A photo portrait from a family trip through Romania and Bulgaria. Each country was distinctly different from the other due to different influences in their histories and modern-day trajectories. In Romania, we largely spent our time in the gorgeous Transylvania region with its Saxon-influenced architecture, folklore (you might be familiar with Dracula), and the mountainous countryside that linked our journey from town to town. In Bulgaria, we journeyed cross-country to visit more diverse parts of the country, including the mind-boggling rock formations of Belogradchick, the Medieval city of Veliko Tarnovo, the seaside resort town of Sozopol and the Madara national historical-archeological reserve.
Here in our mountain landscapes, there exist individuals whose passion is as big as the peaks that cradle them. These intrepid souls are artisans of altitude; their canvas is the very terrain that challenges them. Here are just a few of my favourite images from over the years.
I’ve been photographing ice since the very early stages of my career. Whether glaciers, ice caves, frozen lakes, or mountaintops, I would continuously find myself drawn to cold landscapes in search of ice in its many forms, textures, and hues. Icescapes are among the most dynamic, visually exciting, and rewarding places a photographer can document. But as I spent more time shooting ice, it became apparent that I was capturing something that is vanishing.
Rust-red roofs and sand-coloured buildings set again the azure blue of the Adriatic Seas. Quaint and historic towns that feel like a storybook in real life. Wild skies and crashing waves that keep a photographer on his toes. This, in a nutshell, was our family trip through the Western Balkans.
On a mission to document vanishing ice across the globe, I found myself in Ecuador back in February — a South American nation named for its position on the Equator. You may wonder why I’m chasing ice on the Equator, but Ecuador is home to Andean peaks towering up to 6,310 metres. It turns out that the country’s stratovolcanoes are home to a number of receding glaciers.
Iceland has long captivated me with its dramatic landscapes shaped by volcanic activity. Even before I became a photographer, I was enthralled by this island. At the conclusion of my undergrad in Earth and Ocean Sciences, I walked across Iceland and became familiar with its rugged terrain. Since then, I have returned several times, including this month when the Sundhnúkagígar eruption occurred.
Nestled on the edge of the Arctic, where the icy embrace of the Hudson Bay meets the rugged terrain of the Canadian wilderness, lies Churchill, Manitoba. Known as the "Polar Bear Capital of the World" and a prime destination for witnessing the Northern Lights, Churchill had been on my bucket list for years. I was finally able to make the trip in November 2023.
I started talking, half-jokingly, about trying to isolate an iceberg, which I know wouldn't be an easy task. But Jesse is always super keen to make my ideas come to life. He suggested that we could isolate an iceberg through a mix of towing and paddling. But, all we had for paddling was a hiking pole. As for towing, he suggested that he could place an ice screw into an iceberg, tie that to a rope and then we would be able to tow it from shore.
It seems impossible to take a bad photo in Mongolia. With towering sand dunes that glow during magic hour, vast landscapes that seem to stretch on for eternity, and welcoming people who share their traditional way of life and—a photographer will find endless possibilities. It’s no wonder that OFFBEAT returned to the “Land of the Eternal Blue Sky” this June to host two photography workshops: The Gobi Desert and The Wild West.
I shot this self-portrait earlier this week during an overnight adventure into a rarely visited corner of Kootenay National Park. The traverse from the world-famous Lake O'Hara, in British Columbia, to the even more famous Moraine Lake, in Alberta is undertaken by a handful of parties every year. Here’s the story behind the image!
This time around, play time meant finding ourselves camping on the Greenland ice sheet for three nights, about 50 kilometres away from the closest settlement, Kangerlussuaq. Our main purpose over those few days was to document supraglacial lakes, these surreal, turquoise bodies of water that have proliferated along the edge of the ice cap recently.
I took this black-and-white on a shooting marathon at Mount Assiniboine a few years ago. I only had two nights in the area and the conditions were so good I went without sleep to make the most of the opportunity. I went everything over those 48 hours: in thunderstorms, fresh snow, aurora borealis, inversions, fogbows, you name it. And it was late September, that time of year when the larches are glowing gold – arguably the best time of year for photography in Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park.
