Ole J liodden
Few photographers know polar bears like Ole Jørgen Liodden. On a detour to the more temperate climes of the UK, he tells Keith Wilson about his award-winning images, his 3D printing antics and the location of Nikon’s ‘deepest’ lens…
On a golden autumn day in Bristol, Ole Jørgen Liodden has just stepped off the stage at the Wildscreen Festival after addressing an audience of photographers, film-makers and students about his Polar Bears & Humans project. It has been an eye-opening hour as he has mixed projections of his stunning Arctic photography with hard data. Said data revealed how uncontrolled hunting is posing a greater immediate impact than climate change to the survival of the Arctic’s most iconic species. The alarm on people’s faces and in the questions that follow is profound.
As we attempt to leave the auditorium, Ole is surrounded by representatives of National Geographic, the BBC Natural History Unit, the Natural History Museum and other listeners, all wanting to know more about this untold story. It is a story he has been investigating for the last four years, to be revealed in full next spring when Polar Bears & Humans is published and the accompanying film documentary goes to air…
I know there’s not too much you can reveal, but what can you share with us about Polar Bears & Humans? What I can say is that I started this project four years ago; I didn’t have the project name at the time but it became much bigger than I thought. Climate change is the main problem for polar bears in the future, but at the moment it’s hunting. It is not illegal but legal hunting. The extent of it is serious – between 800 and 1000 polar bears killed every year – and the trade, the demand is increasing. At some point it will trigger more illegal, more grey market trade. And this is when things will start to get really bad.
Where is the main demand for polar bear skins coming from? Since 2006, the demand is mainly from China. But I like to look at the positive side. There are about 300 Chinese polar bear skin buyers a year, but there are about 1.3 billion Chinese who are not buying the skins, so this is not a very big issue for China, it is very few people.
But for the polar bear…
Yes, it’s a big issue for the polar bear and has to stop. The main thing now is to stop the trade. There will always be some kind of subsistence hunting, or problem bear killing, but if you can stop the trade we take the reason away for people buying this and making so much money.
Can you describe seeing your first polar bear in the Arctic? We saw a polar bear in the drifting ice, he came towards the boat and then he lifted his nose up and down a few times – then he stood on his hind legs. But not only standing, he was waving and kind of posing! [laughs] That was the first and I’ve never seen a bear do that afterwards. That was an interesting moment, but back then there was a lot more ice.
How much has it changed then?
In the first few years, clients actually complained about too much ice – we can’t go there or there because of the ice! In 2010, it was the first year in July that we could actually go around the northern part of Svalbard, because at that time there was usually too much ice and you had to wait till August or September. Now it’s ice-free and you have to go up to 82 degrees north to reach the edge of the polar ice. So, it’s changing quite a lot.
Rapidly too!
Yes, we’re talking about only 10 years, and that’s rapid in climate history, very fast. Svalbard is the most western part of the Barents Sea, and the Gulf Stream is just reaching the western part of Svalbard. The last time I checked the Svalbard ice chart, this week, the temperature in the water was four to six degrees centigrade. The water is getting warmer, it’s two, three, four degrees warmer.
Sometimes you have to develop the technology because it’s not possible to buy. So, i’ve been 3d printing everything
This must change the nature of your photography. How do you depict the impact of climate change and what sort of images are you taking more of now?
In the beginning, it was just to photograph polar bears as close as possible or as nicely as possible, sometimes in the landscape. Then, around 2010, it turned into trying to visualize the polar bear on the ice flow with less ice. Using a wide-angle and showing the loss of ice, that was the first thing. But now I’m more concerned about showing the thin layer between the air and the water. So for the last two years I’ve been doing more with underwater housings and fixing a camera to the end of a pole at the edge of the ice – trying to see, in one frame, both the polar bear above and under the ice. You can see that it’s just a thin layer and can show how fragile it is and it’s getting thinner.
How do you operate the camera at the end of a pole beneath the ice? I’m getting better at it. Sometimes you have to develop the technology because it’s not possible to buy. I’ve been 3D printing everything that I need by myself.
3d printing? To add specific parts to the housing?
Yes, all the sections. I have a bracket between the housing and the dome and I also have a mounting system, also 3D printed, with screws. I have a carbon fibre rod with three or four sections that I can add so I can shoot from a three or four metre height.
What sort of attachment do you have at the top?
It looks like bicycle handlebars, so I’m holding it with both hands, with autofocus and a shutter release on the handle. When I’m holding it like this it’s slightly more stable.
So the camera is upside down at the bottom of the pole and it’s telescopic so you can extend it? Yes, upside down but the pole is not telescopic, but a click system. I have a cable coming up, also with a video feed and a screen so I can see what I’m actually photographing.
And that thing can go up to three metres below?
Yes that’s right, three and a half metres from the ship.
It almost sounds like it’s an upside-down periscope! Yes, an inverse periscope! All 3D printed. I had to learn how to make it because it’s impossible to tell somebody how you specifically want it. It was a lot of sketching and diagrams. I think that’s also part of the challenge. This split-level picture is impossible with today’s technology, so you have to make the technology. That was quite tricky for me.
Have you dropped anything? Unfortunately, yes.
does that mean there’s a Nikon underwater housing on the bottom of the Arctic Ocean? No, not that. I have dropped a few lenses. I had a very nice 24-70mm at 81 degrees north that is now a few thousand metres down.
A few thousand metres?
Yes, it’s very deep there. But that doesn’t happen very often!
I’m glad to hear that! Which camera bodies do you use now?
In recent years I’ve used the Nikon D5 and Nikon D850, and before that the D810. They are my main setups. For underwater I use the Sony Alpha 7 RII, and the main reason why it’s the RII and not the RIII is because the configuration of the connectors is good with the II, but not with the III, and it has a similar sensor to what I use on the Nikon cameras.
Of course, the Sony is a mirrorless system and Nikon recently launched its mirrorless Z system. Have you looked at that yet?
Not yet. It looks very interesting. The main thing at the moment is the lack of lenses. You need adapters. In the future, maybe one, two or three years from now Nikon will have increased the lens range and have the second generation of Z-series cameras. The future for a lot of photography will be mirrorless. At the moment, telephoto lens photography, like bird photography, still looks like it will remain with the DSLRS, and the D5 is still better, but that might change.
With the Arctic ice shrinking, is it getting harder to find polar bears? No. This is a paradox because we have done maybe 70 or 80 trips now from Svalbard, and we are doing a full season from 18 March to 23 September. So, we know where to find them and we’ve done this so many times. This year we averaged 20 polar bear sightings per trip. We know exactly where they are because we have seen them one week earlier or know exactly where to go. Also, looking at the ice chart, the map of the ice, we can see where the polar bears are, mostly because they are very selective of the ice they settle on.
What recommendations do you give your clients for photographing in these conditions?
First thing is the advantage of using a ship because you have somewhere to sleep, eat and have a high degree of comfort, so that’s the main thing. You don’t have a tent, you don’t have a snow mobile, you don’t need to survive overnight! It makes it easier because you can dry your camera, you can recharge your batteries, you can download your pictures and check the sharpness – we do talks and look at pictures. In terms of photographic equipment, a dry bag is number one. Then we recommend you bring a wide-angle to do landscape and a telephoto lens, because not all the polar bears come in close.
What focal length do you prefer?
I use 600mm. 600mm f/4, 70200mm, 24-70mm and 14-24mm are my four main lenses for polar bears.
Am I right in thinking the 14-24mm is used in the underwater housing?
That’s actually another one, the 16-35mm. I have it taped on 20mm. I tested it at 16mm, I tested at 26mm, almost 30mm, but around 20mm is good for my requirements.
do you stick to the same camera and lens combination in the underwater housing?
Yes, because the setup and the camera settings for underwater are different from above. Usually, I shoot above sea level with shallow depth of field to give the bokeh effect, but underwater it turns out that you actually need to do the opposite. You need a lot more sharpness because it is completely different underwater than above.
Have you always used Nikon? Actually, I started off with a Canon!
Usually, i shoot above sea level with shallow depth of field to give the bokeh effect, but underwater it turns out that you actually need to do the opposite
I was a Canon Ambassador for Norway until around about 2010.
What made you change?
The Nikon D3S. That was the killer and especially for what I’m doing in the Arctic, with a lot of dark, low-light situations, I needed to push… Earlier it was not possible to push much beyond ISO1000 or 1500. But with the D3S I suddenly had a tool that could give very good resolution at ISO3200 with an autofocus system that was just incredibly fast.
Not only did that lowlight performance give you more options, but did it also mean you could do more photo tours?
Yes. And the best light in the Arctic is when it’s low light. For me, it was not a difficult choice because when Nikon finally came into the full-frame market with the D3 and then the D3S, that was something, that was raising the bar – it was a total game changer. Also, I had just tested the D3S with a 400mm f/2.8 without any instruction and I was shooting a hawk owl flying and the tracking was amazing. So, it had the ISO capability and the autofocus that was amazing at the time.
When did you turn professional? It was 2003. I had a normal job but I was still a photographer on the side.
What sort of photography were you doing back then?
It was nature and wildlife, that was the main thing, but in 2003 when I went full-time I started a book project that lasted two years. It was about the region I was from, which is two hours north of Oslo, in the mountains. It’s a very attractive area for nature, but also for history – it’s from the Viking age. It’s also the area of Norway with the highest density of wooden churches.
Svalbard is the area you’re now best known for, but when did you first go there?
The first time was 2003 or 2004, so immediately after I had decided to do photography full-time. The first time I was a paying guest, but I saw so many things that could be improved. The next time I came with half the boat full of friends and my clients, and the third year I had the whole boat full, so I came as a guest but then I made my own business out of it.
How much have your Arctic photo tours grown in the decade that you have been operating?
We started with one polar bear trip in 2006, now in 2018 we have 15. And for next year we have 16 trips and everything is sold out except for two spots. In 2020, we have around about ten spots left, I think.
And these tours are all for photographers?
Yes. Most of the people are not professionals, there are sometimes, but there are people coming from India, China, US, Europe, Australia, all over. This is what makes it important for me – as the founder of this company, my job is not only to give them the best situation for photography, but I also want to make ambassadors.
I do talks on the trips and I’m very happy when I see that some of these people are very wealthy and move in the circles where the demand for polar skins are high. To know that people may be going back to India or China and telling their friends that this situation for the polar bears is not good – it’s satisfying. Also, they might have governmental connections. So, for us, it’s not only about having a business earning some money, but it’s also about opening up a conservation with these people and everyone else.
What are the photos you are proudest of in your career so far? I’m very happy about the polar bear on thin ice image, which was the winner in Wildlife Photographer of the Year in 2012, because I had been thinking of this situation for years and suddenly it just appeared in front of me. That is what I’m most happy with, this is photography by purpose when it’s something you have been thinking about; something you’ve been dreaming about; something you’ve been thinking about for years.
It didn’t happen on the first five trips, or the tenth but I think maybe on the fifteenth trip. That makes it even better in my opinion, because it was a process of creating a picture in advance – of course, the polar bear had to do what it did – but still I like that photography by purpose is my main philosophy. I mean, I’m not driving around in my car with the camera on the side snapping things. Usually, I’m walking out with the binoculars and just observing, and if there’s something interesting I go back later because it’s more appealing as a photographer to be creative, not lucky.
We recommend you bring a wide-angle to do landscape and a telephoto lens, because not all the polar bears come in close