After nearly two months of solid photography in South Georgia Island, Antarctica and Patagonia I am finally headed home later today in time for Christmas with my family. The last two months has been nothing short of a phenomenal experience that was as always a sheer pleasure to share with so many like minded and passionate photographers.
I am currently in Puerto Williams in Chile having just docked a couple of hours ago after returning from my last Antarctica expedition of the year. We were fortunate to have a relatively mild Drake crossing on the return which was a pleasant and welcome surprise. Another pleasant surprise has been I just learnt that I have won the 2014 Travel Photographer of the Year Award for the Wild and Vibrant Category. The winning photograph was shot last year in Svalbard.
I admit to being pretty shattered at this point having existed on little sleep over this last two months. With so much exposure to the midnight sun so far south my body clock is a bit of a mess. The one benefit of this state of exhaustion is that I am likely to at least catch up on some sleep on the long haul flights home. I quite honestly have no idea when I will get a chance to process some of the photographs I have made during this time away as my time at home is very limited before I next head overseas. In the meantime, I am very much looking forward to walking in my front door, seeing my family and spending Christmas with my kids.
If you have been following along on my blog you will know that I will only be home for a two weeks before I will head back to South America and Antarctica for a scouting trip to photograph the mighty Emperor Penguins at the beginning of 2015. I am super excited about this new opportunity and am looking forward to heading deep into remote Antarctica where the Emperors make their home. The intention of this scouting trip is to spend a week camping and living on the sea ice with the Emperors in order to ensure everything is in place for a future small group photographic expedition in 2016. I will have more to say about this expedition soon. For now, if you are interested in a future expedition to visit, camp, photograph and live with Emperor Penguins you can drop me an email to express your interest – no obligation at this point.
Now, its time to head to the airport in Puerto Williams and start the long trek home. See you in Australia.
As expected Patagonia was a mixed bag of weather and light (or should I say wind, wind and more wind!). The scenery of this amazing location is breathtaking – the precipitous peaks, the plunging mountains and wild terrain is really phenomenal. Hiking through this terrain really puts a perspective on the sheer scope and scale of the geological uplift. I have personally found Patagonia a challenging place to photograph in the past and this trip was no different. The scenery really needs just the right combination of weather and light to really create great images. I have seen a lot of photography from Patagonia over the years and those images that really stand out for me are those that have captured the most dramatic weather and light. Patagonia remains for me one of those places that is dramatic to behold but photographically elusive. I am sure I have some good images from Patagonia, but I am not sure I have any definitive ones as yet. I need to look at my photographs with fresh eyes in a couple of months to really get a feel for what I did or did not accomplish. I took a laid back approach to my photography in Patagonia and was happy in many instances to simply take it in and leave the cameras in the bag. I did very much enjoy our long days of hiking through Patagonia and was very appreciative of the light weight 5D MKIII loaned to me by my good friend Martyn. The thought of schlepping one of my Canon EOS 1DX’s up some of those mountains would have in all likelihood seen me choose to stay at the bar. In fact, it is worth noting that the hiking was fairly arduous and I am not ashamed to admit I arrived at our campsite several evenings tired and sore. Hiking the back country of Patagonia with good friends was one of those life experiences you never forget and the memories from this trip will I hope stay with me forever. I hope to write more about our experiences in Patagonia over the coming months as my thoughts congeal from both our hiking and photographic experiences. Until then, its time to turn my attention again to Antarctica.
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