A Double-edged Sword

Landscape photography is a double-edged sword. When we review our photographs after a trip we are always disappointed. We remember how the water was so much bluer, the rocks so much grainier, the expanses so much larger, the calving glacier so much taller, so much…

Of course everything not visual is totally missing from our photographs: the smells, the touch, the sounds, the tastes… The market ripe with fish, a plethora of textures, winds howling, waves crashing, hoppy-tasting beer, or a fine glass of wine at the end of a long day…

But what if we could exactly replicate all of that – the very essence of the scene? Virtual reality and other technologies are approaching that degree of sensation. We watched a 4-D movie at the Atlanta aquarium misting water and scents at us as we watched the movie with 3-D glasses while our seats moved. But, what then? If you’ve already experienced the complete grandeur of a place – would you need to visit it?

We think so…

[All the photos in this story are "lightboxed" which means you can click on them and they will open in a separate window. This is a great way to see them 'close up'.]

Boyd TurnerApril 17, 2017Comment

Towers of Beauty

You could certainly start a lively debate asking: “Where is the most beautiful place in the world?” There are a multitude of viable choices, with personal taste thrown in to make it a useless subjective debate. But, I could make a pretty strong case for Torres (towers) del Paine National Park, Chile.

Our guide was nearly overcome with emotion when the towers first came into view around a ridge of the Andes, saying she had never seen it so stunningly clear. As we stopped and looked at its splendor, several Andean Condors circled lazily, then chased a Black-chested Buzzard Eagle away, mere feet above our heads. One of those moments.

Andean Condor soars near one of the Torres

The Torres stood resolutely against the sky, defying ages of erosive forces. The lagos (lakes) and waterfalls, with their suspended glacial sediments, cast an indescribable hue of greenish-blue. A glacier cracking so loudly the decibels would overwhelm canon fire, followed by several minutes of jet-volume rumbling as the calved segment broke into a million pieces, racing down the cliff face. It was all nearly overwhelming. Could almost make a person sit down to quietly take it all in and shed a tear in testament to its absolute beauty… ok, maybe it did. Kathy

[You can see the photos in this story in a window of their own by clicking on the photo]

Boyd TurnerApril 9, 2017Comment

Flavor of Chile

As you can tell from our photos we recently traveled to Chile. The country has many spectacular sights and a ton of landscape diversity. Our trip took us to the Atacama desert in the north, central Chile (Santiago and Valparaiso), Patagonia in the south, and Easter Island (Rapa Nui) out in the Pacific. We put together a short video of our travels to try and share some of our experience in this beautiful country. Hope you enjoy the video.. Boyd

Boyd TurnerApril 6, 2017Comment

Loading up a new page...

Hope you saw our favorites of 2016. We have deleted that page to make room for our new "Chile" page. We recently returned from touring Chile. It is a vast (but narrow) country with incredible diversity. And incredible photo opportunities. We have some images from the trip that we hope you will enjoy. So the favorites page had to go. Many of those photos live on in one of the other pages (landscape, fauna, flora, moments, monochromatic). But, there wasn't room for all of them. So if you are looking for your favorite from 2016 and don't see it on the site, shoot us a message (form available on the "Talk with us" page) and we will put it back up. But, we hope you check out our "Chile" page too. And come back frequently as we will be adding new stories here on the blog over the coming weeks.

Boyd TurnerMarch 18, 2017Chile, Puerto Natales, dock, loadingComment

2016 Favorites

In case you didn't notice, we have added a page of our favorites from 2016. There are 10 color and 10 monochrome images. So just click above, on the title bar, where it says "2016 Favorites". And hopefully, you saw the three episodes of our 2016 retrospective (below in the blog). These three video episodes have a different perspective. They tell the history of our year photographically. The gallery page 2016 Favorites displays our 20 individual favorites. Did I mention you can click on the link above? Did i mention they are our favorites?

One of our 10 favorite color images from 2016.

And one of our 10 favorite monochrome images from 2016.

Boyd TurnerJanuary 19, 2017Comment

Summer and Fall 2016

Episode 3. The concluding episode of our 2016 retrospective. Yes summer and fall wrapped into 4 minutes and 10 seconds. You know you don't have to be anywhere in the next 10 minutes. Heck, you can watch it twice! Enjoy!

Boyd TurnerJanuary 15, 2017Comment

Spring 2016

And now for Episode 2, the 2016 retrospective continues with photography from our spring adventures. As usual this is best viewed on a large monitor at 1080p. But it works on a mobile device too. Don't forget to watch Episode 1, Winter 2016 too. We hope you enjoy Spring 2016.

Boyd TurnerJanuary 9, 2017Comment

Winter 2016

Here is the first segment of our retrospective on 2016. This segment is winter photography from Iceland.

Boyd TurnerJanuary 6, 2017Iceland, black and white, video, short film, ice, snow, ocean, beach, mountains, winter, 2016Comment

Texture of Time

Geologists classify rock into igneous (basically volcanic), sedimentary (rock broken into small pieces and turned back into rock), and metamorphic (igneous or sedimentary rock changed by pressure and heat). We aren't geologists and we can't always differentiate rock into the three types. But we do love the different textures. Especially when we think about the age of some rocks.

While at the Oregon Coast recently, the texture of the rocks caught our eyes. Some places rough, some places fine. All of the textures constantly changing and evolving, facilitated by the movement of water and the grinding of one piece of rock against another. Just imagine the journey of a single rock. Out of the center of the earth, ground down to sand, buried under miles of other layers of sand and mud, then lifted up above the waves and exposed to the relentless force of wind and rain, only to be buried again, maybe heated, melted, squeezed by pressures of unfathomable force. When you think about them like that , there's no such thing as just another rock. No wonder the textures are so fascinating, they are the lines of age on the face of the planet.

Boyd TurnerDecember 16, 2016Comment

Fern Canyon

Can we all just chill for two minutes? Breathe in. Breathe out. Two minutes. Maybe this will help.

Boyd TurnerNovember 7, 2016Comment

Journal