so Adam and I just about to hit this frozen waterfall because it's very icy
it's very important to have the appropriate Footwear so that you're safe
so whenever you're on a frozen waterfall always get these ice cleats and make
sure to apply them properly to your Footwear so I'll show you how I put
these on so I always put it on the front first and then you know drab that back
part and pull it over to the back make sure it's really tight and that you've
got them on nice and secure and there you go I'm all set go and do some frozen
waterfall photography so into the frozen canyon we've ventured his royal
grumpiness got busy immediately and he was super excited because he'd never
seen this place before and to see it for the very first time under conditions
like this well I think it's fair to say oh that's Georgia so I brought Adam to
this little grotto this is a place that I found there in the springtime just as
one of those dry fires on the road and we check these temperatures overnight
which recently have been about -10 Celsius
I reckoned that this might actually be quite pretty and it is absolutely
gorgeous so we're gonna work our way up the the stream see if we can somehow
figure out a composition that gets the most out of these beautiful ice
chandeliers it's a little bit trickier because the further back you get this
log kind of cuts across the composition which isn't that pretty
and might compose a vertical that whore column with these in the
foreground but see how it looks so this was the first shot of the day and I
pretty much consider this a practice shot we were a little bit pushed for
time because the second that we arrived and started to find ships in the ice and
start to take those first few shots the snow start to come down very very
quickly and it was beginning to cover things up so rather than devote all my
time and energy to this one composition to refine it I thought I'd better just
kind of walk around the scene and see if I could find something a little bit more
striking a little bit more impressive and I eventually did find that but this is not bad for a first shot
I just had a full blown Fotogasm because I
absolutely love semi frozen waterfalls it's kind of my thing
And on Vancouver Islands when you get these big freezes...
we seem to happen mid February every 4 years, when you get these this is
what you have everywhere and this is the week of the frozen waterfall so I'm
pretty much committed to doing this all week. Anyway, I've just seen another shot
and within this Canyon it seems like the best shots are vertical I love that wall
of ice and moss together in the same shot I would have back up here now
the composite is really nice shot with the water flowing in from the left
so with the second shot of the day I was starting to get a little bit more of an
eye for the place but again I was pushed for time that snow was coming down
rapidly but I love these details I just love that prismatic quality that you get
in the ice but I knew that I could find a better composition and as I was
filming this clip of Adam I looked up and I noticed that tree behind him with
the roots all wrapped in ice and I thought oh let's have a look at this
business
I just can't get enough of details like this.
where you've got the roots of a tree completely
encapsulated in ice it's trust I suppose this
it just tells that story of the motion of water and the change of the seasons
these these shapes I like how they don't say that the snow
is settling on top of it but I much prefer it when it's like this kind of
semi frozen I need
it's just a mass of wine it's nowhere near how beautiful or as
interesting well as I moved up the canyon and got behind that musk of a
tree I finally found it I found my composition and those fangs that you see
that were forming under that log just look like the teeth of some giant sea
creature just tremendous I think the reason why I love ice so much is because
it's a phenomenon it's a demonstration of how powerful nature can be in that it
changes the landscape completely and usually makes it far more beautiful it's
also nature's way of taking a photograph it's a moment frozen in time that won't
last forever and might not even last the night it's almost like having your own
pause button on reality time slows down long enough for the photographer to
capture these fleeting works of art that are never quite rendered the exact same
way again
can I get you
shot
the light feature we advise it side of caution on
we should slightly darker
then you just don't have to worry
it's all just right
goal decisions decisions
while I did check out the Upper Falls but it was too dangerous to reach the
top and the snow was beginning to cover everything in this big blanket of white
we'd only been here for less than two hours but I was already on my seven
hundredths Oni battery as they do boast the power capacity of kitten burps on
the ice it's getting a lot more tricky to put move around like it's super
slippery snow on the ice fresh though is the slipperiest thing ever and then it's
also difficult to photograph because now we've lost quite a lot of the detail and
the way that the light hits the ice because now it's covered in snow it's
and finding it quite tricky to now find compositions that half an hour ago were
quite obvious and now they've started to disappear and we have to get working
faster and try and get more out of this before completely on photograph abour if
there is such a word I think what I like about this shot is that it shows how
winter invades a landscape the way that ice takes over and forms in all
directions I think it's kind of like a living thing that appears to grow on its
host like an alien invader well by now the snow was beginning to make this
place a bit tricky to either shoot or move around in so it's definitely time
to move on to the next shooting location which was the magic of opana caves where
I'd had a shot in mind for years so he got back in the plunder bus and
drove from the middle of nowhere to nowhere in particular and by now we were
both definitely in need of a thunder throne the best thing about winter is
that these wilderness toilets don't smell too bad that the smart the cold
keeps the smell down fur in the summer what you do not want to be going in
these things that can help it
yeah he actually wasn't that bad and it didn't even really pong that much but I
am glad that I brought my own shit tickets so we hit the trail to Impaler
caves and headed straight for the main cave with its amazing cast topography
which creates these spectacular rock formations
once again the ice really added a new layer of beauty to the cave but it also
came with its own perilous dangers as my bomb was about to find out
descending those cold stone steps of the main cave feels a little bit like
descending into a dark and dangerous dimension
look at the bounce of that you know it's sad for when you bounce back off of a
rock-hard stone oh that was brutal I tell you what though my ego was
bruised but it was my hand that I actually heard not my bat see well I was
extremely embarrassing I wiped out once again I probably said it not plan
to do that and already hurt so the plan with this is these amazing cast
formations are the subject you know this this beautiful typography that we've got
here we're gonna try and do a little bit of light painting but it's gonna be
better if we come back when it's either blue hour or DAC so that we can really
control all of the light it's quite difficult to shoot this scene when
you've got this big white hot shit hole in the middle of the frame then
everything else is like pure black so we we brought some lights we can do some
light painting I just think it's a little bit too early to get that done
but what a guard just seen I mean look at all this ice as the ice that I wiped
out on but I've been here this summer before but never in the winter and now
because it's winter it's freezing we've got these beautiful columns of ice of
just you know pouring down from the side there's water that's melted and frozen
and wha and melted and frozen and some really cool icicles up there too so that
just adds to the composition and yeah I hold them when it gets a little bit
darker we can control the light and get exactly what we want
so here's a very rough and ready shot of the inside of the cave during daylight
just so that I can show you what it is that I'm dealing with and what I'm
trying to do here by coming back at night I can completely eliminate the
problem of those very complicated looking trees in the background and that
can get very creative with light painting so we decided to kill some time
and check out some of the other caves and did I mention just how much I love
ice and moss together I think I did both myself and sir grump a lot just could
not resist stopping to take a quick shot of this combination of absolute
deliciousness
well I have to confess that after taking that shot I suffered yet another fall on
the ice and it really took it out of me so by the time we got down to this
lowest cave here I just was not feeling it at all so I just had a break let Adam
get his shots and just was killing time until it got dark and if you are a
landscape photographer - I'm pretty sure you'll also know the value of patience
in this game because just as soon as it began to get a little bit dark look what
we found
okay so what we're doing here with families really fascinating stalagmites
of ice which form after the the water that drips off of the ceiling freezes
and gradually filled up and it's always nice to backlight these and if you count
backlight them with natural light then you got it cheating so we brought some
some LED panels to put behind it and it doesn't look so great on the video
because it's totally blown out but when you're shooting stills you can bracket
and get really close up and get some gorgeous texture and capture all the
dynamic range that you need so what what we're doing right now is backlighting it
and shooting with super wide lenses into it and getting some of the cave entrance
what are you doing with your shot you get included a cave or is it just click
the stalagmites no i'm going to include the whole cave entrance this is a really
nice contrast kind of a bluey contrast yeah and you can see that the icicles of
the entrance are all backlit so right just that freaking side but yeah we're
gonna clone out that side but Adam just banged his head really hard so that
means he's now down to only 18 brain cells I don't know how you're gonna cook
are you feeling oh there's no blood dogs uh-uh
I don't think so alright it was hard to watch
so with that shot in the back now it was time to go back to the main cave and
have a crack at capturing that shot that I have been after for years
okay so we where'd four nine times now dark quite obviously and we spent about
an hour trying this composition with backlight on this beautiful shape here
and we've got quite creative with lighting it from different angles and
doing light painting I think it's probably gonna be a bit more juicy what
do you think juice I'd say it was juicy it was everything I'd hoped it would be
I just love it when I plan a shoot and it all comes together to create the shot
that I had in my mind there was so much juice in this shot that had even
forgotten that I popped a grape when I fell on my ass in fact the only thing
that would have made it better is if I'd been wearing a photo tripper t-shirt
which you can purchase right now in my merch stock underneath this video you
know seriously though it's amazing what you can achieve with a little bit of
patience some planning and some very affordable lights I hope you enjoyed
this video I work really hard to create this content and hopefully it inspires
you in some way let me know what you think in the comments like subscribe
tell your friends thanks for watching bye bye
you