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Josh Kempinaire

Traveler and landscape photographer based in Switzerland.

"You can do anything. You can go anywhere"

Lord Byron, one of the leading figures in the Romantic movement, a noble man and a poet once wrote: “There is pleasure in the pathless woods, There is rapture on the lonely shore, There is society where none intrudes, By the deep sea and the music in its roar; I love not man the less, but Nature more.” This quote, used by the director Sean Penn for the movie Into the Wild, could not define better the adventurous and intrepid character of our guest, as well as his love for nature and the outdoors lifestyle. 

Josh Kempinaire, best known as @supertrampeur in Instagram, is one of those landscape photographers you don’t want to miss! His art inspires thousands of people everyday to explore and discover new and exciting places. Nowadays, Josh is one of the most influential personalities supporting the nomad lifestyle in Instagram and he is currently traveling with his yellow van searching for the most epic landscapes in the world. His photography couldn’t be more pure and elegant, and his mountainous landscapes seem to perfectly encapsulate the thrill of adventure!

"In order to understand better who is Josh as a traveler and dive into his photography, I asked him 13 questions. The following was the outcome!"

Welcome Josh! The famous book “Into the Wild” was written by Christopher Johnson McCandless, who was an American hiker and itinerant traveler who also went by the name “Alexander Supertramp”. Considering your nickname in IG, @supertrampeur, can we take for granted that you are a huge fan of the book or it is just pure coincidence? 

Hi, thanks a lot for having me here ! Yeah definitely, I’ve always been attracted by real stories or adventures and travel stories. “Into The Wild” is one of them and probably still my favorite book 5 years after reading it for the first time. I’m actually a big fan of Jack Kerouac’s work, I have all his books and I keep reading them from time to time when I need to be inspired.

So, I got inspiration there for my nickname. And for the funny part, it also comes from the fact that I’m a big fan of the rock band “Supertramp”. When I started this social media journey, there was a huge community called the Belieber, fans of Justin Bieber, on Twitter, so let’s say that I wanted to make fun of them, in a nice way.

The 20th of April 2015 you shared your first pic in IG. Three years later you are one of the most inspiring landscape photographers in Instagram. What a ride! Can you summarize for us your last three years? 

I started taking pictures even earlier with my phone but just to share memories with my family and friends. Then I heard about Instagram, but to be honest I didn’t use it a lot at the beginning.

However, in May 2015 I bought my first DSLR camera and on my graduation day I went together with a friend to shoot the stars. So, while everybody was partying and drinking to celebrate, I was hiking and camping. At this point is where all started.

Afterwards I spent the summer hiking and exploring my region and then I decided to take a gap year before starting at the university. I got a job to save money and then I planned a trip to Scandinavia. 

In April 2016 I left my home in a little yellow van and I drove all the way from Switzerland to North Cape, in Norway. On the way, I meet a lot of people while I was taking photos daily. Eventually I went back to Switzerland, where I started University while I was going outdoors as much as possible to take photos. However, in the end I decided to stop my studies since I had the certainty that I wanted to become a photographer.

People discover photography through different channels. What stimulated your interest for landscape photography? 

I think that my father stimulated my interest for photography since we lived in the middle of the Swiss Alps and we spent every weekend hiking around the mountains. In addition, we spent a lot of time driving a camper around France, Italy and the Balkans when I was 8 years old. My father also documented all his trips around Nepal or Equator for instance, and he shared those pictures with me. So yeah, my interest for photography started really early and it is part of my childhood. Furthermore, when I discovered all the social media platforms my interest for photography grew even bigger since I had access to a lot of inspiration.

How do you sustain a life full of travels? Is there any trick or tip you can share with us?

There is no magic! I have a really small budget so I have to travel cheap. This basically means that I have to sleep in my car, eat pasta and noodles really often and avoid fancy restaurants. However, because of my work, sometimes hotels invite me to spend the night for free and join nice activities. I am really thankful for that. But I don’t want people to think that to be active on Instagram means that I always travel everywhere for free. I use every cent I earn through my photography or prints to develop my career, this is why I am so thankful for the support that I am receiving.

Among all the extraordinary places you have been to, what landscape impressed you the most?

It’s really hard to tell because every location has something different to offer. But, if I’d have to choose one, would be Aoraki National Park in New Zealand. I dreamt to hike Mount Cook for years, so when I actually did, the feeling was really special. I was driving the van along the lake facing the mountains for about 50 km and I was going crazy. Otherwise, I would say that Norway and specially the Lofoten Islands are quite impressive as you can witness sharp peaks going straight out from the sea.

You are currently based in Switzerland, a country that is inspiring so many landscape photographers nowadays. If you had to choose, what three spots would you recommend visiting to our readers? 

It can be funny but from all the countries I’ve been, Switzerland is maybe the one I explored the less and it’s a shame. But I still know some cool places, even though some of them are already so famous. I would still recommend anyone to go to Zermatt, the Matterhorn will always be impressive to see, no matter how many people are there at the same time. I really like the Augsmatthorn as well because it offers a wonderful view, if you don’t get the valley covered with fog! The last one and my personal favorite would be the area around the Corbassiere Glacier in Wallis. The view of the glacier and the Grand Combin which is the peak behind, from the Panossiere Cabin is absolutely fantastic.

Your photography has a really special style. How did you reach such level? What is the first thing you do when editing a photo and how much time do you normally spend on Lightroom?

I really appreciate these words because nowadays it’s really hard to stand out and sometimes I feel like I just do the same as everybody. I think it’s just a matter of practicing as much as possible, trying different edits on the same picture to see the endless possibilities of Lightroom and develop something special. 

Not so long ago, when it came to editing, I was just going through all the pictures applying my presets and I spent a lot of time considering that I would use only a couple of pictures in the end. Now when I open Lightroom, I first watch all the pictures and select only the best ones. These are the ones I will be editing, which means I will maybe have 5 pictures instead of 100 to work on and the result will be way better. Then I apply my presets and keep playing with the settings to get exactly what I want. Some photographers don’t like the editing process so they do it as fast as possible, but I really enjoy it and sometimes I can spend an entire day on Lightroom, it all depends on my mood I guess.

Can you tell us the most notorious anecdote that ever happened to you being outdoors? 

Many things happen when you are hiking or camping but I can remember when last summer, I tried to hike to a summit with 3 friends and the weather wasn’t that good. We still decided to go and we got caught in a thunderstorm halfway to the top, we were stuck in the middle of a field and didn’t know what to do as we had all our camping and camera gear, which means we were basically covered with metal pieces. At some point we just decided to run down and made it to the car alive, but for sure it was a stupid idea to start this hike and we should have known that.

For the story, we tried again twice the day after. We made it to the summit twice but the view was covered by fog. When I tell this to people, they realize that photography isn’t always as nice as it seems, we did the same hike 3 times in 2 days to get 0 picture in the end.

As a photographer, I am sure that you feel attached to all your photos. All your pictures represent unique moments of your life. However, among your works, do you have any picture that you really like? Which is your favorite photo? 

I think the pictures I took in Zermatt last summer are my favorites because it was not planned at all, that was a last minute camping and it turned out to be perfect as the sunrise was exactly where we wanted it to be and the reflection of the lake couldn’t have been any better. More than that, I usually like to add a person in the landscape to get a scale but for this picture, my friend was randomly standing on that rock so I ran down to the lake with my camera to get that perfect shot. Otherwise, I currently really like all my pictures involving water and ice structures because I can be much more creative with these patterns and close-ups.

Learning a new skill requires practice and time, but useful tips can accelerate our learning process! What are the 3 most important pieces of advice you would give to young talent pursuing a career as a photographer? 

The first one, and every photographer will say that probably, is to go out and shoot as much as possible, with different light conditions to be able to play with the settings and understand how the camera works. Then, I think it is really important to spend a lot of time on Lightroom to understand the program and develop a signature style. Another important thing is to go out and shoot with other photographers to get inspiration and learn new methods and techniques, as long as your own photography stays authentic. Nowadays I think that this is probably the hardest part of photography, or at least this is the biggest problem that I encounter within the creative process.

Is there any artist/photographer who has inspired your art? Can you name three?

I think that the first person who ever inspired me was Roman Königshofer (@rawmeyn) because his pictures are incredibly good, but also because he has an adventurous mindset that stands out. It’s easy to see that he truly loves exploring and being in the mountains, he is not only taking pictures at the famous spots but he is spending most of his time seeking for new places.

My current favorite photographer is Benjamin Hardman (@benjaminhardman) because he has a really special style. If you go through his Instagram profile, it’s really hard not to fall in love with his photography.

It’s hard to choose only three but I would say that Alex Strohl (@alexstrohl) is also one of my favorite photographers. Every single pictures he takes gives me a special feeling and I think that’s the most important goal in photography. When I see one of his shots I really want to spend time on it

I would love to mention a few more photographers though, Johan Lolos (@lebackpacker) for instance, he was my first big inspiration when I started with photography and it was really nice to finally travel with him for some weeks this last summer. Niklas Söderlung (@nattesferd) is also one of my favorite, I really enjoy what he is doing and he only started taking pictures a year ago! Finally, I would like to mention two more photographers, Ben Simon Rehn and Donal Boyd (@bensimonrehn and @donalboyd) because their work with animals is absolutely stunning! And the list goes on and on…

Any new projects coming up or countries you will be visiting soon?

I have plenty of new projects, some die and some keep growing. But basically I will be visiting Estonia for a surf trip, Iceland, the Maldives, the Seychelles and Sri Lanka, and probably spend the summer in Norway!

Can you fix the world in one sentence?

Stop wasting, try to avoid plastic as much as possible and be kind with others.

Josh, what a pleasure to host you! It has been so didactic and interesting to read your feedback and I am sure that the community can learn valuable lessons from your experiences! Thanks a lot for sharing with us so many tips and anecdotes, I couldn’t be happier for this interview! Keep inspiring with your travels and never stop showing exploring!

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