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Phil Douglis | all galleries >> Galleries >> Gallery Eleven: Aspects of Antarctica – a travel photo-essay > Floating Dream, Antarctica, 2004
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08-JAN-2004

Floating Dream, Antarctica, 2004

Because Antarctica is so “other-worldly”, a visit is often likened to a dream. The final third of my photographic essay reflects these dream-like aspects of Antarctica. The first of these five final images confronts us with a bizarre blue and white iceberg that seems to bear a figurehead at its front – it was as if the ghost of an 18th Century ship came sweeping past us, a reminder of those who came through these very waters during the great age of polar exploration.

Canon PowerShot G5
1/1000s f/4.0 at 28.8mm hide exif
Full EXIF Info
Date/Time08-Jan-2004 17:54:28
MakeCanon
ModelPowerShot G5
Flash UsedNo
Focal Length28.8 mm
Exposure Time1/1000 sec
Aperturef/4
ISO Equivalent
Exposure Bias
White Balance (-1)
Metering Modematrix (5)
JPEG Quality (6)
Exposure Program
Focus Distance

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Phil Douglis26-Dec-2008 18:57
Thanks, Nero, for this observation. A photograph is a stand-in for reality. It can still excite the imagination because, by necessity, it leaves out more than it can include.
Phil Douglis04-May-2004 16:48
Thanks, Lara, for your perceptive comment. You are right -- an expressive photograph should offer its viewers food for thought. The fact that different people see different things in this image is very humbling. I am delighted to have made an image that can, as you say, convey so many different stories. Your Titanic connection is understandable -- it was destroyed by an iceberg, and the "carved" head looks a least a century old.
Lara S04-May-2004 16:03
WOW. This beauty leaves me speechless, Phil. Well almost speechless, because I love how a photograph can convey different stories. One person sees a blue iceberg, another a ghost ship. This could be the Titanic? :)
Phil Douglis10-Feb-2004 21:34
Thanks Anna -- as for the blue ice, it is called "old ice". The blue color has something to do with the oxygen within it.
Anna Yu10-Feb-2004 05:01
It certainly looks like a huge ghost ship from the past. Do you know why the ice is so blue?
/Anna
Phil Douglis01-Feb-2004 23:46
You have a wonderful imagination, Denise. And that's why i made this shot and posted it -- because its ability to remind us things we care about. I care about ghostly ships, and you care about parfaits, and between us, this picture still manages to do its job.
Denise Dee01-Feb-2004 19:45
reminds me of a parfait. love the layers. thanks, denise
Phil Douglis26-Jan-2004 23:34
Thank you, Lisa. Your own photographs are often quite mysterious. Images posted by both Linda Zimmerman (Bailey) and yourself have inspired me to loosen my photojournalistic roots and explore the inexplicable things that come our way. This photograph is one of those images that gets to the imagination and goes to work.
Guest 26-Jan-2004 12:04
This is incredible, well captured!
Phil Douglis26-Jan-2004 02:41
Thanks, Jill. This was just one of those things that happens to photographers. I happened to be on deck at that moment with a camera in my hand. I saw this thing coming at us, and had no idea what it really looked like until I saw it from the side as we passed it. The front view was just a mass of ice. The side view was amazing, to say the very least.
Jill26-Jan-2004 01:21
Humbled
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