Eloquent Images by Gary Hart
Insight, information, and inspiration for the inquisitive nature photographer
Right Place, Right Time
Golden Sunset, Lake Wakatipu, New Zealand
Sony α1
Sony 16-35 f/2.8 GM
ISO 100
f/18
1/125 second
A few years ago I listened to an NPR show about time and the arbitrary ways we Earthlings measure it. The guest’s thesis was that the hours, days, and years we measure and monitor so closely are an invention established (and measured with increasing precision) by science and technology to serve society’s specific needs. A question posed to listeners was, “What is the most significant measure of time in your life?”
Most callers responded with anecdotes about train schedules, school years, and work hours that revealed how conventional time measurement tools, the arbitrary units of clocks and calendars, rule our existence. Listening while on my morning run, I was unable to call in to share my own (significantly different) relationship with time, so you’re stuck with reading about it here instead.
Landscape photographers are governed by far more primitive time constructs than the bustling majority is. We’re more beholden to the fundamental laws of nature that inspired, and ultimately transcend, clocks and calendars: Earth’s daily rotation on its axis, Earth’s annual revolution about the sun, and the Moon’s motion relative to the Earth and Sun. Clocks and calendars, which have little to do with the picture taking aspect of my life, are useful to me only when I need to interact with the rest of the world on its terms (for example, to run my business).
While my photography days are inexorably tied to the sun’s and moon’s arrival, and my annual schedule is governed by the changing angle of the sun’s rays and the weather this change generates, I can’t help but long for a world where I could simply mark my calendar for the rainbow that arcs above Yosemite Valley at 4:29 p.m. every May 26, or the lightning bolt that strikes the Grand Canyon’s South Rim at 2:45 p.m. each August 18. But Nature, despite human attempts to measure and manipulate it, is its own boss. Even reliable celestial events are regularly thwarted by clouds. The best I can do is schedule workshops and personal photo trips to maximize my odds for these special phenomena, then show up and hope for the best.
The insignificance of clocks and calendars is never more clear than the first morning following a time change. On the second Sunday of March, when “normal” people moan about rising an hour earlier, the sun thumbs its nose at Daylight Saving Time and rises a mere minute (or so) earlier than it did the day before. So do I. And on the first Sunday of November, as others luxuriate in their extra hour of sleep, I get to sleep an entire minute or so longer. Yippee.
There’s irony in the immutability of the natural laws responsible for the (perceived) randomness of the very events we landscape photographers covet: Earth’s revolution and rotation, our orbiting moon, each predictable in microseconds, set in motion the atmospheric, ocean current, and tidal dynamics that are the catalysts for unpredictable seasons, weather, and waves we photograph. Ironic or not, I love nature’s mixture of precision and randomness. Though I try to maximize my odds for photographically special natural phenomena, understanding that “it” might not (probably won’t) happen only enhances the thrill when something special does happen.
This year Don Smith and I scheduled two Iceland workshops in January. There are many, many reasons to visit Iceland in January, but I think if you were to poll the members of both workshops, each would say their prime reason was the opportunity to photograph the northern lights. The first group hit the aurora jackpot, with back-to-back dazzling displays rivaling anything I’ve ever seen; the second group had a couple of shoots where, if we looked closely at the our LCD screens, we saw a little green on the horizon, but basically the aurora for that group was a swing-and-miss. That second group did enjoy some spectacular photography that the first group didn’t, but I think each of them would have changed places with the other group if given the opportunity.
Another example of Nature’s fickle inclinations is my Grand Canyon monsoon workshops, where (despite all the spectacular Grand Canyon beauty we photograph) the prime goal is lightning. I make it clear to all who sign up that I can’t promise lightning, and more than 2/3 of my groups do get good lightning, but that’s no consolation to the minority who don’t get it. Fortunately, nearly all photographers understand that I have no control over the weather (I can’t believe I need to qualify that with “nearly”).
I’m thinking about this because I’m often asked how I choose the dates for my workshops and photo trips. I avoid weekends because photography and crowds don’t mix; some trips are specifically scheduled for celestial events, like the Milky Way, northern lights, or a moonrise or moonset, while others target seasonal phenomena like fall color or spring flowers.
The bottom line is that, whether it’s a personal trip or photo workshop, (like many nature photographers) I am extremely strategic about my scheduling. Which is why Don and I end up choosing winter for our New Zealand workshops.
Of course I have no doubt that New Zealand is spectacularly beautiful any season. But with snow on the peaks and the Milky Way’s brilliant core visible all night, winter is a no-brainer for me. A winter bonus is that flights are cheaper, lodging is easier, and crowds are low. And it’s really not that cold, at least by most people’s winter expectations. We usually get lows in the low/mid 30s, and highs in the 40s and 50s. Rain and fog are possible (we’ve seen more fog than rain), and snow has been extremely rare (we visit a few places with snow on the ground, but I can’t remember it ever actually snowing on us).
The image I’m sharing today is from this year’s New Zealand workshop’s first day. The clouds were a tremendous addition to this already lovely view of Lake Wakatipu, the (nearby) Humboldt Mountains, and the (distant) Southern Alps. While snow on the peaks wasn’t as prominent as in previous years, it was certainly enough to enhance the scene.
My original plan was to not photograph at all this evening, but at the last minute I grabbed my camera bag—just in case an irresistible opportunity to photograph presented itself. I spent most of my time working with the group—pretty typical for a workshop’s first evening. But as I started making suggestions to others for ways to handle the scene—not just what was happening at that moment, but also anticipating what could be coming—I started envisioning some things I might like to try. And when it became clear everyone was done with me (it can reach a point where my input, no matter how well-intentioned, is a distraction), I went to my bag and pulled out my Sony a1 body, 16 – 35 GM lens, and tripod.
The main vantage point was already packed with our group, so rather than jam myself in, I wandered about 50 feet back down the hill to an elevated natural rock platform just off the trail. This was not an “official” vista, but I could tell by the well-worn path that I wasn’t wasn’t blazing any new trails.
As I scanned the beautiful scene, I thought to myself that these are just the conditions we hope for when we schedule the New Zealand winter workshop. But matching the right scene with the right conditions is only half my job—I still needed to build an image.
There were pros and cons to this new location: the pros were the way the hill dropped abruptly, making the foreground shrubs less of an obstacle than they are at the main view, as well as the nicely textured rock at my feet; the cons were the way the photographer-packed vista on the right obstructed much of the view up the lake toward the Southern Alps.
With the sun such a prominent component of this view, I decided to lean into it and make that a focal point of my image. More than a little concerned about the clouds cutting too much light to make a sunstar, I decided to go for it anyway and stopped down to f/18. The right side of my frame was determined by my desire to eliminate the viewing platform. With the sun’s strong visual presence as far from the right side as I could make it, I was concerned that going too wide on the left would throw the image off balance, so I went just wide enough to include all of the mountain reflection.
My frame’s left and right boundaries decided, I just had to pick the foreground/sky balance. When the sun popped out and warmed the nearby rocks, I decided to give the rocks and clouds equal billing. Turns out my concern about the clouds diminishing the sunstar were valid—I only got a handful of frames with any sunstar at all, and the one you see here, while mushier than I like, was about as good as it got.
Join Don Smith and me in New Zealand next year
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Right Place, Right time
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Eloquent Images by Gary Hart 
Nice blog, Gary.
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