Landscapes of colour on Earth Day
Loch Dunmore, just north of Pitlochry, Scotland
Ice hot blue, Myvatn geothermal nature baths, North-East Iceland
Mountain valley at dawn, somewhere over the Icelandic highlands
Reykjavik, Iceland
Godafoss waterfall at dusk, North-East Iceland
Lake Myvatn before dawn, North-East Iceland
Myvatn Nature Baths, North-East Iceland
Sulphuric pools and steaming vents, near Hverir, North-East Iceland
Following up from my last post on the National Geographic’s Space Picture of the Year, the Guardian’s Travel Photographer of the Year 2012 is another compilation of beautiful, and evocative, photographic images taken over the last 12 months.
Similarly, many of the photographs convey a story of humanity’s interaction and interconnection with nature, wildlife, and the wider environment- from an Indonesian fisherman, a young Kenyan boy guarding his family’s cows, to a stunning desert nightscape in Namibia.
While I have to acknowledge the winning photographer Craig Easton’s effort ‘Dreich’- beautifully capturing dark and foreboding rain clouds off the west coast of Scotland (as having spent my life living in this part of the world, I am well aware of such weather that often, quite literally, comes with the territory)- I think my favourite has to be the above picture, taken by Alessandra Meniconzi, of a young Siberian girl collecting wood from the forest. I’ve undertaken the Trans-Siberian railway through mid-winter Siberia and Mongolia- and exactly 3 years since I was there, this image really brings back some memories of the landscape and environment.
Like the space photographs from National Geographic, the wide open expanse of the Siberian terrain, particularly in the deep freeze of mid-winter, are an unforgettable reminder of your own insignificance, in scale, to the wider natural world.
The approaching end of a (western) calendar year is always an opportunity for a number of the ‘best of the year’ photographic collections/awards to be put together- and the National Geographic’s ‘Best Space Pictures of the Year 2012’ is one of my favourites I have seen this year. The pictures above are taken from the collection- which I have chosen because of the different perspectives and scales they capture (and also because of their individual beauty) on the subject.
From a perspective of space from Earth (of the Milky Way over a Turkish landscape), of a counter view of Earth from space (of phytoplankton blooming in the South Atlantic Ocean), and of a photograph depicting a nebula in a star constellation (an image appropriately named ‘Thor’s Helmet’)- each captures, and are a reminder of, the cosmological interconnectedness of the natural environment in which we, as humans, are a tiny part of- from micro organic phytoplankton in our planet’s seas, to immense interstellar nebula.
Across Loch Long from the west side of Rosneath Peninsula, West Coast of Scotland- taken while out on a cycle on a rare relatively mild mid December day.
Genghis Khan Statue and dogs, east of Ulan Bator, Mongolia
The Forbidden City, Beijing
Jake the cat
