EXTREME PHOTOS OF THE WEEK VII

Extreme Photo of the Week
By National Geographic, 22 November 2012.

1. Backcountry Skiing in Arolla, Switzerland

Getting the Shot

"I want people to dream about skiing when they see my work,” says photographer Jérémy Bernard. In 2011, the International Freeski Film Festival, or iF3, launched a photography contest to honour the work of still photographers. In the inaugural year, Bernard captured the Best European Photographer award and returned in 2012 to win Best European Cliché for this picture of skier Nicholas Falquet. "This is the second time for me to get an award at IF3. That’s an honour for me - it means that people like my work and are touched by it," Bernard says.

Near the end of a ski season with tumultuous weather, Bernard was on "stand by" in Arolla, Switzerland, with Falquet brothers Nicholas and Loris, waiting for a weather window to allow the trio to be dropped by heli at the top of a mountain.

“Spring light is still really soft in the morning on the north to northeast face of the mountain, so we got nice contrast and kept details in the shadows, while the sky was pitch black," Bernard says. "On top of that, I was just surrounded by big faces all covered with white snow. It’s like a big reflector was just pointing at the skier and lighting him a bit."

After shooting an initial line, Bernard noticed this scene to his left and asked Nicolas if it was safe to ski with the ice cliff below. Nicholas gave the OK and made the run. “A day like this morning happens twice in a whole season," Bernard says. "You just have to take your chance and don't let it go!”

Bernard photographed using a Canon EOS-1D Mark IV and f/2.8L USM, 70-200mm lens.

2. Canyoneering Monmouth Creek, British Columbia, Canada

“This was just one moment of a challenging descent down 16 rappels with rushing waterfalls, nature-carved rock slides, and cliff jumps,” says veteran canyoneer Damien Briguet, whose dozen years in the sport include six working professionally out of Switzerland. “The water below was nice, but really cold - just ask the fish in the pool!” Briguet is seen in the "cave” of Monmouth Creek, located just outside of Squamish and about an hour north of Vancouver, British Columbia. “I'm part of a small canyoneering community in Vancouver. This is a new sport in western Canada, and we are all really excited to discover more wet canyons.”

Getting the Shot

Photographer Francois-Xavier De Ruydts met Briguet for the first time just a few days before the duo decided to explore the undescended Monmouth Creek. “That's what exploration is about,” says De Ruydts. “Basically, you don't know what you're doing or where you're going. Nobody knows what's around the corner. Exploration of canyons is a [huge] commitment - most of the time, the only way out is down.”

He calls Monmouth "a real natural wonder" with "16 rappels ranging from 5 meters to 45 meters. As the bird flies, it is no more than 500 meters long, but the elevation gain is about 600 meters. It is a very steep canyon."

The first full descent took a total of two days. “Managing your camera exposure is a nightmare in canyons. The water is almost pure white, the wetsuits are almost always black, and [the space] is often not more than ‘not very dark,’ says De Ruydts. “I shot this image from a very, very tricky spot. I was attached to my rope, standing in a super-slippery toboggan, which had been carved by water. The tripod was standing on this almost vertical rock and attached to my harness … that was pretty uncomfortable."

De Ruydts photographed with a Nikon D700 and carried a Nikkor f/2.8, 24-70mm lens and a Nikkor 50mm lens.

3. Backcountry Skiing, North Cascades, Washington, USA

After a slow start to the 2012 Washington State ski season, photographer Ian Coble and skier Tyler Ceccanti knew an approaching storm system meant snow was on the way to the North Cascades area.

As a former local resident, Coble knows the terrain well. "I've always loved this grove of trees," he says.

The day of the shoot, in early January 2012, Coble battled flat lighting conditions in the storm and was preparing to move locations when he saw this shot. "Right before I put my camera away, I wanted to take a few shots of the trees for scenic [photos]," he says. "When I aimed my camera into the sky, it added a contrast to the otherwise white landscape."

Then Ceccanti made the 20-foot jump, and Coble was ready.

"It was snowing incredibly hard when I shot this," he says. "I couldn't hold my lens in this position for long or it would get soaked with snow. I composed the shot, pre-focused on the pillow [Tyler hit], and then brought my camera down to shield the lens. Once Tyler got about 20 feet from the take-off, I lifted my camera and recomposed at the last second. … It's the only way I could keep the lens clean."

Coble photographed with a Nikon D3 and 14-24mm lens.

4. Free Climbing the Phoenix Wall, Vampire Peaks, Northwest Territories, Canada

“I was thinking about carefully placing my foot on a little crystal because the finger-size crack I was holding on to was muddy and slippery,” recalls climber Jeff Achey, seen halfway up the first free ascent of the 2,500-foot Phoenix wall in the Vampire Peaks.

The Vampire Peaks are remote granite towers about 25 miles from the Cirque of the Unclimbables in Canada’s Northwest Territories. Climbers, noting the Phoenix wall’s large chest, its prow, and its long “wings” that soar from the side, aptly named the formation. The range’s granite has protruding, walnut-size crystals that climbers can stand on and grab. “Those nice crystals are also pretty sharp - like little vampire bat fangs, actually,” says Achey.

Getting to prize, unclimbed terrain rife with first ascents like this was no small feat. Achey, who is based in New Castle, Colorado, drove more than 50 hours with expedition leader Pat Goodman to join Jeremy Collins and photographer James Q Martin in Watson Lake, Canada. They then flew 50 miles by bush plane to a put-in on the Nahanni River, where they rafted a hundred miles down the Class IV white-water river. Finally they took an eight-mile helicopter ride to the base of the wall.

Getting the Shot

“I always dreamed of climbing the aesthetic and remote Cirque of the Unclimbables,” recalls photographer and climber James Q Martin. “When I was invited to the Vampire Spires, the Cirque’s lesser known peaks, I jumped on the chance. Although I never reached the Cirque, I was stoked to have the opportunity to be part of free climbing one of North America’s biggest unclimbed walls.

“On the helicopter ride into the mountain range, I saw the transparent glacier lake and immediately knew the glacier lake would offer a beautiful complement to my photos,” say Martin. The team fixed a thousand feet of rope before starting the first free ascent. After battling wet weather conditions, the team returned two days later for the historic climb. “The colour in the flora and fauna, due to the earlier rain, gave everything a vibrant glow, saturating the landscape in pastel colours. The overcast weather that day made it seem like there was a large soft box on the entire environment, allowing for clean, shadowless images,” says Martin.

Martin photographed with a Nikon 5D Mark II camera and 16mm, f/2.8 fixed lens.

5. Climbing Sea Stacks, Newfoundland, Canada

“If pirates got up these towers, they certainly were good climbers,” says Canadian climber and paraglider Will Gadd, seen with partner Sarah Hueniken on Skerwinkle Rock, a sea stack rising out of the ocean near East Trinity in Newfoundland, Canada. Legend has it that pirates left their treasure on top of the isolated rock formations by leaning their boat masts against the spire. “This climb had by far the worst rock I've ever climbed. It was more like climbing rotten ice than rock,” says Gadd. The pair relied on close teamwork to get up four sea stacks. While perhaps seeing birds land on the towers to eat the sea urchins and crabs they caught was not so surprising, Gadd was astonished to run into a huge colony of ants living on top of a 20-by-20-foot tower summit. “I have no idea how they survived for so long, as there was no way for them to reach the mainland,” says Gadd. “We felt like we were the only food they had seen in decades and had to run for our lives!”

Getting the Shot

Photographer Christian Pondella has worked with Gadd for many years. On Pondella’s third trip to Newfoundland, the team headed to see sea stacks Gadd had located on Google Earth. “Will and I have been on many great adventures together, and this was pretty similar to most," says Pondella. "We had an idea of what we were getting into but had no idea of how it would unfold when we got there.”

Pondella used rope to hang over the edge of a cliff adjacent to the sea stack and photographed from there. “Fortunately the sea stacks were close to the shore, so I was able to shoot them from the sea cliffs," says Pondella. "It was a perfect vantage point, I was the same height as the top of the sea stack.”

Though Pondella originally planned to feature more of the turquoise blue water surrounding the sea stack, Gadd’s climb brought different lighting. “The outline of the trees looks pretty cool and dramatic. The reality is, in a place this beautiful, once that sea stack had light on it, it was going to make for some beautiful photographs,” recalls Pondella.

Pondella photographed with a 14mm lens.

6. Cycling in the Tour of Beijing, China

Cyclists rush toward a steep descent in the Gao Ya Kou mountain range during stage three of the 2012 Tour of Beijing. In its second year, the five-stage Tour of Beijing - part of the UCI WorldTour, which includes the Tour de France - wound past Chinese landmarks such as Tiananmen Square, the Bird’s Nest Stadium, Summer Palace, the Great Wall, and the Ming Tomb Reservoir.

Getting the Shot

Photographer Dan Patitucci was thrilled to be covering the emerging Tour de Beijing race in a land where cycling races are still unusual. “My job was not just to photograph a bike race, but to present the race within the Chinese landscape and culture,” says Patitucci.

“There is a sizable cycling community around Beijing. Lots of fixies, racers, and bike commuters are interested in the sport. In less than an hour from the city, you are on the same roads as the racers,” says Patitucci, who photographed the race from a motorbike.

Entering stage three, Patitucci was warned that he was approaching a steep section. “I only knew that the descent was going to be steep and fast - and that the Chinese wanted to line the walls with padding,” recalls Patitucci. ”They told us at kilometre 88 the drop would come, and that until you were right there you couldn't see how much it dropped … they were right.”

Patitucci photographed with a Canon EOS-1D Mark IV camera, carrying lenses from 15mm to 200mm.

7. Paragliding Above the Red Desert, Wyoming, USA

“I fly for the joy and freedom - the views are mesmerizing,” says 25-year paragliding veteran Jon Hunt, who along with photographer Nick Greece flew for 200 miles on this seven-hour flight in August 2012, setting a distance record in the U.S. They launched out of Wilson, Wyoming, and flew for seven hours, passing the Teton Range, the Gros Ventre Range, and the Wind River Range to finish near Rawlins, Wyoming.

“Over the last 60 miles we flew over the amazing Red Desert of Wyoming, an incredible wilderness of high-altitude desert featuring fantastic rock formations and mineral deposits," recalls Hunt, who is based in Jackson, Wyoming. “This particular spot is amazing because of the remoteness and stark beauty of the desert landscape, but our entire flight path is a new classic.”

Getting the Shot

“Paragliders follow cloud streets in the sky that serve as visual markers for rising columns of air. We surf these columns of air, going as fast as 2,000 feet per minute,” says photographer and paraglider Greece.

“The bumps that you hit in an airplane, bumps that make folks gasp, are actually the huge air waves we are trying to ride and spiral to the cloud on,” says Greece. Shooting in about 20-frame intervals with his camera strapped in his harness, Greece finds himself photographing about 20 percent of his flight. The rest of his time is spent flying. “I chuckle sometimes when reviewing photos after a flight. I see frames where I had to literally drop the camera in my lap and grab control of the wing,” says Greece.

On this day in August, Greece and Hunt battled strong winds. “We were running to the one place that still had sun … That sun makes up a big part of this photo, and those rays are what propelled us over the sought-after 200-mile mark,” states Greece. “I still can think back to this day and visualize some of the climbs and amazing traversing of unbelievably beautiful lands. I feel incredibly lucky to have shared it with such a good friend and mentor, which is very rare in our sport. We were in the right place, at the right time.”

[Source: National Geographic. Edited.]