Tin Man Photography

I regretted not listening to my buddy Conrad Tan who had been here before.

“The snowy owls are on the beach. It’s cold. It’s a long walk. Bring more water,” He said.

Living in Los Angeles, I imagined any beach would be like Santa Monica Beach, where I would park my car next to the ferris wheel and Merry-go-round, walk down the stairs next to Bubba Gump Shrimp Company to the beach. And the snowy owls would be there waiting for me.

Ocean Shores, WA, certainly didn’t look like Santa Monica Beach…

The snowy owls stayed at the very tip, which was a 50-minute walk for me from the parking lot. Since it was a thin piece of land extending out into the ocean, it was windy and cold. The highest wind speed recorded there was 150 mile per hour in the 1960s.

I did listen to Conrad a little bit. I brought one small bottle of Aquafina 500mL water, which I finished within the first half an hour in the morning. I never expected that it would be so difficult to walk long distance with the camera gear on my shoulder. It was like walking while hand-carrying a 50-inch LCD TV. It was okay in the first few minutes, but the weight got to me quickly and it became a daunting task. To me, walking 100 feet with the 50 pound camera gear felt like walking miles without any gear.

Now, it’s way past sunset. I didn’t have a flashlight. Everybody else had long gone.

The sweat dripping off my forehead was burning my eyes, as I was marching on this beach in Pacific Northwest with my 50 pound photo equipment on my shoulder.

Yet my sweat was instantly dried by the cold 40-mile-per-hour gust from the Pacific Ocean blowing from my left. The roaring sound of the breaking waves was like thunder. I could hear nothing else. Heck, I could hardly see anything. It’s so dark.

I couldn’t see the parking lot clearly from where I was. From the weak ambient light, all I could see was sand and a few scattered distant light. I was disoriented.

I wanted to wipe my eyes. But I couldn’t lift my hand up. Indeed, the backpack strap on my left shoulder had slipped for a long time. But I didn’t have strength to fix it. What happened? My whole body wasn’t listening to me. I couldn’t take another step forward anymore. The fact that I just finished an exhausting 9-day Yellowstone trip two days ago wasn’t helping either.

My heart was beating in a rate it felt like jumping out. My lips and throat had never felt so dry. I hadn’t drank a drop of water for 12 hours.

I had walked for 40 minutes and it felt like hours with the heavy gear on my shoulder, yet I didn’t seem to be able to walk out from this place. Was this Blair Witch Project? How did I end up here? Why did I even come here? For what?

It’s because of the owls.

Owls are super cool. Any beginning wildlife photographers would eventually be drawn to owls.

Why?

Because owls are…

Mysterious: A lot of people have never seen a wild owl in their life.

Elusive: A lot of them are only active at night. Their flight is completely silent. I love elusive wildlife.

Powerful: They all have strong fluffy feet like mitten and sharp talons. Their hearing is amazing. All birds fear them. A photographer once was attacked and lost his eye while trying to photograph a Tawny owl:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Hosking

Owls look just like us: Their face resembles human, with a relatively flat face and forward facing eyes, eye lids, long eye lashes, and bill that look like human nose. They would yawn like human too.

And among all owls, snowy owl looks the most majestic with their white feathers and huge size.

One might have to travel to the high arctic and search for days to see one. Even then, you still have to ask for a permit from the Owl Institute to build a hide to photograph the nesting snowy owls in Barrow, Alaska.

And who would forget Hedwig from Harry Potter.

If you have watched “Legend of The Guardian: The Owls of Ga’Hoole”, the king and queen of Ga’Hoole are both snowy owls.

So, are there any easier ways to see them in the wild?

Irruption…

A word that would make bird photographers around the world pumped up and hopped onto the next flight to come.

It turned out that once every six to eight years, lemmings, the main food source for the owls living in the high arctic, will be insufficient. The owls would have to migrate south to look for food.

In 2004, hundreds of Great Grey Owls irrupted into Minnesota. They hunted in day time and could be seen easily pouncing for voles and lemmings in the snow. I missed that opportunity. I wasn’t going to miss another one. This time, one of the hot spots was in Ocean Shores, WA, and the irruption species was snowy owls. I certainly didn’t want to wait another 8 years.

How many 8 years we have in our lives?

My hands were shaking due to excitement the first morning when I saw my first snowy owl.

Anyways, I took a deep breath, gathered all my energy, and ignored all my body pain. I kept walking and walking for god knew how long.

Things started to get familiar. The rocks, the curb, the buildings…

I finally got back to my car and put all the stuff in the back trunk. But there’s still no water.

I had my mouth open, gasping for air. My head was slightly tilted to one side yet I didn’t have strength to turn my head back. I was driving in such an awkward position.

My eyes kept glancing left and right. After 10 minutes, I saw a gas station.

I used all my remaining energy to walk in the gas station store. I took one big bottle of water and one big bottle of ice cold Gatorade to the cashier and paid for it.

There, I picked up both big bottles like a cowboy with double pistols. I had my left hand holding the water bottle, my right hand holding the Gatorade. I gulped them down furiously, a big gulp to the left bottle and then a big gulp to the right bottle repeatedly. I had a brain freeze. A happy brain freeze. The guy at the cashier looked at me in awe.

Never felt so good. It’s good to be alive.

—- Drift Wood —-

There were about 20 snowy owls at the tip of the beach. They were quite well scattered. After photographing one snowy owl, I had to walk for at least a few hundred feet to reach another snowy. There were piles and piles of drift wood on the beach. Some piles covered an area of 100 feet by 100 feet.

On one occasion, I saw a snowy owl perched at the edge of the beach about 400 feet from me. I was so happy to see Mount Olympics behind the owl. It would make an interesting photo. So I walked quickly towards the owl.

Then I saw a big pile of drift wood in between us. It would be a lot of extra walking if I didn’t walk right through it.

As I was walking through the pile of drift wood, I paid a lot of attention to the owl to make sure I didn’t disturb him/her.

What I didn’t pay attention was the drift wood I was stepping on. As I was climbing up onto a big piece of drift wood lying on top of the other drift wood, I suddenly felt a lightness in my left foot. Because of my weight, I cracked open a big hole in the drift wood. I began to free fall into the hole. I didn’t know that a lot of drift wood was half decomposed and they were very fragile though they looked just like any other piece of wood. And I never knew that the pile of drift wood could be so deep underneath. I fell almost 4 feet straight down. As I was falling down, what came to mind was the Indiana Jones movie, where I fell onto a “deadfall” pit trap with a lot of sharp tree branches sticking upwards. Usually the bad guys died that way.

I used both hands to protect my equipment and finally landed onto some hard wood on the bottom. I landed with both of my knees. The sound of the impact was loud. Tears almost came out. I saved my camera equipments. I stayed in that position for 30 seconds before I could move again. When I looked up. This was what I saw.

And it was published in a newspaper. Click here.

—-”The Mysterious Lady”—-

The second day I learned from my mistake and brought 6 big bottles of smart water and a bottle of Gatorade with me. Indeed I never went to any hiking trails without multiple bottles of water since then. The feeling of dehydration was not for the faint of heart.

After trekking for 50 minutes with the 40 pound gear on my shoulder and the extra water bottles, in freezing cold and gusty wind, I felt like crap.

I had to walk through three different habitats:

Sand: With the weight of the extra camera gear, I sank into the sand with each and every step.

Tall grass: In order not to get tangled up with the tall grass, I had to raise my leg really high in each step. Otherwise I would trip and fall down with all my equipments. Damage could be unimaginable.

Drift wood: As mentioned… all I could say was that drift wood had to be respected.

On the third morning, after I got to the spot with two snowy owls on a driftwood, I bend my back to put the tripod down, right beside some other photographers. I was completely exhausted. I was breathing heavily, with sweat dripping. I was saying to myself, “oh man, this sucks. I am so freaking tired.”

While I was whining and whining, I looked to my left. There stood a beautiful lady. She was smiling cheerfully looking at the owls. On her right shoulder, there was a big Gitzo tripod with a huge camera and a heavy 500mm F4 super-tele lens. Her left hand was holding a big camera with a 300mm 2.8 super tele lens. This set of equipment weighted much more than mine.

Yet she was smiling!

I immediately shut up on my cursing, realizing how such a crybaby I was. I looked down on myself.

Though we never talked to each other, I would never forget her bright smile. I admired her dedication so much! I had learned from her and never again would I complain about the weight of the equipment.

Five months later, my parents and I went to Alaska. (The trip where I saw the dall sheep and rainbow at Denali National Park) After Denali, we decided to drive from Anchorage to Seward to see the Glacier before we flew the small plane to Lake Clark National Park to see the bears. (The trip where I saw the insane Bear vs Beaver scene in Lake Clark). Just a few miles outside Anchorage, we saw a lot of birds flying around in the Potter’s Marsh. I quickly made a U-turn and parked the car to see what’s going on.

There, I was so excited to see the Arctic Tern nesting. It was like a carnival, with arctic terns feeding their young right in front of us. I was told that it only lasted a few days in a whole year. I told my folks that the trip to Seward would be postponed indefinitely, because Potter’s Marsh would be our destination of the day.

My dad and I happily photographed there for an hour while my mom urged us infinite times to get going.

It was very windy that day. Photographing the terns would be ideal because they almost got frozen in the air when they flew towards the wind. My dad even got a in-flight picture of a arctic tern catching a dragonfly!

After an hour, a photographer came to me and asked if I was the driver of a blue rental car. I said yes. Turned out the photographer’s tripod fell down due to the wind and bumped on my car. The photographer was kind enough to call the rental company and got everything fixed. I gave the photographer my photography card and said if there was any question just contact me. My card had a snowy owl on the front.

The photographer looked at my card and said, “Was this taken in Ocean Shores?”

I said “What? How do you know?”

The photographer said “Because I was there.”

I started to look at the photographer’s face, who was standing in front of me.

I looked at her face again and again like a psycho, trying to search thru my memory.

I said “Oh my god, you were the smiling photographer who were carrying the 500mm and 300mm standing next to me in Ocean Shores.”

She smiled “Yes, that was me.”

I asked “How could you carry so many stuff and was still smiling that day?” That was my question that I didn’t ask 5 months ago.

She said, “I had bruises on both of my shoulders afterwards. But who cares, it was the snowy owls!!!”

So yes, we “bumped” into each other twice. The second time, literally.

And we are still good friends.

What are the chances? If I didn’t stop by the Potter’s March in Anchorage that day, if we left just a bit early, if the wind didn’t blew, or if her tripod didn’t bump into my car, I would never show her my card with the snowy owl on it, and I would have never re-united with her.

——- Lost and Found ——-

The second morning, I found a great spot where a snowy owl was perching on a drift wood with the roaring sea as the background. It was quite unique in that I had not seen a photo with a snowy owl in front of a roaring ocean.

Suddenly, a girl in her 20s walked up to me, and asked if I dropped something. She showed me a CF card holder.

I checked and made sure my CF card holder was still in my jacket pocket. So I said no to her. She walked away.

Then something came to mind. I read through a lot of forums about the snowy owl irruption before the trip. I remembered a famous bird photographer mentioned in naturescapes and Birdphotographers.net, and Fred Miranda forums that he lost his card holder weeks ago here. I didn’t know that photographer personally, but I remembered his name, his name was Arash, because I had seen his amazing birds in flight photographs that inspired me for a long long time. Here is a link to his amazing photos. I ran to that girl and asked if I could take a look at the card holder. I opened the holder. Lo and behold, the photographer’s name and email were written on it. Guessing that Conrad may know the photographer, I called Conrad. We quickly linked up with Arash. I mailed the CF card holder with the 7-8 cards in there to him. He was very kind and sent me a gift even though I told him there was no need. We have been good friends since then.

In a place with rain, snow, gust, sand, tall grass, and drift wood, somehow the CF cards survived through all this, was found by the girl and got back to the owner, and the photos were all intact. Was this fate?

—- Gone in 1/60 seconds —-

When I reviewed the pics taken from the last two days in my motel room at night while munching down some General-Tso’s chicken with rice I bought from a nearby Chinese Fast Food store, I found out that the snowy owls closed their eyes most of the time during the day. And even when they had their eyes open, the pupils shrinks to block out the sun. They definitely looked “cuter” when their pupils were dilated, both in early morning or after sunset, in order to let more light in.

So I set out to get there really early the third day, also my last day at Ocean Shores, to get a different kind of “big eye snowy owl” shot.

I also planned to get the beautiful morning sky background to add to the mysterious mood of a snowy owl.

I knew I only had a small window of a minute or two right before sunrise to achieve this. Too early, the light would be too low. Too late, the sun would come out and the pupils of snowy owl would shrink.

That morning, I trekked in the dark to get to the spot where snowy owls frequented, then I lay flat on my belly on the beach, and crawled around to look for them. And of course I accidentally scratched my Canon 70-200 2.8 II lens on my waist. That poor baby.

The reason that I crawled was because its easier to approach a bird, and that I needed to stay low so the background would be the beautiful sky, not the distant brown long weed.

The owls were especially active in the morning and they tended to fly around from one drift wood to another.

After several attempts, the place started to light up more and more. I knew that time was running out. I finally located a snowy owl perched on a nice looking driftwood.

I was inspired by Charles Glazer, my tour leader from the previous Yellowstone trip, whom got two frost bites in his fingers while trying to take a photo of a bison in frost in -50F. He said he used a shutter speed of 1/30 with a 600mm lens and a 2x converter during a snow storm.

So I learned that a slow shutter speed was actually possible if handled properly. I decided to use 1/60s shutter speed to get my shot this time.

The snowy owl never stayed still. They kept looking left and right, front and back continuously for potential enemies. So 1/60s was very risky to get a sharp shot. To get a sharp picture with a 500mm lens, it typically required at least 1/500 second shutter speed. Now I was attempting a shutter speed of almost 10 times slower. It would be very difficult to get a sharp photo especially because the snowy owl was restless and kept moving. But that’s the only shutter speed to obtain proper exposure.

I knew that I only had one chance, now that I felt the sun would pop up from horizon at anytime. I observed the special pattern that he would look to his left, stay there for 2 seconds, then quickly turn to his right and stay for 2 seconds, then look to the front, stay for 2 seconds towards my direction before he turned to his back.

I waited and waited. There weren’t that many 2 seconds before the sun came out.

Left…. Right…. Front…

I had to pray when I rolled my finger onto the shutter for a shutter speed of 1/60 second.

I reviewed the photo in the camera LCD, and saw a snowy owl in purple-ish sky background. The pupils of the snowy owl were huge.

Within a few seconds, the sun popped up from the horizon and it’s bright and golden everywhere…

So I scratched my lens, had severe dehydration, got bad bruises in my knees, and was completely exhausted.

——— But as the mysterious lady said, “Who cares. It’s THE SNOWY OWL!!!”

I know you like moose… I want to tell you my 12 notes of how this photo happened:

1. It was snowing in the Alaska Arctic in late Sept, 2012. We saw the moose from far away near a river. We were led by pro photographer and leader Hugh Rose and trekked for half a mile through the wet boreal forest, constantly guarding our face and cameras from the numerous protruding sharp tree branches. The ground was so soft I felt like walking on cotton. With snow falling, my face
felt like frozen… I love it.

2. Contrary to most people think, a bull (male) moose in mating season is EXTREMELY DANGEROUS, more so than if we run into a grizzly bear. Bear generally won’t attack if we form a big group because bear would feel he/she is outnumbered. But moose is not as “smart” as bear and wouldn’t count, he would just charge at people at his will. Weight easily more than 1,000 pounds, with a height of 7 feet at the shoulder (not even counting head and neck), if he charges, its like a freight train running towards you. More people got injured by moose than bear in Alaska each year, especially during their mating season because genetically the bull moose is wired to attack anything they see except female moose.

3. This bull moose was in heat, meaning he was looking for female desperately to mate, and was ready to fight with any other males on his way.

4. He was so irritated (because no females were around, well, who wouldn’t? ) that he drilled his head into a dead tree and got some tree branches onto his antlers. It’s the “bling bling” in moose’s world to impress the ladies.

5. At first we were very far away. But he approached us slowly.

6. We didn’t dare to move a bit. Heck, we didn’t dare to breathe heavily. There’s nowhere to hide.

7. I remember a famous photographer once said, “If a wild animal sleeps in front of you, it’s the biggest compliment a nature photographer can ever receive. Because that means the wild animal accepts your presence.”

8. Well, this moose walked close to us. Looked at us for a few minutes. Then he sat down behind some branches, and took a nap in front of us. I finally understood what that famous photographer meant.

9. We just stood there in awe. No one spoke a word. Every one of us taking the time to soak in every moment we spend with this gigantic powerful wild animal in such close distance. It’s like seeing a person you dream to meet, but you know he/she may leave your world at any moment. We know not many people in this world could experience something like this. And we might not have another opportunity ever again.

10. After who knows how long, the moose finally wake up, and gave us this look when he walked by. He was so close to us. He weighted at least 1,500 pounds. As he walked by, the cracking sound of branches were so loud and clear, penetrating through the whole quiet boreal forest.

11. We all held our breaths the whole time he walked by.

12. This is a full frame photo, no crop. I was trying my best to fit his head into the viewfinder because he was too close and I only had one lens, and more importantly, I only had one chance, in just one split second when he turned his head. But due to my lack of experience about moose, I didn’t know he has such long beard. So I cropped it. I should have used a vertical composition! Kicking myself now. Well if I used vertical I probably couldn’t include both of his antlers…

An experience I would remember for the rest of my life.

Thank you for reading the whole story. I hope you feel like I have taken you along in my adventure.

With leader Hugh Rose in an Arctic Tour.

 

My hope was slowly fading away.

Five days have passed. For each of those days, we left at six in the morning and drove for twelve hours straight, back and forth, on a figure “8” shaped road inside Yellowstone National Park. We were desperately trying to track “her” down through the snow covered mountains and plains. So far, it has been impossible.

“She” was my photography target of the trip — the beautiful and elusive red fox.

I originally thought, “How difficult would it be to find a red spot in a field of snow.”

However, in the blink of an eye, five day have passed without any sightings. That evening I paid an ungodly fee for Internet service at Mammoth Hot Spring Snow Lodge just to send one email to my buddy who had visited Yellowstone in the past. She said: “Indeed, the red fox is difficult to find. I had an experienced tour guide who’s been working in Yellowstone for six years, and he’s never seen one.”

Wearing three sweaters, an extremely huge North Face Himalaya Parka jacket, snow pants, a beanie, a balaclava, a pair of liners and gloves, and snow boots, I became a Michelin Man, desperately lying on the back seat of the snowmobile.

 

 

I closed my eyes. Only one day left to find her.

 

Photography in the snow

One of the most iconic images of a Yellowstone winter is the bison covered in frost. They usually stayed motionless in the snow to preserve energy. When their whole body was covered with snow, it looked as if they were wearing a beautiful white armor while wearing the helmet of King Leonidas of the Spartan Soldiers played by Gerard Butler in the movie “300”.

Temperature is constantly lower than minus twenty degrees Celsius. It was -50 last year. Our photographer tour leader got frostbit in two of his fingers within a few minutes while attempting to take a picture of bison in the “snow helmet”.

 

 

I suddenly thought of my near-death experience few years ago in Yellowstone in the Spring…

Yellowstone National Park is located on a plateau at about nine thousand feet above sea level. The Rocky Mountains surround the park, while the world’s largest volcano sits underneath it. Due to the pulsing magma beneth, hot springs and geysers dot the landscape. The park is filled with the smell of sulfur. In winter, cold air gets trapped by the mountains. Yellowstone becomes one of the coldet places in America.

 

Snow can be the kryptonite for camera autofocus. Autofocus depends on contrast of the scenery, and there is no contrast in snow. If I point the camera to the snow and half press the shutter to autofocus, the camera focus system will keep hunting back and forth and cannot take a sharp picture. The only solution was to have the tiny focus point of the camera placing right on the animal before pressing autofocus, but it could be difficult because the animal could be far away and moving fast.

Cold weather can cause all sorts of problem for digital camera especially killing the camera battery.

Ice can be slippery. One time I was walking down the stairs of the snow coach to get out, with my left hand holding the Canon 1D Mark IV body and a 500mm F4 lens, right hand holding the Gitzo 1341XLS tripod, while wearing a Black Rapid strap that is attached to another Canon 1D Mark IV and a 70-200mm 2.8 II with a 1.4x III teleconverter. It was like hand-carrying 5 buckets of 1 liter spring water. I slipped and fell down a few steps, all while trying my best to hold on to my gear. I eventually landed awkwardly on the last step right on my butt. I was in shocked silence. It was not a beautiful scene. The first thing I did was to quickly look around to make sure no one saw me fell. Well, everyone saw me. I sat in the snow, clutching my gear for a minute before I could walk again.

I could never tell how deep the snow was.  I once sank into four feet of snow while walking towards two beavers. The camera with my 70-200 lens that was hanging on my waist ended up buried in the snow. It’s heart-breaking to see that everything inside the lens hood was covered in snow.

 

However, that moment was the first time that I crouched side by side in the deep snow with Professional Photographer Mr. Charles “Chas” Glatzer, THE best wildlife photographer in the world.  We were discussing photography, observing animal behavior, and sometimes smiling at their comical acts. It was dark and snowing the whole day. But while I was chatting with Chas, all of a sudden the snowing stopped, and we had 30 seconds of beautiful sunlight penetrating through the thick cloud. We could even see the catch-light in the eyes of the beaver.

Life was good again.

Although we didn’t see the red fox, we did see a lot of other wildlife.

 

 

 

 

 

Yellowstone is like a lost world during winter.

We stayed late outside to photograph the sunset on the second day. When we were driving back to the snow lodge, it was dark. There was not a single vehicle on the road except us.

After such a long day, the only thing on my mind was a big bowl of hot soup from the lodge restaurant.

But the least expected thing happened.

About 50 miles away from our lodge, the wheel chains of the snow coach made a strange, screeching noise. The noise got louder and louder, to an unbearable level.

A few minutes later, our snow coach completely stopped.

We looked at each other and had no idea what had just happened.

Our driver turned around and said, “looks like the snowcoach is dead. I cannot start the engine.”
Since all the other vehicles in the park had already been driven back to the lodge, there was absolutely nothing on the road. It was completely dark outside. And it was cold. There was no phone signal. The radio signal was spotty. Who’s going to rescue us?

The driver decided to walk half a mile in the dark wilderness to look for help. Before we had a chance to talk to him, he had already walked away.

Looking at the back of the driver’s disappearing in the darkness, I had a strange and sick feeling that I would never see him again. We were stranded in a forest in the snow in the heart of Yellowstone wilderness. Gray wolves hunt during the night. Some old grizzly bears do not hibernate and would still hunt in the winter…

The moment felt so familiar I almost thought I had a Dejavu. It was the scene from Jurassic Park, where the people in the broken park ride were eaten by dinosaurs one by one.

We waited and waited. Nobody spoke a single word. We had no food or water left. Who would have thought the snow coach would break down?

I remember clearly that we still had our headlight on. It was snowing heavily. The snow reflected the light in the darkness. We could see the gusty wind outside. The wind was blowing thru the thin opening of the door.

Finally, the driver returned safely. Despite the weak radio signal, he was able to contact the headquarters. They sent a small snow coach for our rescue two hours later.

Seven of us crowded into the much smaller snow coach very quietly. We were in pitch-black, speeding in the lonely and bumpy snow covered road. It turned out to be a good experience. It helped us form strong bonds of friendship. After that night, we felt that we could overcome any obstacles.

Good friends and good wine make for a more memorable stay.

After shooting all day, we always enjoyed gathering at the snow lodge’s bar, sitting next to the fireplace, sipping Glenlivet whiskey, telling our stories of the day, discussing photography, and joking about life experiences. One of us was a man in his eighties and he was still very fit. He often said, “I remember when I was young.” Then he would pause before adding “I mean, when I was in my sixties.” His jokes made all of us smile. At that moment, I felt like I had gazed into my future. I realized that we all have the power to choose how our lives will unfold.

Love and Lost

In Yellowstone, I took a series of pictures that, to this date, still leaves me with a haunting feeling whenever I look at it.

“One need not lose hope” — Stephen Hawking

As I lay on the back seat, our snow coach started to drive out from the Old Faithful snow lodge.  This was the 6th, and final day of my trip.

Just like the past 5 days, my eyes routinely scanned through the distant ground. It was an overcast day with soft light, perfect for photographing the red fox, except that she’s nowhere to be seen.

Half an hour has passed.

Suddenly, I saw a misty red dot surrounded by white.

I wiped my eyes.

There she was! She sat elegantly on the side of the road, looking slim and petite. Her red fur swayed with the wind. She was just like a ghost, appearing out of nowhere.

As our snow coach approached, I saw her ears suddenly point forward, as if she were listening to something. She slowly squatted down. Our leader said, “She is going to jump and pounce!”

Without hesitating, I grabbed my Canon 1D Mark IV camera and a 500mm F4 lens and ran towards the front of the snow coach. I didn’t have time to zip up my jacket. I didn’t have time to grab my tripod. While I was dashing out, I set up the exposure parameter in my camera. I have rehearsed this moment for so long. I knew very clearly I needed at least 1/1250s shutter speed to capture this fast moment. My hands quickly set up all the parameters for my camera while I leaped past the stairs, hanged in the air for a little while, out from the snow coach into the -20C snow.

I knelt down in the snow. Two other photographers sat beside me, both getting ready.  I knew I only had one chance. I needed to raise my lens and target right at the fox. One tiny slip and the autofocus would get stuck on the snow, and I’d end up with a blurry photo. I took a deep breath. All the practices had come down to this point. I calmly raised the camera and lens and pressed the autofocus. And I locked the focus right on the fox!

The photographer on my right yelled, “Holy cow, the camera is not focusing. Ahhhh”

At the same time, the other photographer said, “What the…! Why it said the aperture F91? What the hell is wrong? Ahhhh” His camera broke down in the extreme cold.

They were both cursing and trying to fix their cameras.

Meanwhile, the red fox was oblivious to our presence and got ready to pounce. The whole scene was kind of funny. I felt a smirk form on my lips.

In the midst of all the cursing, the fox jumped unexpectedly fast and high, at least ten feet. I didn’t see it clearly in the viewfinder, but I placed  my finger on the shutter and fired away.

Miracles do happen sometimes.

 

 

 

Written by Tin Man Lee

Critiqued and edited by Lew Andrada (special thanks)

My Testimony on Shoot The Light Winter Yellowstone Workshop

My Red Fox Pouncing Photo Won Editor’s Choice Award in 500px.com

 

 

 

I still remember an incident that happened in the Spring time at Yellowstone several years ago.

We were driving on a mountain road when we came to a big traffic jam. Over ten cars were parked on the side of the road.

Big traffic jam usually meant wildlife sightings. I quickly took my cameras and went out to take a look.

Fifteen photographers were lining up along the edge of the road with tripods and big lenses. They were all pointing downwards. I set up my tripod as well and looked thru the camera viewfinder.

There was a river stream below the cliff where we were standing at. I saw an elk carcass on the side of the stream. As I glanced around the elk carcass through the viewfinder… I almost fainted. There stood the species that all yellowstone visitors dreamed to see– the gray wolf.

I was in ecstasy. He would give us a mean look from time to time even though we were at least 200 feet away. With a greedy smile, I clicked the camera shutter continuously like no tomorrow.

There were at least thirty people behind us, all smiling and celebrating this rare sighting.

After half an hour, I heard somebody said bison.

I thought to myself, Who cares? Bison were everywhere in yellowstone. Why would I want to photograph a bison when I can photograph a rare-to-see wolf?

So I kept photographing the wolf, as if I didn’t know that every photo I took of the wolf would look the same.

Then, all of a sudden, I felt the ground shaking.

Was that earthquake?

I took a quick look to my left.

I saw three photographers on my left. They were all standing at the edge of the road behind their tripods.

About 20 feet to our left, there was a black shadow. My first impression was that it reminded me of the ring-wraith from the movie “The Lord of the Rings”. It was at least one feet taller than us.

It’s a bison charging at us at full speed.

The bison was going to knock us down in no time. The 3rd photographer, the one furthest from me, grabbed his tripod and camera, and… he jumped down the cliff.

I didn’t have time to react to that shocking act. I wrapped around the tripod with my arms, and quickly stepped backward, barely avoided the collision by the bison.

I could still remember the loud noise when the bison passed by us.

That’s one small step for me, a giant leap for my life.

I looked back and saw that the whole place was in chaos. Some were hiding behind their cars. Some were running away.

After the bison ran passed us, he charged at a girl who was about 30 feet from me. The girl was in her 20s, with long blond hair, who looked like Kristen Dunst, and was wearing a light blue down jacket. She ran for a few seconds and accidentally fell down before a 2-feet tall snow dunes. She sat helplessly on the ground as the bison was about to hit her.

It all happened so quick that none of us were able to go and try to save her. I closed my eyes. I heard a big splash and opened my eyes. The bison braked in the snow about 3 feet from the girl. He looked at her and breathed heavily. I could see white smoke coming out from his nose. The girl was looking at him. The wind was blowing on her hair. It was bizarre, but it reminded me of a scene in the beauty and the beast.

Then the bison turned around. He was taping the ground quickly with his feet. His body was rotating but he remained at the same location. He could charge at any one of us at anytime. We felt so helpless. After half a minute, he turned and walked away. We all walked towards the girl and lifted her up. She was smiling.

And just at this time, we heard a siren. The park rangers arrived.