Pho­to­book “Spits­ber­gen”: the sto­ries behind the pho­tos

The new pho­to book “Spits­ber­gen – cold beau­ty” has 227 images that take you on a com­pre­hen­si­ve jour­ney around Spits­ber­gen, both geo­gra­phi­cal­ly, sea­so­nal­ly and regar­ding wild­life and a bit of histo­ry here and the­re.

I took the pho­tos over a peri­od of almost 20 years, on uncoun­ted tours and jour­ney from 2005 (when I had just bought my first digi­tal came­ra) to 2023. For me, many of them are con­nec­ted to unfor­gettable memo­ries, and the decis­i­on for every sin­gle one came tog­e­ther with indi­vi­du­al decis­i­ons against 1000 other images that might just as well have been in the book now.

In the book, the pho­tos can and do speak for them­sel­ves. The­re is no long text to dis­tract the eye. My own thoughts, sto­ries and memo­ries don’t mat­ter the­re. But I would nevert­hel­ess like to share some of them. The place to do so is here. It might turn out to be a litt­le series over time if you like. We’ll see what hap­pens.

The first image: nor­t­hern light

In the Arc­tic, the year beg­ins in the midd­le of the polar night. Hence, so does the pho­to book. And how to illus­tra­te the beau­ty of the polar night bet­ter than with a nor­t­hern light?

A nor­t­hern light pho­to was thus also the ope­ner of the first ver­si­on of the book in 2011. I remem­ber how proud I was of my very nor­t­hern light pho­tos! But alas, I lacked all requi­re­ments for pro­per nor­t­hern light pho­to­gra­phy. I dare to say that this resul­ted in a rapid deve­lo­p­ment as far as I am con­cer­ned and things did impro­ve. But the 2011 ver­si­on of the book was prin­ted, and every time I took a copy of that ear­ly edi­ti­on up and saw that pho­to, I was kind of put off and I thought “that should be bet­ter”. Well, now it is. Over the years sin­ce then, I have spent count­less cold evenings equip­ped with warm clo­thes, full frame came­ra, high qua­li­ty prime len­se and tri­pod in Advent­da­len, whe­re I took the pho­to of my final choice in 2019.

The first pho­to in my new pho­to book Spits­ber­gen: Cold beau­ty: nor­t­hern light.

If you look at dif­fe­rent polar light pho­tos, on the inter­net, in books or maga­zi­nes, they are often very bright and extre­me­ly colourful. The­re may be the odd excep­ti­on, but in by far most cases this is a mat­ter of exag­ge­ra­ted twis­ting knobs and but­tons during image pro­ces­sing. It is important to resist this tempt­a­ti­on, the­se results are not rea­li­stic.

That one nor­t­hern light pho­to in the old 2011 edi­ti­on would have been reason enough for a new edi­ti­on of the book. Well, here it is, and this time I am hap­py with it 🙂.

The first sun­light

The return of the sun wit­hout seve­ral months of sun­light is always a very spe­cial event, any­whe­re in the Arc­tic. In Lon­gye­ar­by­en, which is sur­roun­ded by moun­ta­ins, this does not hap­pen befo­re 08 March. If you have a free view to the south, you can enjoy that delightful view con­sider­a­b­ly ear­lier. In Farm­ham­na, a trap­per sta­ti­on on the west coast of Spits­ber­gen, we could cele­bra­te the return of the sun as ear­ly as 20 Febru­ary during my time the­re in 2022, and this is when I took this pho­to.

First sun­light in Farm­ham­na, 20 Febru­ary 2022.

My time in Farm­ham­na will fore­ver be among­st my tre­asu­red memo­ries. The­re are seve­ral more pho­tos from Farm­ham­na and sur­roun­dings that have made it into the new Spits­ber­gen pho­to book.

New Spits­ber­gen pho­to book: Cold beau­ty.

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