Yesterday, the plan was to head out with the family to the cliffs beyond Uluksan to join most of the community for tea. When I got down to Leah's folk's however, Leah and the kids were already in a komatiq ready to pull away, and I got instructions to go with another relative on another machine. I watched them head away and then I waited, and waited, I filled up the machine and I waited. At this point my inner curmudgeon took over and I jumped in the truck and decided that the day was too nice to not do something.
The something turned out to be a hike to the iceberg for my first close looks since it became stranded here last fall. Confronted by several thousand tons of ice, forty feet tall, armed only with a camera and brand new lens what was I to do but take a hundred and fifty or so photos. Luckily for you, I've weeded them down to a dozen or so, and even luckier I've hidden most below the fold. Just in case you subscribe to the the theory that if you've seen one photo of a particular iceberg, you've pretty much seen them all.
This photo was taken as I was walking up, just prior to the photo from the previous post, with the Sun flaring around the top of the iceberg. Notice the water vapour coming off at the top from the warmth of the sun.
It is difficult, in these photos to tell the size of the berg. I'd guess it is about forty feet high from the ice surface.
You can get a sense of the colour of the ice in this photo. Its caused by bubbles of air compressed by the pressure of the glacier. Iceberg ice will "fizz" somewhat in water. Also check out the smooth ice that was under water before shifting centre of mass tilted the iceberg. Oh, and Arctic Bay is visible in the distance.
King George provides the backdrop here.
All but the last two photos in this series were taken with the new wide angle lens. And I'm still getting used to how it stretches the distance between objects. The ice in the foreground is about 2 feet high, and very close to the camera.
It was a warm day, and I ended up not wearing my touque or gloves, and my jacket was undone. Air temperature was about -16C. Note how small the iceberg looks here.
Here is that stretching of distance. In this picture I'm only about 10 feet farther away from the camera than I was is in the previous shot. I'm still a fair distance from the iceberg.
St George Society Cliffs in the Background.
Now compare that with this moderate telephoto shot, look how the telephoto compresses the distance.
Part of Arctic Bay in the background.
Comments
2 responses
Playing with the different lenses is part of the fun with the fancy cameras.
Nice photos.
It is part of the fun. Although I do say I miss film, because I wouldn’t have near as many images to sort through at the end of the day. Thanks M&M.