather of the entire winter thus far. Compared to last year, 2018 was a dream season – though a little more snow would have been nice. But weather wise, there were no ‘indoor weather’ days until this past weekend.

And good weather on Lofoten means lots of green at night. Every trip managed at least 2 nights of decent northern lights, while a couple tours got lucky with some solar storms – such as this photo from last week.

We started the night at Storsandnes, but as soon as I saw what the lights were doing, I made a quick decision to head over towards Vik beach, where we remained for some time until the sky grew quiet. Next was a quick stop at Uttakleiv, but the entire beach was fully of blinking camera, so we headed for a slightly long drive to Unstad – where we had the beach to ourself somehow.

Even as we were arriving, the aurora had picked up again. And as we made our way down to the the beach, the entire sky began to fill with light. Another one of those nights where you don’t know which direction to look.

Just before the last tour I had finally made some much needed equipment upgrades as well: Nikon D850 + Sigma 14mm f/1.8 lens. I should have bought this lens at the beginning of winter! It might not seem like much, but that extra 1.3 stops of light can make quite a difference. In this shot for example, I was at 4 seconds, where I would have been 8 seconds with a f/2.8 lens. Quite a difference! And I could have shot even faster had I raised the ISO beyond 1600.

Sadly, there is only a few more weeks left in the aurora season. So I will try to make the most of things in the days to come. Though the lens is a beast! So I’m not sure whether I will attempt to carry it up any mountains – and unfortunately, it doesn’t replace the 14-24.

Camera Info:
Nikon D850
Sigma 14mm f/1.8
14mm
ISO 1600
f 2
4 seconds
WB Daylight
2 images – top, bottom

Friday Photo #271- Vik Aurora

Vik Aurora - Friday Photo #271

Photo: Northern lights over Vik beach, Vestvågøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. March 4, 2018. 00:25

I posted a similar image to this the other week – Friday Photo #268 – where the moon was directly over the beach. A couple weeks later, and the moon was more or less behind me, and out of the scene.

This night was quite amazing, with the aurora dancing with stunning speed and filling the sky from horizon to horizon! With nearly full moon lighting up the landscape, it was possible to shoot with a relatively fast shutter speed of 2 seconds, which for northern lights is pretty good!

On nights like this, 14mm is simply not wide enough. I want to show what is happening in the sky, yet I also want enough of a foreground to anchor the image and make it a decent composition. So I was shooting foreground and sky images in quick succession – it is important to be fast when the aurora is dancing so quickly, otherwise the reflections might not line up correctly if the aurora has moved between shots.

I wish Lofoten had more snow though, would have been a fantastic image with bright white mountains instead of a somewhat ugly brown on this night…

Camera Info:
Nikon D810
Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8
14mm
ISO 2000
f 3.2
2 seconds
WB Daylight
2 images – top, bottom

Friday Photo #270 – Ice

Ice - Friday Photo #270

Photo: Ice, Nedreheimredalsvatnet, Eggum, Vestvågøy, Lofoten islands, Norway. March 3, 2018. 17:34

I’m back with another detail shot this week. I originally headed out to Eggum for sunset, but soon the sun disappeared behind some clouds and the golden light was gone. So I headed over to lake Nedreheimredalsvatnet to see what I could find.

It has been a cold winter this year on Lofoten, and the whole of the islands are in a deep freeze – even the lakes in the west, which didn’t freeze at all last year. With only a short amount of daylight this time of year, everything at Eggum in frozen.

The lake can have some nice structures where the rocks crack through. Unfortunately though, I was not the first, and the light dusting of snow had been thoroughly walked through at most of the rock cracks. So I looked for something else.

I am still fascinated with ice, and the patterns that form. Maybe I will photograph a whole abstract series one of these days. Here, I simply liked the cracks with a light filling of snow to bring out some contrast. I knew that I would like this image as a 1:1, so I put on my 24mm tilt-shift lens and pointed the camera straight down, shifting the lens between shots.

Camera Info:
Nikon D810
Nikon 24mm f/3.5 tilt-shift
24mm
ISO 160
f 6.7
.3 second
WB Daylight
3 images – top, middle, bottom

Friday Photo #269 – Rope

Rope - Friday Photo #269

Photo: Mooring rope coiled on pier, Toppøy, Lofoten Islands, Norway. February 18, 2018. 14:59

If you’ve been following me for a while you’ll have noticed that I normally don’t shoot too many detail type images. However with a busy tour season this winter, I have been returning again and again to the same areas with my guests – areas that I’ve already been to hundreds of times before as well. So unless there is some spectacular light or particularly unique conditions, I’ve more of less shot all the ‘big views’ already.

So sometimes I look for small details to fill in the gaps between the landscapes; stuff which helps tell the story about life on the islands.

I saw this rope on a previous day or two and and made a mental note that it might look more interesting if there was a bit of snow – the was none when I fist saw it. Luckily, a light snow did fall one evening and I rust randomly happened to be back at the location, so I went and took a look. I initially took another composition, with the mountain Olstind in the background and then went away.

It wasn’t until later in the afternoon that I was back again. The snow had been walked on by that point in time, ruining any wider shots. So I decided to go low, and close. Even with my tripod completely flattened out, it was still too high, so I took my camera off and held it on the ground.

I knew I would likely crop this 1:1, so I used my 24mm tilt-shift lens, shifting vertically, to shoot 3 images. I also knew I wanted a shallow depth of field and to focus just on the front coil of rope. Though I did use some other focal points, such as the pole, but this makes the house in the background too sharp and distracting.

[That was a lot of words about a boring rope on a pole…]

Camera Info:
Nikon D810
Nikon 24mm f/3.5 tilt-shift
24mm
ISO 100
f 4
1/80 second
WB Daylight
3 images – top, middle, bottom