favorite panoramas

Quintuplet Prism

This is from a mountain trip up the mountain top called Saksa, basically meaning scissors as it comes so close to another top making a pair of scissors, to the far right the top of Slogen is seen one of the tallest mountains in sunnmøre at 1564 while we are at 1073 and we started at about 100 or 50meters up, so we went about 1000 meters up, and the craziest thing is that we managed to get all the way to the top with my 87 year old Grandfather! :O, I sure hope Im still that fit when I get that old if I even manage to make it that old. He is a great inspiration to me in so many ways and is also a great painter and a pioneer in our family. I was blown away when we got to the very top of the mountain just a few meters above the clouds or even in the clouds it gave a surreal atmosphere and was nice to still see the neighbouring mountain tops but what I was astounded by was the rainbow in the clouds opposite the sun, when I popped the CPL filter on 5 bows appeared, there is two in the center though they are small and then three big ones but the biggest is mainly just a nice white frame to the inner bows. Truly an experience worth the effort, time and energy and the muscle pains that lasted about 5 days later. Would be nice sometime in the future to try camping on top of a mountain like this, and this one was nice and soft still here on the top from the moss which is unusual. Autumn provided a lot of nice colors along the way as well as a stunning sunset on the decent and red leaves from the blueberry bushes all the way up and down the mountain. The image has a little bit of toning done and fixing up mistakes of the camera but very little was need to have this image scream, and I feel it stands on its own as a masterpiece without me having to do my magic on it. Have you ever seen this light phenomena and if so with 5 rainbows? Tell me about it if you have and if you havent I hope you will someday see it! Prints are available at http://fineartamerica.com/featured/quintuplet-prism-iwan-groot.html?newartwork=true

Light of a Secluded Village

This is taken a couple meters away from where I set up my tent. This is the view that I left imprinted on my brain as I entered my little mobile abode to rest until sunrise. the Moon rose with a nice orange fire-like hue in the opposite direction of the Milky way making its decent below the horizon very very slowly. creating HDR for this scene proved somewhat challenging but also worth it. I changed the aperture also for bracketing instead of just shutterspeed and ISO. a Solar storm struck our atmosphere just a little bit before I went to sleep though there were northern lights the whole time I was there as well. It is definitely a place I liked revisited after last years challenge here. a nice unique quaint lighthouse is the star but not the only nice motive on the little achipelago. Do you got any adventures planned for the weekend? Feel Free to Share =D Enjoy and Check the HQ at flickr to enjoy all the small little details

Twilight Above Ålesund II

The second of from the Photoshoot Combination of Averaging, lighten and some HDR blending. a little bit later than the other. so a little more contrast and darker. Hope to make a Star Trail here some time. i really like the crane on the right side of the frame. slightly different a bit tighter and some action from the cars. Follow me here or at https://www.facebook.com/artiwangroot Like, Favorite, Comment, Share, Enjoy! =D

Lights of Panorama

I was staying with My Uncle for a week and he took me out to a few Nice places around Ørsta to get some really Nice photos, and it was a nice surprise to get some Northern Lights in it as well. you can follow me here or at https://www.facebook.com/artiwangroot Like, Favorite, Comment, Share, Enjoy! =D also check out my Facebook page for a giveaway!

On Top of the World

I was lucky that the sun moved right in front of the sun for that part of the panorama, the mountain straight ahead in the middle of the frame is called Storhornet if I remember right, and the fjord to the left is the one that goes to Geiranger a very famous fjord here in norway. The mountain range is quite impressive though it is not the great alps of italy or switzerland, or the dolomites of lofoton or chile. Still love them. This photo is right above the ski center in stranda.

I Like that Boulder

Sorry for the name change, i called it "Rock at Alnes" but decided to use a quote from Shrek "I like that boulder, thats a nice boulder" 6 vertical shots to make another great panoramic, this is an old shot from the summer that i made a bit sharper and darker with some new techniques. you can follow me here or at https://www.facebook.com/artiwangroot Like, Favorite, Comment, Share, Enjoy! =D also check out my Facebook page for a giveaway!

My Town in Autumn II

8 frames 4 on top 4 on bottom and a few extra for blown out areas Here is the other panorama from my town during its peaks of colors in autumn, I found a rock on the edge of the cliff with some red. i found this part a bit more colorful, maybe not as nice view but nicer colors. you can follow me here or at https://www.facebook.com/artiwangroot Like, Favorite, Comment, Share, Enjoy! =D

Glow

This is a reedit of a shot that I took on valentines day 2015. Two reasons for the re-edit, the first had some issues that didnt allow me to sell it on 500px and now also so it will fit my astroscape style a bit better. I went up hiking up the mountain with my camping gear and camera gear which is like carrying a third of my own weight up the mountain, so takes a bit longer than the normal hike up here. it was my first time to explore this area, and was wonderful to enjoy RAW nature, hearing the wistling of the breeze in the trees, twigs cracking, ice shifting, water trickling. and ever so often a bird of deer in the distance. as for this shot it would have been a nicer composition to wait a couple hours for the milky way if I were to get an arch over the mountain however this which was around midnight was when there was the best northern lights. this is also the first occassion where I witnessed yellow, orange and pink northern lights without other colors, and I find it very cool seeing these colors by themselves, which gives more of a feeling of fire from heaven. and passion to the photo. fitting for valentines day right? If i knew without a doubt that the ice was thick enough I would have Loved to go out to the rock that you see there and take a photo of me standing on it. or take photos out on the ice. however I knew it was not thick enough to support my weight and definitely not worth risking my life for. This is another 180panorama about 10 vertical tiles To the far left you see orions belt while you don't see it here there was also pleiades and the small dipper in plain view, two or three planets also in view, some of the ones I find online are jupiter, venus, mars. "WHAT CAUSES THE NORTHERN LIGHTS? The Northern Lights are actually the result of collisions between gaseous particles in the Earth's atmosphere with charged particles released from the sun's atmosphere. Variations in colour are due to the type of gas particles that are colliding. The most common auroral color, a pale yellowish-green, is produced by oxygen molecules located about 60 miles above the earth. Rare, all-red auroras are produced by high-altitude oxygen, at heights of up to 200 miles. Nitrogen produces blue or purplish-red aurora." ~http://www.northernlightscentre.ca/northernlights.html

My Town in Winter

Today I looked out my window close to sundown and notice the sky had cleared up and was promising a nice sunset, we just had fresh snow, so everything was beautifully covered in white, and I saw my opportunity so i grabbed some snow gear, tripod and camera and hiked up the first leg of the mountain, right above our town. takes about 20 minutes to get up there, i think, I wasn't counting. my house is towards the middle of the frame across from the shipyard. I wish I had gone up a bit earlier so I would have time to take photos of some of the trees on the way up. but time was short, since I started going up while golden hour had already started and was fading into blue, however the more colorful sunset it is closer to blue hour. I was a bit afraid I would miss the peak of colors, however I made it in time. This is part of a seriesI Ive taken in all of the seasons now except spring, which is coming soon. I also want to photograph it sometime at night with the stars. but Ill have to see. below are links to my panoramas of the same location from the autumn and summer. in the distance you can see ålesund, vigra, valderøya, godøy, lepsøya. https://500px.com/photo/76553935/summer-in-søvik-by-iwan-groot?from=user_library https://500px.com/photo/85443083/my-town-in-autumn-by-iwan-groot?from=user_library two autumn bonuses https://500px.com/photo/85919279/my-town-in-autumn-ii-by-iwan-groot?from=user_library https://500px.com/photo/97054309/my-town-in-autumn-iii-by-iwan-groot?from=user_library

Green Arrow

This is a reedit of the shot as I made quite a big mistake noticeable for they that know the milky way well. So here it is stitched in a way to to show the actual pattern, but the milky way was brightened a bit in this shot and with a different technique than last time, though i used the same technique at first, but more subtlety and then I used luminosity masks which are available from Jimmy McIntyre. This one was edited shortly after the last one but sat on the computer a long time because I didn't want to immediately reupload a new version, and I like the obscurity of the other version as well. Im posting it as somewhat of a celebration as the dark skies are returning to norway, we still dont have atmospheric dark but soon will be dark enough to start capture the milky way in which we live and stars and the magnificent auroras of the northern skies. here is the text from last time: "I watch the TV series Arrow a lot and the green bow in the sky made me think of a bow. and hadn't thought about calling any of them anything like that. but when I looked at this shot I thought it would be sweet to have a bow and arrow in my hand in this shot, i considered painting it in, but decided to leave it like this. This is probably around 3 o'clock in the morning, between 4 and 5 the east starts to light up a little bit from the approach in dawn. I wasn't sure I was going to see northern lights while being out, but they were there the whole time I was there. which was nice to marvel at the grandeur and beauty they shine. I found this nice large round rock and thought about doing a star trail there, but ended up not doing it but rather make a lot of panoramas and stills. though they are great the highlight of the night was when I was biking home again I saw the Biggest meteor I've seen. or shooting star. It stretched a bout a quarter or a third of the sky with the brilliance of blue and purple in the trail and fiery orang at the front, and most just fade out when they are burnt up, but this one exploded and looked like fairy dust being sprinkled on the mountain. and right before the explosion the fire got so bright that is flashed light onto the ground before me and lit up everything just a bit more for a split second. I wish I had captured it. but then if I was behind the camera I might not have seen in person." Enjoy it and as always feel free to Share =D

Early Hours

For this session I went out a bit after midnight and was out until 5 in the morning and spent several hours exploring another part of the island at night. for this shot I actually tried to do horizontal steelwool sparks, but it wouldnt light since it was not fine enough. In this shot I used 9 shots but it is mainly 6 shots since there was a lot of overlay. there wasnt much Northern Lights on the forecast but there was a nice glow the entire time I was there, I planned on making a star trail that night but didnt get around to that, ill have to do more star trails next winter. The milky way and aurora are no longer visible from the long days of summer approaching. the auroras were a bit messy in this panorama and dont know why, but I think it was natural but in the shot looked like a photography mistake, so I filled the gaps a bit. I also played with Chanel Mixer in photoshop for fun to see what it does, and found out it can make nice inverted colors and this case made the light pollution disappear and make the skies look clearer. hough they are great the highlight of the night was when I was biking home again I saw the Biggest meteor I've seen. or shooting star. It stretched a bout a quarter or a third of the sky with the brilliance of blue and purple in the trail and fiery orang at the front, and most just fade out when they are burnt up, but this one exploded and looked like fairy dust being sprinkled on the mountain. and right before the explosion the fire got so bright that is flashed light onto the ground before me and lit up everything just a bit more for a split second.

360° Coast of Norway

Here is something fun from 360° panoramas you can take a small glimpse of what I got to enjoy march 14 to 15th. I love making milky way panoramas and seeing the universe unveil itself. This is probably around 4 o'clock in the morning, between 4 and 5 the east starts to light up a little bit from the approach in dawn. I wasn't sure I was going to see northern lights while being out, but they were there the whole time I was there. which was nice to marvel at the grandeur and beauty they shine. though they are great the highlight of the night was when I was biking home again I saw the Biggest meteor I've seen. or shooting star. It stretched a bout a quarter or a third of the sky with the brilliance of blue and purple in the trail and fiery orange at the front, and most just fade out when they are burnt up, but this one exploded and looked like fairy dust being sprinkled on the mountain. and right before the explosion the fire got so bright that is flashed light onto the ground before me and lit up everything just a bit more for a split second. I wish I had captured it. but then if I was behind the camera I might not have seen in person.

Purple Edge

500px Photo ID: 104495211 - love this composition, the blank space between the aurora and land to me looks like the head of an elephant. the purple you see at the edge of the aurora was actually visible where the other colors aren't always as visible because of it is not always as bright. but this purple edge is at the brightest part. I hardly ever see that little purple edge on the bottom part. Another thing I love about this composition is the simple view and contrast between the left that is smooth and blurred together, and the right which is sharp and crisp. I used two exposures at both tiles in the panorama to heal some of the shadows however I didn't fully recover them because of how unnatural it looked in comparison to the contrast of the rest of the image. on March 17 we got a 8.93 aurora storm and it was spectacular! I am in love with the Aurroa, with them filling the whole sky and dancing everywhere. the town on the island to the left is Terøya and I'm on the peninsula of Søvik. on the edge of the big rock you Can see my friend laying down trying to take a shot with my other camera. I was whoop whooping the whole time pretty much, it was a great show.

Moody Elements II

I went out to this little island called Bjørnøya for sunset and even as the colors faded near 11 or midnight, as there is hardly any darkness here in Norway anymore. I went down to the shoreline to check out the rocks and see what sculptures have been made by the waves over time. This part of the shore doesn't have many anomalies but still very pleasing to the eyes for me, and wanted to share. I plan on visiting the shore once again to look at the different formations.

Sky On Fire

I went out to the islands a friday night and ventured around on Ulla part of haramsøya until midnight and then cycled out to Flemsøya to capture the beauty of the beach out on Sandvika, there are many more gems on the islands I want to explore, there will be quite a bit more of these shots coming the whole time I was there the weather was perfect which gave me 8 hours of shooting time from 9 in the evening till 5 in the morning the next day. This is from my longest shooting session probably ever, I spent 8 hours continuously behind the camera shooting away with the exception of biking to the next location to continue shooting. Im pretty sure Ive cycled for 25kms in this session. started at 9 and finished shooting at 5 because the color of sunset never faded, it is the point of the year where Dusk and Dawn blur together because we do not get the night anymore, a few stars made an appearance which was refreshing. would also be a great location to shoot wildlife, I saw seals, otters, and various bird species.

Windy in the City

For some of my followers you might have noticed that my Page "Iwan Groot Photography" which was for portraits has been merged with this page. So you can expect me to upload some of those portraits, but will be mainly my Retouched Portraits and my fine Art portraits, I dont think I will included my regular photoshoots, I also have just moved to Ålesund so you Might see a bit more of the city from now on. The Stairs up to the Fjellstua were rebuilt this year So for my Photo "Twilight above Ålesund I & II" I went up a different path since this one was closed and shot from higher up. I Mainly went up here since I had some time to spend and since the clouds were very blah I thought I would just take some test shots to plane my next shoot here. But towards the end of my time here on the Stairs, the clouds started to break showing the patterns of how the cotton candy of the sky was flowing over the mountains and splitting apart to let some light through. This oppurtunity gave some clouds I really liked. I believe this types of cloud is called Stratus. I like shooting lower to get some foreground, aswell as getting a several different poses at the edge and the wind provided some nice movement to my hair. The angels from this postion I find more complimentary, also the stairs going back and forth making s curves at the bottom of the fram give a unique image. This Panorama is made out of 4 tiles each with exposures, and to emphasize the colors I was seeing coming through the clouds I used two different white balances. For some it might be too much editing as it isnt straight out of the camera, But Im trying ti show what i experence, when I look i see color, I see contrast, I see Movement and a moment. I see a composition rather than a view, I see nature that can be captured in the Fine Art of Photography. I think you will see some fine art portraits from here in the future, if I can get models. =D

Road Down from Heaven

I got at the edge of of the road and out on the side of the mountain side and so that I could capture a panorama of the road winding down to the fjord that cut through the islands. At the edge of the panorama you get to see Flemsøya and and lepsøya so you get to see the three main islands of Nordøyene. The sunlight helped bring out the great lush colors, and with the CPL filter you get some great blues and rich greens with so much light. Hope you all like this one even though there are blown out highlights, I tried blending exposures for an HDR and but the single exposures I found a lot better.

Green Pastures

One of the simplest landscapes I've done, I did some light retouching of the highlights with HDR and digital blending with the Thumb Rule to get rid of the Flare. Usually I don't shoot with so much sunlight but made for some real lush, summer feelings. This is on the Island Haramsøya and another reason that I've fallen in love with this little island, on the top it is quite flat and provides several farmlands for the farmers. and around the corner from here I saw the largest Sea Eagle Ive seen now and was about 7 meters away when it took off, and wish I could have caught a decent capture or silhouette of it to include in the landscape of the islands' cliffs. I considered desaturating the colors in this piece since they are so strong and vibrant that they almost look fake, and I don't like making regular landscapes to look fake, but Ill let it be as a statement to the power of sunlight. On the left side if you look very closely you can see the open ocean which never cease to wonder me.

Always Greener On the Other Side

Had a hard time deciding on a Title, I thought about plain "Ulla" since that is the location, "Road to Paradise" because one of the reasons I came here was to get a shot of the winding road down the mountain side to this turquoise colored coastal island's water, especially when it is sunny you get a glimpse of the shallow water between the islands and around them. This is the most turquoise you will get in the area, however I was not high enough to get the real nice colors, so I will have to revisit this location again when it is sunny with clear skies. Here is another reason to love the island of Haramsøya. I was a little scared taking this shot because I went out to the edge of a cliff, and saw some large cracks, so I was a bit curious about the stability of it.

Para...Para...Paradise

This is a shot Ive been planing for a long time last autumn I was looking on Google maps and Noticed that the Area between Haramsøya and Flemsøya was the nicest color water in the whole area at least for Haram, Finnøya, skodje, Ålesund and Giske Kommune. So Since it has such great color and is unmatched in so many kommunes I love going here and seeing the Sun hit the nice white sand laying at the bottom of the shallow water. I find the bridge quite cool as well as the rock formations down by the shore formed by the waves and tide pools and the mountain side itself has lots of cool formations and textures that I love. I find the colors out on this island very vibrant and stronger than Im used to around my town. This area between Haramsøya and Flemsøya is a nature reserve and many birds visit, as well as minks, otters, seals and orcas. on This mountain top I saw the largest eagle I've ever seen over 2 meters wingspan, and when I stand next to the docks on this island I am also amazed by the fish I see swimming around. Im a little off the top of the cliff so you might say I went off the edge to get this shot, but Im very careful and dont go unless i feel it is stable and feel like I have good control. On this occasion I went out here with folks and we drove the car up one side of the mountain and down the other side. It was such a joy to show them this beautiful island and enjoy the scenery with others. They were in agreement with me that this island is majestic and more beautiful than Geiranger. They understood why I love this island so much. Another thing I pointed out to them is the diversity in follows on this island. There are so many flowers and so many of them that Ive never seen before anywhere else. I think the seeds are dropped here by the birds that visit and drop their droppings on this fresh fertile soil. This is pretty much all shot at 1/30th of second as that was the main shot I got. that evening I was looking for my photos and they all had been lost so I had to use some recovery software to fetch them and so shots were too damaged to use however the all the shots at 1/30th and 1/100th of a second were usable so I used the 1/100th to recapture some of the blown highlights but then used the base layer of 1/30th of second to make the majority of the tones. and used luminosity masks to make it more of an HDR shot and also used them to give a little kick as far as light. Please Share as well since this is one of my favourite shots from the year and one that Ive been waiting so long to take. =D

Olsvika in Glory

You might have seen my Road side quickie, This is a panorama from the same time and just a minute or two later. the bay in Olsvika is nice and quaint and I capture the whole bay in the panorama but I found it too much so I cropped the panorama into two images instead. for the camera nerds, it was at ISO 800 f1.8 and 2,5 seconds. It was a shame I couldn't stay out and photograph more or in a better quality, but i had to get some sleep for work the next day. it was a very quick trip down the shore and back as this is just down from my apartment. I hope you enjoy this panorama

Pinnacle of Spjekavikfjellet

I find this shot so amazing and I wish I could share it in full resolution for you guys on Facebook, at least better than this size. so make sure to check it out on 500px or flickr afterwards. This pinnacle I saw from quite far away and in the darkness made my way to it. It was even cooler than I had expected when I came to it. i went around it to see what angle I liked the most, at first I took a shot of it with the northern lights in the background and then realised how great this location was for a 360 panorama. and I love making them. Im a sucker for them and being able to share the full view i find amazing. I made 13 vertical shots with my Sigma Art lens which gives me 16 out of 18 megapixels on my camera which is a great quality for the lens, almost getting the full worth of the camera. where my 10-22mm before would give me 12 i believe, which is also good. I also had to make the photo smaller to be able to edit it. 7000px x 25000px which i do not have a machine able to properly edit something that big. and can't be uploaded to 500px because it is so large as well as so large it would be only useful that large for a bill board or something like that. Im going to make an album to share with you guys how I went about editing it and also so you can see before after and the process as well as he smaller details I love so much about this panorama. if you can notice the way I edited the milky way here, i would be interested if you like the old way or the new way more. i like this new way more. the majority of fine tune editing in this panorama were recovering shadows and darkening mid-tones, cutting through the light pollution and lightening a few places of the milky way. in retrospect I wish I had made an HDR of Ålesund from here to get more details from there as well as a sense of the shape of Ålesund on its several islands. but making HDRs in panoramas like this can be a big pain and I thought at the time This would be awesome and HDR would be unnecessary. I was also surprised how much light was making its way up here. with the combination of distant city lights, twilight and the northern lights I got quite nice directional and soft light on the mountain side and top which i find really adds to the scene. compositionally I usually dont try to have the same scene twice in a 360 panorama but the tree with the orang light behind it from sykkelven helped add balance when on both sides, and thought can also drive the point home that it is a 360 degree panorama. EXIF 20" f2 at ISO 1600, 18mm on Sigma Art 18-35mm f1.8 13 vertical shots on s 550d I hope you all enjoy

Lonely Lumber at the Lake

A scene I loved so much, with great details of the Milky way on the opposite side of the lakers the tree, with great light behind it for a great contrast and warmth to the tree, I didn't do any brushing for the milky way to enhance it, but rather used luminosity masks, and various blending modes of the same layers masked to make the details pop. I love the mountains in the background and i love the details there, I wish I could capture them better. enjoy this scene from camping two weeks ago!

Rippled Reflections

This image has been well appreciated on my profile as well as on viewbug it has gotten great ratings so I thought I would share here as well. I Generally dont shoot in the middle of the day but this one turned out quite well. When it comes to mirror reflections I also dont like perfect reflections because that just becomes redundant, I like a little bit of ripples, and I got that here. This is at Brosundet in Ålesund, Norway, on a sunny day. I hope you all like it! Feel Free to share =D prints at: http://fineartamerica.com/featured/rippled-reflections-iwan-groot.html?newartwork=true