Brown bear and a big landscape
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Category Archives: Adventures
Grizzlies in the mist
Grizzly bear, Ursus arctos. A large adult male grizzly bear stands in dawn’s early light, shrouded in fog on a cool fall morning. Brown bear, Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
We were treated to some gorgeous soft light in the cool fall mornings on our recent grizzly bears photo tour. Fortunately for our group, no one had any troubles with lenses fogging up, which can wreak havoc on shooting early, cold mornings. The ethereal, moody experience of standing in the mist in near silence, watching the bears go about their morning, was really a special experience we all were grateful for. The photos were just the icing on the cake. And this bear? Ted, the coolest bear in the whole wide world. Ever. 🙂
I’ve shot this bear a number of years now, and it’s always exciting to see him on the river again. He’s a beautiful animal, and I’m lucky to have had so many great opportunities to see and photograph him.
Thanks Ted.
Cheers
Carl
Grizzly bear and the Alaskan Landscape
Why you need a bear photo guide
Brown bear, Ursus arctos, and a wildlife photographer, walking along a road in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
Just a fun photo to show you that this grizzly bear photography isn’t as easy as it looks. Here’s an experienced Alaskan wildlife photographer setting off trying to find a bear to photograph.
You might THINK it’s easy to find a 800lb brown bear, but such isn’t the case. Take a guide who knows what he’s doing with you so this photo isn’t you on your next photo trip. 🙂
Cheers
Carl
Northern lights and fall colors
Northern lights, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
Here’s another image from a recent sojourn to Wrangell-St. Elias National Park to see and photograph the northern lights, or Aurora borealis. It was a treat to have a moonlit night to shoot by, providing plenty of ambient light to capture the fall colors as well as the northern lights.
This trip was a wild ride. A mad run from Anchorage to the Glennallen area Continue reading
Brown bear at Sunset
Arrigetch Peaks at first light
Arrigetch Peaks at dawn, Gates of the Arctic National Park, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
Here’s another photo from the trip to the Arrigetch Peaks we took back in August. This scene appealed to me, the light striking the underside of the crags’ overhang, yet most of the rock in shade. It was a wonderful morning, with some gorgeous early light that disappeared all too soon, the sun spent most of the day behind this ridge, but the view up and down the valley was simply stunning.
I hope to get back to this area sometime in the summer of 2012, and shoot it some more. Fantastic landscape. I think the fall is a great time to visit the arctic; earlier in summer the sun doesn’t get as low in the sky, which means the light doesn’t get quite as subtle as it does in the “shoulder seasons”, so we’ll probably head up there in August or September again some time. Look for a possible photo tour announcement coming this winter. I’ll keep you posted here for sure, but the trip will be run through Expeditions Alaska; awesome backcountry travel company! 🙂
Cheers
Carl
Mount Saint Elias Photo
Mount Saint Elias, 18 008′ high, stands tall in the evening light over an unnamed glacier, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, Alaska – aerial photo. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
Well, just back from 2 weeks to photographing brown bears in Katmai National Park, and I’m off again already; I’ll be gone for some time on this trip, 4 weeks down along the coastline of Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, where I will meet up with Erin and Hig, of Ground Truth Trekking. They’re spending 2 months in the area, Â finding out
“what would it be like to live on ice? In the fall of 2011 we will set out to spend two months living on the shifting, melting surface of North America’s largest glacier, along with our two young children.
Trekking between a series of camps on the Malaspina Glacier, on Alaska’s remote and harsh Lost Coast, we will explore this dramatic and wild landscape, weather the fall storms, and document climate change in action.”
Pretty cool stuff. Continue reading
Wrangell-St. Elias aerial photo
Wrangell mountains, fall colors, sedimentation rock layers ad striations, aerial photo, Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
An abstract aerial shot of the Wrangell Mountains, with a little fall color thrown in. Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve, Alaska.
I’d actually asked the pilot to fly us up in this area in the hope to find a particular glacial scene I wanted to reshoot, but the great patterns and colors along the ridges above the glacier were more interesting; in part because we didn’t find what I was looking for anyway.
Aerial photography is an exciting challenge; trying to see compositions that work in camera from such an unusual perspective is harder than one might imagine. The sensory overload of flying through such magnificent scenery, Continue reading
Brown bear feeding on salmon
Brown bear eating a Sockeye Salmon. Brown bears love to eat the fat rich skin first, consuming much needed calories for their own winter hibernation. The brown bear here has it’s tongue poking out. Brown bear, Ursus arctos, Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska. Please click on the image above to view a larger version of this photo.
Hey Folks,
Just back from 2 weeks shooting brown bears here in Alaska, and I hardly have time to unpack before I’m heading out on my next trip, but I wanted to post at lease something from the bear photo tour before leaving.
This year I wanted to concentrate on some different kinds of images than I normally shoot, so I shot a lot less, and threw out even more than usual; but I did come away with some photos, I think, that I’ll be happy with. I still haven’t looked over all of them yet, but I know I made at least a couple I will like. Once I get down to editing I’ll try to post a few. Continue reading