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Sebastian Lehrke
@sebastian.lehrke
Best of the week 52 at #nomadict 2021
The story of the winning shot is probably one of the most unique but also dangerous moments I experienced in the mountains so far.
When I spontaneously joined a trip to the Dolomites with some of my friends and my twin brother, I jeopardized their plan with my idea of sleeping a night up at the mountain plateau of the famous Seceda, overlooking the Puez-Geislerspitzen at night. However, there was the prediction of scattered thunderstorms and my friends didn’t want to risk getting into it. As a sometimes stubborn person, I insisted on my plans and told them that if there really would be a thunderstorm coming, we could hide at the mountain station.
"Just imagine having a dark stormy sky in combination with some lucky sun rays for sunset - could there even be something more epic?"
After several discussions, we eventually decided on going up. My brother and I enjoyed the high grassy slopes without any people while our two buddies were taking a break at a lower located hut. Hanging out there, setting up our place for the night, we didn’t realize how fast the weather changed. We were just facing these stunning peaks in front of us. Within a few minutes, everything around us was dark.
"Out of a sudden one of the heaviest thunderstorms I witnessed surrounded us and left us in almost complete darkness."
The lightning bolts in the clouds were frighteningly close and the wind became super strong very quickly. We got scared and we tried to hide in the nearby ski lift station but the loud alarm went off so we couldn’t stay there. Being shocked and frightened, we decided we would have to make our way back to the mountain station which was around 150 meters in altitude below us. We left everything behind and ran as fast as we could. The only thing which we took with us, was our camera (luckily). Fortunately, nothing went wrong on the way back which took us a horrific 3-4 minutes. It felt way longer!
In the protection by the mountain station, we witnessed a thrilling thunderstorm for around two hours. No one would like to be anywhere but be covered and protected during these crazily dangerous weather conditions. And we were in the mountains! Nevertheless, I was right. Suddenly, the clouds cleared up and some sunlight came through. The whole place was mysteriously quiet as the thunderstorm moved away. Photographing into the direction of the light, down into the valley, we completely forgot to turn around. It was more or less a coincidence when I walked a bit in front to place myself as a scaling point for the others at the end of a small slope that I got to see this other view when I turned around to go back.
"I couldn’t trust my own eyes."
I saw something I had never seen before: unbelievably shaped clouds, like huge drops of water, being held up by the sky, threatening to fall down but magically being held. It honestly felt like being in a twilight zone. Instantly I grabbed my camera, shouted at the boys, and pointed wildly to the sky. All were stunned. My brother and I ran back up the hill to get that iconic view on Seceda as fast as we could. Time stood still at that moment. I can’t tell how many times I pressed the shutter while just being fascinated by the whole scene. It didn’t feel real. It was a complete overload for all my senses.
Looking back, it’s been one of the most unique photography AND mountain moments in my life. It was super scary and other-worldly at the same time. Even today, when I take a look at the pictures, I feel the same. All these colors and shapes, the fog, the golden mist, the so-called Mammatus clouds (as I learned afterward), and the iconic Puez-Geisler group… I barely edited the photos I took since most of them were just so stunning by themselves because of the scene.
"As I wanted to keep the scene and this photo as natural as possible, I simply focused on pushing the exposure and the shadows."
I underexposed the photo slightly on purpose in order to keep all the detail alive. I then increased the contrast a tiny bit and decreased clarity to keep that dreamy smooth look and I decreased saturation and vibrance because the colors were too bright for my taste. Still, the colors are pretty intense even now. To finish, I twisted the tone curve to that classy S-style and pushed perfectly on the shadows and highlights in the histogram to get that sharp and contrasty feeling between the fore-, middle-, and background.
However happy I am with this photo or with any other photo, the stories behind each photograph are more memorable and special to me than the photos themselves. I had the chance to travel to Iceland this year and as a lot of photographers and people know, Iceland itself is a true gem in terms of landscape and outdoor photography. However, in 2021, something special happened: The volcano in the south/west peninsula close to Keflavik erupted. As the volcano had grown in summer, I was super lucky to have been able to capture it during a never expected very unique sunrise. It remembered me of that Seceda moment of the winning shot because it also felt so other-worldly. I had goosebumps on my whole body and I couldn’t figure out if it was due to the freezing cold winds in the early morning hours or that pure joy of the moment itself.
It’s been over the past year that I learned to enjoy a moment with my own eyes again. My biggest challenge in the last years was always to decide with which gear I wanted to capture my shots. Having a camera and a drone with me all the time stressed me during the few minutes of perfect light. I realized for myself that I wasn’t satisfied with switching from drone to camera and back to the drone – back and forth all the time. In the end, I figured that I loved my drone photos when light is still a bit harsher in the golden hour and to capture the last or first light with my camera since it has a way larger sensor and depth. From that point on, I mostly did send my drone up way before the last minutes of light or some minutes after the first light, which made me also enjoy the final or first moments of the day in a calm and relaxed way.
By giving importance to finding out what worked and what did not for me, I could bring back peace and reduce stress during those perfect photography moments. In addition, I learned to appreciate seeing the changing scene through my own eyes again, which in turn even increased the joy I felt with my camera.
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