“Arrow to the Sun” — Death Valley National Park, California, USA.

On our 12-day Southwest trip, led by photographer Marc Adamus, the focus was on adapting to the weather. Every day Marc would look at the weather maps, including live satellite and radar views, and make decisions to drive hundreds of miles, often backtracking, to see the best sunsets and sunrises. Indeed we had already passed through Death Valley a few days before, into the Eastern Sierra, but we drove 200 miles back for the opportunity of this sunset, and it was probably the best of the trip.

“The Fortress” — South Greenland.

While this iceberg was actually fairly small, it was undoubtedly the most amazing ice structure I saw during my time in Greenland. I mean, look at it!! I have no idea what would cause such perfect jagged forms.

“An Invitation to Dance” — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

“And to be delightful is not some factor of trying to make yourself look delightful. It is to do things that are delightful to you.” - Alan Watts, The Web of Life, Part 15: An Invitation to Dance

Taken on our 2nd night backpacking, much of the evening (and the next) we spent on this unnamed frozen lake, with real air temperatures around 0F (-18C) and wind chill 10-20 degrees lower than that. This was a spectacular auroral substorm with the aurora moving rapidly over the entire sky like electric currents, bright enough to read a book!

Aurora is often described as a dancing lady, and here I think the aurora actually looks like a woman dancing in a flowing dress, which is why I called this image “An Invitation to Dance”. At the same time, the phrase reminds me of the lecture of the same name by Alan Watts that I’ve quoted above, and this was, without a doubt, one of the most delightful experiences of my life.

Sastrugi — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

Shot at sunset on the first evening of a 7-day winter backpacking tour led by Marc Adamus. On that tour I learned this word - sastrugi - a Russian word to describe patterns in the snow formed by wind, just like this one.

Cactus Sunrise — Arizona, USA.

This image, like many of my other photographs, uses a technique called “focus-stacking” to improve the sharpness of the image. A camera lens isn’t capable of capturing the entire depth of some compositions with good sharpness, so multiple shots are taken at different focal distances and blended together.

However, this image was uniquely difficult. It’s a handheld focus-stack (no tripod), which isn’t that special, but with these cholla cacti, even a millimeter of movement means that the needles will align very differently, so the blending has to be done by hand in Photoshop. It was impossible to set up a tripod here though, because there’s a large cactus directly below the camera too, so I needed to extend my arms over it, control my breathing, and take two images while carefully turning the focus ring, doing my best to move the camera as little as possible.

Bay Bridge Dusk — San Francisco, California, USA.

A three-image panorama, shot briefly after sunset using a Mavic Pro drone. On the left is the Bay Bridge, with Salesforce Tower being the tallest building, and the Transamerica pyramid on the right.

Mount St. John — Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming, USA.

I woke up before sunrise this morning to try to get a photo of the Tetons, but the highest peak, known as “The Grand Teton” or just “The Grand”, never emerged from low hanging clouds. I had a beautiful composition set up, and I waited for hours, because the light and atmosphere were amazing, and a part of me knew that it would show as soon I left. But eventually, I needed to continue my drive cross-country, so I couldn’t wait any longer. And I was right, about 10 minutes after I left my spot, I was driving and saw The Grand emerge from the clouds. But wait! I was coming right up on an overlook. I pulled into it, and within a minute from seeing The Grand I was out of my car with camera in hand… but it was gone already. So I snapped this picture of Mount St. John, but I actually really like the alternating layers and depth of this image.

A remote location in the Chilean fjords of Patagonia, many miles from civilization, without even any trails. One of the most beautiful and pristine wildernesses I’ve ever seen.

Utah Badlands Sunrise — Central Utah, USA.

This is definitely one of the luckier shots of my trip to the Southwest. I didn’t feel too inspired by this location from the ground, because we were on the higher plateau to the right and looking out towards flatter areas. I thought it would be more interesting to fly the drone and capture the cliffs and formations looking back towards us. It was my first drone flight of the trip, and I intended to do one “scouting flight”, to get a sense of the compositions, and then do a flight to take more shots.

However, while I remembered to charge multiple batteries, I forgot to charge my remote controller! I realized halfway through my scouting flight, that was the only flight I was going to get. And the light became perfect, so I tried to fire off as many shots as I could in that one flight, including this panorama, made from 7 images in portrait orientation. If I’m being honest, I wasn’t sure how this would look after I stitched the images together, but I couldn’t be happier with the final composition.

If you want this image as a desktop background, check out this blog post.

Last Sunset — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

Aspen — San Juan Mountains, Colorado, USA.

Photographing forests is not something I’m good at, but I definitely got a lot of practice on this trip. I took hundreds of shots, and this might be the one I dislike the least.

Ice Bubbles and Tombstone — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

An unexpected treat of this trip were the incredible ice bubbles we found on every lake of the entire trip, surpassing those of even the famous Abraham Lake in the Canadian Rockies, and with far more impressive mountain backdrops.

American Alps — Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington, USA.

Taken during my first solo backpacking trip ever, and also my single best day of photography, this image is a reminder to me of why they refer to the North Cascade mountains as the “American Alps”. With jagged peaks, tall cascading waterfalls, and lush greens, this looked to me more like say, Switzerland, than anywhere else I’ve been in the US.

Aurora over Mt. Monolith — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

Our very first night backpacking in Tombstone. I really struggled to find a composition I was happy with, but Panos Laskarakis, one of my favorite wildlife photographers ever (or as he calls them, “aniscapes”), found this really awesome cracked boulder pointing towards Monolith.

For full-disclosure, the aurora in this image was composited from a previous night. However, the aurora over this mountain was actually even more spectacular, but its high-speed made it incredibly difficult to capture, so I used a shot of aurora that was more slowly moving. Additionally, I took care to make sure that the compass direction of the images was approximately the same, since the shape of aurora is oriented around the magnetic North Pole.

Sunset Ridge — Olympic National Park, Washington, USA.

Although this is a relatively popular day-hike, it was probably the “closest” wildlife encounter I’ve had on any of my hikes. Until recently, this area to be overrun with mountain goats, and they were quite aggressive towards people. As I was hiking up, I noticed a family of them up ahead on the trail.

I decided to stop, keep a safe distance, and wait to see if they would get off the trail. While I was waiting, another group of goats came down onto the trail behind me, so I was trapped! And one of the goats started jogging towards me.

I decided to go off the side of the trail, down a scree slope, which wasn’t in of itself dangerous, but I knew if the goat followed me off the trail, I would not be able to move fast. Fortunately the goat stopped right where I had been, and looked down at me, as if to taunt me or mark its territory.

I’ve since heard, and this may be apocryphal, that mountain goats were introduced to Olympic NP by humans in order to hunt them. Because the mountains in Olympic don’t have enough natural salt licks, they are attracted to the sweat and urine of people. At the time, I was covered in sweat, hiking uphill aggressively to make it in time for sunset, so it makes sense why the goat came towards me. Of course, I made it for sunset, with the help of some other hikers who scared the goats off, and I was treated to one of the best mountain views I’d ever seen.

Since then, the goats have been helicoptered from Olympic NP to North Cascades NP.

Lone Tree - Yukon Territory, Canada.

Taken from a moving car on our way back to Whitehorse. If we didn’t need to catch our flights out, it would have been a great morning for more moody photography.

Haifoss — Iceland.

While neither the tallest nor the most powerful waterfall I saw in Iceland, Haifoss was undoubtedly favorite. The combination of height and power (3rd and 2nd in Iceland, respectively), as well as the remoteness and beautifully carved canyon, made such a strong impression.

Rodrigo and the Shark’s Tooth — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

An image of talented photographer Rodrigo Viveros, whom I had the pleasure of meeting on this trip, in front of the famous Shark’s Tooth face. I had no intention of taking a picture of Rodrigo here, I was just testing this composition, but I was lucky he ended up being right in the middle of the frame, and with such a great pose!

For full disclosure, this is one of my images which is not representative of a real scene that I saw. The snow, ice, Rodrigo, and the mountain were all in the original photograph, however the fog and some of the low clouds were added in Photoshop to give the scene a different atmosphere.

If you want this image as a desktop background, check out this blog post.

Cholla at Sunset — Superstition Mountains, Arizona, USA.

If you ever decide to go hiking in Arizona, my two tips are 1. wear thick boots and 2. bring tweezers. Because these “jumping” cholla cacti are as nasty as they are beautiful! Almost every person I was with on this trip got stuck by one, and you cannot remove the spines with your bare hands, tweezers or pliers are necessary.

In fact, while setting up this shot and waiting for the light, a little spiny ball on the ground attached itself to the side of my hiking shoe, went through the shoe, the sock, and a few millimeters into my foot. It wasn’t a huge deal, they’re not poisonous, but if you’re not careful it could be much worse.

Moonrise Self-Portrait — Tasermiut Fjord, South Greenland.

This image is available in higher-resolution as a desktop background, in this blog post. This image received a “Silver Award” in the 2018 Epson International Pano Awards competition.

Aspen in Morning Light — San Juan Mountains, Colorada, USA.

“Sublimination” — South Greenland.

I absolutely loved this iceberg for its subtle lines and forms, although it wasn’t as overtly spectacular as the others I have photos of here, I thought it was sublime.

For (probably unnecessary) disclosure, this is one of the few images on my site that is not representative of a real scene I saw. This photo was taken neither at sunset nor sunrise, instead on a flat cloudy day, and the color was added in Photoshop.

Sunset on an Eroded Mountain — Colorado.

A big credit for this image goes to Andrei Trocan, who not only invited me on this trip with him to Colorado, but knew exactly the right time to photograph this composition.

“Sierpinski Valley” — South Greenland.

Probably my most seen image, due to it being shown on Chromecasts and on some television sets. This is a spectacular valley, with dozens of peaks visible in all directions, that Max Rive took our group to in South Greenland. Far from accessible, it required a private boat to one end of the valley, and approximately 6 hours of off-trail hiking (one way) to reach this place, our campsite for the night. Additionally we’d hired an Inuit polar bear hunter to stay guard for the night.

I call this image “Sierpinski Valley” for two reasons. First, I don’t want to reveal the real Inuit name of the valley. That’s out of respect for Max’s efforts to find this area and take us here, and out of respect for the locals who also occasionally come through this valley, I wouldn’t want it to become “touristy”, as touristy as something that requires backpacking in Greenland could be. And second, the image reminds me of the Sierpinski Triangle, with its subdividing triangular forms.

This image also received a Silver in the 2018 Epson Panorama Awards competition.

If you want this image as a desktop background, check out this blog post.

Aspenglow — San Juan Mountains, Colorado, USA.

When I first arrived in Colorado for this trip, I was awestruck at the yellow aspen all around. Walking through woods like, the perfectly golden leaves would disperse the light and glow. It felt like being in a fairytale. I wanted to take one photo that captured that feeling, that gave the sense of magic of being there, and this was the best I could muster.

Sunset over Downtown and Bay Bridge — San Francisco, California, USA.

This image is a panorama taken with a DJI Mavic Pro, flown from Treasure Island. The unusual, subtle, beams of light between the buildings are not from mist or fog as you might expect in San Francisco, but smoke from wildfires in Northern California… something which is becoming unfortunately more common since I grew up there.

Cataract Falls — Marin County, California, USA.

A popular hiking trail in Marin, two friends and I decided to hike up the valley formed by these falls in February 2017, after an enormous rainy season nearly ended California’s multi-year drought. However we didn’t make it very far, because this spot was so beautiful and photogenic, especially with the morning light breaking down into the valley.

The Girl and the Volcano — Thórsmörk, Iceland.

The best view I saw in Iceland.

Sentinel — Tasermiut Fjord, South Greenland.

Photographer Urs Zihlmann stands up against the backdrop of the incredible Ulamertorsuaq peak on a foggy morning.

Morning Break — South Greenland.

Taken on our last morning camping in South Greenland. As we were waiting for a boat to pick us up and bring us back to civilization, the light broke through the clouds on the fjord in the distance. This trip was such an incredible, life-changing experience for me, and this was a fantastic end.

Hall of Mosses — Olympic National Park, Washington, USA.

In general, as a landscape photographer, I dislike doing photography around many other people. There are a lot of reasons for this, chief among them is that it damages the experience of being in nature for me, which makes me less inspired to capture a memory.

Another reason is that I’m self-conscious, although I’m getting better at that. The Hall of Mosses is an incredibly popular, crowded, family-friendly trail, though spectacular. But camping at the campgrounds adjacent to the trail, my friend Jake Schual-Berke and I were able to come early morning on a Monday, and spent over an hour on the 1-mile trail without seeing another person. In order to get this shot, I actually lay down at the base of this tree to find a perspective I liked, something I never would’ve done with strangers around.

Max's View — South Greenland.

Most likely the best view I’ve ever seen in my life. This spot was made famous (yet no more accessible) by Max Rive’s photo Somewhere Only We Know. This was my attempt to copy that image on Max’s tour, with Max standing by me, and afterwards he helped me to process the image!

Max’s original is the only photo that I can say truly changed my life. If you want to read more about why, I talk about it in the About Me section of this site.

If you want this image as a desktop background, check out this blog post.

Iceberg and a Duck — South Greenland.

One of the largest icebergs we saw in South Greenland (although the icebergs in other areas of the country are much bigger), this was truly a sight to behold. If you look very closely, near the middle of the image is a duck swimming in the water. I think it helps to give the image a bit of a sense of scale. I also love how this iceberg is textured and yet so smooth, it almost looks computer-generated.

Sunset in the North Cascades — Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington, USA.

Another image taken on my first solo backpacking trip, and “best day of photography” ever, from the same location as the others, but facing a different direction!

Flowers and Mountains— Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington, USA.

This is probably my favorite image taken from my first solo backpacking trip and best ever day of photography. To me this shows the absolute best of the North Cascades, and why they are tied with Glacier National Park for my favorite mountains in the continental US.

Smoky Sunset in Assiniboine — Mt. Assiniboine Provincial Park, BC, Canada.

I have so much to say about this image… this was the first night of the first backpacking trip I went on, ever, and it was the first trip I ever went on explicitly for the purpose of landscape photography. And yet despite my inexperience, this is one of my favorite photos I’ve taken, due to some truly exceptional circumstances.

Significant wildfires had just begun nearby, and the smoke was being blown in, creating these incredible light rays, while still maintaining visibility of Mt. Assiniboine. If we had come the day before, it would’ve been less spectacular, and the day after, you couldn’t have seen Assiniboine. Because the smoke rolled in at just the right time, not earlier in the day, or at night, this is a photograph that would be difficult to ever replicate.

This image also placed in the Amateur Top 50 of the 2018 Epson International Pano Awards.

I need to thank my friend Jake Schual-Berke for this, because he went with me on this trip and showed me the ropes of backpacking. He tolerated a bunch of my complaining, especially about a poorly-fitting pack, not having enough snacks, and he also carried all the cooking equipment, shared meals, and so on. This trip wouldn’t have been possible without him.

Dramatic Skies over the Shark’s Tooth — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

Sunrise in the American Alps — Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington, USA.

Another image from my best day of photography ever, this one of sunrise. I woke up about 30 minutes before sunrise, to a completely clear sky, but this planar sheet of cloud FLEW in at incredible speeds just in time to catch all the light! As I saw this happening, I was literally laughing out loud, I couldn’t believe my luck after such a great afternoon and evening of shooting the previous day.

Midnight Sunset — Kirkjufellsfoss, Iceland.

On my trip to Iceland, I had no real intention of photographing Kirkjufellsfoss, having seen hundreds of other photos. What could I possibly add? But I was staying in a hostel nearby with my girlfriend, and our room exploded with light from the sunset, so I felt I had to go out. Fortunately, this was close to the summer solstice, when sunsets would last a ridiculously long time, so it took me over 30 minutes to get here. As I expected, it was literally shoulder to shoulder with photographers, nowhere to even set up a tripod. So I stuck my hands between some other tripods, took maybe 3 images, and left.

Remarkably, despite being handheld at 1/5 second, this photo came out really sharp, and despite the popularity of this place, for such a great sky and sun positioning, I like the photo.

Quiet Night — Tombstone Territorial Park, Yukon Territory, Canada.

Our third night of the Yukon trip. While I am happy with this image, it also represents the greatest regret of my entire photography journey. On this evening I stayed up until 1 AM, and because the aurora was faint and simple like in this photograph, hardly moving from this one spot, I decided to go to sleep in my tent. Those who stayed up, were treated to one of the greatest aurora shows they’d ever seen, starting at around 2:30 and lasting hours.

Additionally, high winds that day had blown snow off the ice and created spectacular foreground and reflection opportunities like this one, and most of the people who stayed up had the best night of photography of their entire lives.

The title is almost a joke about that. The image depicts a “quieter” showing of aurora than some of my other pictures from previous nights, but additionally, I wish that I had woken up instead of sleeping through the night 😅.

Autumn Sunset in the Woods — Brighton, Michigan, USA.

This image is definitely quite a happy accident. I looked up a park, about 30 minutes away from my home, to photograph fall colors in sunset. I typed in the name of the park to Google Maps, and a weird bug happened that I’d never seen before. The location Google showed me for that park was correct, but when I started the navigation directions, it changed the location completely! It took me somewhere else, a few miles away from where I had intended. Still, with light running out, I decided to hike through the woods, and came upon this spot.

Smoky Sunset — Banff National Park, AB, Canada.

Taken the day after this image in Assiniboine, backpacking out of Assiniboine park back to our car. We stayed in an old cabin near here, and it was pretty interesting to photograph sunset in these smoky conditions. I thought it made for interesting layering show the shapes of these mountains. This was a really spectacular valley, not very photographed due to the remoteness of it. Unlike Assiniboine, which you can reach with a subsidized helicopter trip (which is what we did - flew in and backpacked out), you have to hike a considerable distance to reach this valley.

Sunset over a Stream — Banff National Park, AB, Canada.

Glymur — Iceland.

Glymur was the tallest waterfall in Iceland until 2007, when glacial melting revealed a taller one (Morsárfoss), but it’s still the tallest that you can hike to the top of. One warning though: put on a ton of bug spray, and cover yourself. The midges (black flies) are brutal, and I got a lot of bite marks on my hands, because I hadn’t covered the top of them in enough bug spray.

Lupine at Sunset — Iceland.

Although I see many photos of lupine flowers in Iceland, I see few that convey the utter vastness of it, in some places fields that seem to extend forever. This was one such place that I happened to be driving by at sunset, with the last light hitting the clouds.

Flowers — Lofoten Islands, Norway.

If you know the name of these flowers… let me know! Maybe shoot me a message on Instagram. I would love to have something better to call this image.

Sunrise on the Eastern Sierra — Owens River Valley, California, USA.

I can’t believe that I lived in California for 20 years and never visited the Owens Valley until this past December. With the Eastern Sierra on the west side and White Mountains on the east, both going over 10,000 feet above the valley floor, this is the deepest valley in the United States! Pictures don’t really capture the grand expansiveness of being there.

The North Face of the Eiger — Grindelwald, Switzerland.

Polar Vortex — Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA.

I don’t photograph a lot around my home, but sometimes unique weather conditions inspire me. This was the last morning of the so called “polar vortex” in early 2018, when Ann Arbor went from a relatively mild winter (rarely freezing or snowing) to dropping down to -20F, and no, that’s not even including wind chill! It gave me an idea, to photograph Barton Dam, hoping that ice had formed around the dam.

So I went out the last morning of the polar vortex to photograph sunrise. It was only 0F, which I was well-prepared for thanks to the Yukon trip a few months earlier. But I had no idea that it would look like this! Due to the mild winter overall, the water flow was still extremely high, forming incredibly beautiful mist which then froze as rime ice, covering all the nearby surfaces. And then the sun came up, and the mist glowed, and it made my favorite image I’ve taken in Michigan.

Bench in the Fall — Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA.

Stormy Sunset — Lofoten Islands, Norway.

Mount Judge Howay at Dusk — Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington, USA.

Another image from my first solo backpacking trip, looking over the Canadian border at the distinctive twin peaks of Mount Judge Howay, 50 miles away.

Confluence of Seasons — Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA.

Another photograph of unusual conditions in Ann Arbor, this was shot in mid-November 2019, the day after Ann Arbor had the most single-day snowfall in November ever. In this part of Southeastern Michigan, there isn’t much overlap of winter and fall. Unlike in other places, most of autumn color in the leaves has fallen off the trees before much snow starts coming in. So I drove around, hoping to find an image which captured this unusual circumstance. This image doesn’t really show much fall color, but I think that it’s still unusual for the standing corn stalks and soft snow on the ground. And it’s certainly unique within my photography, far more minimalist than my usual work.

The editing of this photo was partially inspired by the work of Benjamin Everett, one of my favorite photographers/digital artists.

Mossy Maple — Hall of Mosses Trail, Olympic National Park, Washington.

Mount Baker — Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, Washington, USA.

Storm Clouds Engulfing Puʻu Kukui — West Maui Mountains, Hawaii, USA.

Vertical panorama taken with a DJI Mavic Pro.