Behind the Scenes: Sun Dog

Matt Belzile - Whistler Backcountry

This was another one of those days where we got skunked by the weather. We had some good conditions in the morning, but as we moved into the afternoon it started to cloud out with high clouds at first. Noticing this sun dog becoming visible I knew I wanted to get a shot with the rider in front of it. We were already in a zone taking some fun laps with a slope that lined up reasonably well. I wanted the sun dog to intercept the slope so the rider appeared in the middle.

It took a little time to sled around to find the exact spot and then point out what I was thinking to Matt Belzile. Once you’re on the top of a line it looks totally different. From the perspective of the photographer, it looks like a distinct ridge, but from the rider’s viewpoint, it is more of an open panel with no recognizable features. On the first go Matt went a bit far right out of my view, luckily the first track was out of sight and we were able to line it up in the correct spot on the second go.

I shot this on a Fisheye as it was the widest lens I had in my bag that would allow me to show the entire sundog and the rider. I wasn’t too concerned about lens distortion since the circular nature of the sun dog would make this less visible. I stopped down to expose for the sun so it wouldn’t be blown out, knowing the rest of the image would be slightly silhouetted, but this was the look I was going for.

Once in Lightroom, I cropped the image to square. Since I shot on such a wide lens there was some foreground I didn’t want to have in the image but had to include in the field to capture the parts of the image I did want.

Gear:
Canon 7D MK II
Canon 8-15mm f4 L Fisheye (15mm)

Settings:
1000 sec at f / 14, ISO 100

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Behind the Shot series where I tell the story behind my action, adventure and landscape photography and dissect the techniques and gear that was used to make it.