February 2020

Continuing my drone photography of Iceland, this installment features episodes titled “Remote Lakes on a Windy Day,” “Iceland’s Westfjords Region,” “Dark, Remote Landscape in Iceland,” “Village by Lake Myvatn,” and “The Town of Eskifjordur and its Pool.” 

On the subject of swimming pools, every Icelandic child is required to learn to swim before graduating from school. Because of this, every village seems to have a pool. Most pools are outdoor pools with heated water. Most pool water is heated by mixing Iceland’s abundant geo-thermal heated water to obtain a comfortable temperature. Outdoor hot tubs are also very popular in connection with the swimming. During our recent two weeks in Iceland, we swam in six different pools, including  Eskifjordur.

As someone who used to fly small airplanes – I have over 500 hours as a pilot – it is similar but unique to fly a small drone and use it to photograph the landscape. My drone has a nice five inch screen on the controller that lets me see what the onboard camera sees. But you are pretty busy flying to follow the screen in detail, and five inches isn’t very much for detail anyway. So when I get home and load the files on my computer and begin viewing them on a 27 inch screen, it is almost like flying with the drone myself. This is especially true with high resolution video. And the ability to slow things down or speed things up or zoom in close adds more. So the editing is a lot about discovery, and the following is some of the results.