We started the hike before the sun came up. It was really cold, so I was dressed in layers. People always give you very silly advice. Actually, whenever anyone tells me to “dress in layers”, I always find it very condescending! Why is that? I don’t know why that bothers me. I mean, OF COURSE dress in layers. Oh, you mean, if I get too hot, I can just take off a layer? Oh, brilliant! Why didn’t I think of that? Well… This is a concept everyone is already familiar with, so whenever anyone tells you to “dress in layers”, try not to let it annoy you as much as it does me.

Anyway, after removing many layers, since I was burning hot after the first five minutes from carrying 50 lbs of camera equipment over the Andes, we stopped at this mountain lake to relax and have a quick lunch. It was a good chance to drop off the bag, put together my camera and tripod, then break it all down again, repack, and get back on the hike.

Also, we have a fun new features opening today on the site. It’s a great and simple way for you to share photos on Facebook, Twitter, Email, or IM. You can probably see it when you mouseover a photo… I think it will be a good way for regular viewers to easily share the photos with their friends and family! Below is a short video showing how to use it (even though it’s pretty dang simple!). Again, the more you share, the better it is for the site… so thanks again, very much!

I didn’t get enough sunsets in BA, but I tried to make the most of what I had!  This picturesque park was enormous.  And I mean enormous.  We walked for miles before finding our final destination, which we made it to just in the nick of time.  The parks of Buenos Aires were pretty much what I imagined… the Argentineans stroll around parks with a certain sense of style.  It’s hard to explain…but kinda cool.

Also, Jim Austin has written a nice article about HDR for Apogee Photo Magazine entitled “Symphony in a Moment: HDR Nature Photography from Eight Maestros”. Very nice of him to call me a maestro – not sure I deserve that! The photo he included (“A Razor to the Sky”) I have put below… of that amazing mountain range called Fitz Roy. The way to catch that orange-pink morning light was to hike up another mountain in pitch-black conditions. It was certainly worth it, traversing the icy crest, catching that glimpse of the sun coming over the horizon of the Andes.

This is the Perito Moreno Glacier that empties into Lago Argentina. It was simply awesome to be there, as you can plainly see.

I was there with a bunch of Russians who had brought an insane amount of cognac. Between shots, they would all drink cognac, yell, and try to bring down the next ice wall. We were the only ones there, and we stayed until the last moments of dark to eek out every last bit of light from the sky.

Also, I wanted to point you to an article over at Abduzeedo yesterday about the new book. It was written by good man Paulo Canabarro (his Twitter account here). You can also follow @Abduzeedo if you are looking for another good set of Tweets. I notice that people that complain about Twitter always have the same sort of complaints: “I don’t want to know when everyone is standing in line at Starbucks!” Well, then, I say, you are following the wrong people! Once you get 50-100+ people to follow, it becomes a nice source for information, fun, and inspiration. It might take a while to build your personalized list, but then you will be hooked. (I am @TreyRatcliff, in case ya didn’t know).

This is probably one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. I knew it was going to be pretty beforehand, but I wasn’t really prepared for the non-stop grandeur of the landscapes. We chose the perfect time to go, right in the middle of Autumn. The backpacking took about twice as long as expected. I couldn’t stop myself from holding up every few minutes to set up for another photo. It was irresistible!

In other news, I’ve cleaned up and updated the “About Me” page here on the site. That thing gets longer and longer… I’m sure it looks like I’m some kind of egomaniac! Hehe… but people keep asking me the same sorts of questions over and over, so it’s kind of grown organically over time. Plus, my publisher was asking for a photo for the back cover of the book. We’re leaning towards that first one… they kind of like the little story that was related to it (which, in turn, is related to this photo!).

Two textured shots in a row! Sorry, I usually don’t do this (put two very similar things back to back on subsequent days) but I’ve been spending my weekend evenings here recording these videos. I just finished this one and was happy with the way it turned out.

There was this interesting tree sitting alone after a morning snow. The snow had melted, but the skies still had these white-out conditions. Those skies normally make for very dull visuals, so I thought this would be a good candidate for textures. I think, by now, you guys know I can’t stand a boring sky in my photos… and since you can’t always have a four-star sunset, maybe it drove me to use the world around me to find textures to re-purpose inside these photos. I don’t know. Maybe I’ll figure out that bit in a while.

I’m in the middle of working on a full upgrade for the Stuck In Customs Textures Tutorial. I think it’s already very good (only had ONE return in over a year!), but I can do even better. I’ve learned a lot in the past 18 months about this stuff and the technique continues to evolve. As I am working through some new shots for the tutorial, I thought I would go ahead and post this one. It was taken late one afternoon near a glacial lake on the southern edge of Argentina.

We have put together a fair upgrade plan if you have purchased the current Textures Tutorial and you want to a new set of 50 Textures taken from secret locations along with the new video. I’m excited to get it out there… not sure how much longer it will take. I want to give it a professional touch. In the meantime, I wanted to share this one with you!

This is yet another glacier-filled lake in the mountains between Chile & Argentina. I got up pretty high on a short hike to get this shot. I had seen this bright tuft of red leaves and wanted to work it into the final product. We were on the edge of autumn and a few leaves were starting to change colors. Most of the leaves were not in any interesting compositional angles or were impossible to get near! So this one took a bit of a hike to find and set up…

Also, thanks to everyone on Twitter and Facebook that became agitated when the cop threatened to arrest me because I looked like a professional photographer with my tripod in front of the Coke museum. Anyway, Coke saw the message on Twitter and via several emails that were sent in – so thank you Gail and all the others that helped! Props to Coke Social Media (see down in comment 55) for the response.

And last, I’ll be on FOX here in Austin this (Tuesday) morning for the morning news… A little interview at sunrise. It’s midnight and I should be asleep right now… okay here I go.

After we set up camp in a little wooded area, we headed off to see if we could get to one of the glaciers by sunset.  This is near Cerro Torre, a region that is disputed between Argentina and Chile.  I didn’t see much of a dispute while I was there — no armies or anything.  I did see some wayward Guanacas, but I was not sure which side they were on.

I walked along the river until I got to a stopping point, where I got stuck.  I couldn’t cross because it was too sketchy, even for me.  So I set up here to prepare for the sunset.  This was shot about two hours prior to the sunset while I was exploring the area.  I’ll be sure to edit the other photos soon (ish) and get them up!

Argentina is gorgeous. Have I said that before? Doesn’t it go without saying by now?

You really get to know a set of mountains when you have to hike around them. Fortunately, in the middle of these death marches, I was able to stop and drink in some of the scenery. It took a lot longer than necessary to get to the destination, but at least I arrived with a camera full of photos.  That beautiful peak in the distance is Fitz Roy.  I was very lucky to see it, because 90% of the time it’s covered with clouds.

So, last night something else lucky happened! Here are the high points:

• I did an interview that aired on NBC at 10 PM here in Austin.  The segment was all about HDR and turned out really well.   Jim Swift interviewed me and he did a great job editing together a nice little story.  You can see the full video by pressing play in the upper left hand area of the TV Station’s KXAN site. There is a second video down on the left with some extra interview stuff…
  • You guys should contact your local NBC affiliates and ask them to get the segment from KXAN – that would be cool!
  • The story also mentioned the HDR Tutorial, which you can get to via that link.
• The news segment mentioned an upcoming PhotoWalk in Austin on August 6 that I am organizing.  You can find out more inside the Facebook Event!

You can click that picture just above to visit the NBC KXAN site to see the whole segment with Jim Swift.

The 40km hike in Argentina (which my legs still feel and probably always will), it started out by ascending a small mountain in the Andes. A small mountain in the Andes, by the way, is a mountain of incomprehensible proportions in any other part of the world. After a harrowing trip, I was greeted with this view of the rest of the hike. Luckily, I was tired enough to grant myself an excuse to take off my pack and put together my Inspector Gadget camera setup to grab this shot.

In other news… wait just a few hours… we have a big announcement coming! 🙂