Rainbow Whirlwind
Oh boy had I been doing a lot of photography!
It was 2006, and my first visit to Iceland. Moreover, it was a gonzo, too-quick, one-week around the island marathon following at the heels of three and a half weeks photographing in Svalbard and East Greenland, by all rights, I should have been exhausted, but If I was, I didn't notice. As you can tell from the direction of my work in the last nine years, Iceland had captivated me, and few moments more so than this one, spotting the rainbow near the bottom of Seljalandsfoss and managing to put aside the "big picture" of one of the beautiful waterfalls in the world and finding something even more magical in what was, on the scale of this waterfall, a detail.
I experimented a lot, knowing that the "feel" of the moving water was going to vary based on exposure time and the moment I selected to press the shutter, of the dozens of exposures, this one in particular managed to convey the swirling sense that I got within the water.
And only by including just the tiny window into the pool of water at the bottom of the image was I able to connect this incredible light, which suggested a fantasy painting, with the real world, the image is far more powerful as a result.
Perhaps not surprisingly, prints of this image work extremely well on pearl or metallic papers, and just as important it renders well in large prints, a 44" tall print I made for one client looks incredible in her home.