Iceland Photography

Sherryman

Hi All
To anyone who has done a photography tour/ trip to Iceland what's the best way to go about it. That's not overly expensive. How long would you want to stay and would it be possible on your own. Has anyone set up a group of random people etc.
Thanks in Advance for any advice.

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firemansam4

Hi I was in Iceland for a 3 day solo tour in January, it was a great experience and loved every minute of it. I actually arrived on a Monday evening and left on the Friday morning, but it was 3 full days I guess.

There are quite a few tour operators in Iceland, most of them geared towards the usual tourist spots and not so much dedicated to photographers as in they may only stay at some places maybe 20 minutes and move on.

There are some company's that offer multi day tours which are a lot more expensive, Extreme Iceland is one of them.
Then there are specific photography workshop tours such as Thor Photography tours, these can be more expensive again.
I know a few photographers on facebook who are also organizing photography workshops in Iceland this year but you would have to go by there dates, Tyler Collins photography and Rodney O Callaghan photography are 2 I can think of, but there are probably many more photographers running workshops over there this year.

Myself I choose just to do my own thing. I studied out a lot of the locations I wanted to see and the times of day that would suit best and I hired a car for the time of my stay there.
I traveled solo but shared my car with some other tourists for parts of my journey to help pay the car costs.
I managed to see most of the places I wanted to see, the only disappointment was missing the northern lights, as there was total cloud cover every night I was there.
Iceland is very expensive, I would recommend trying to pack your own lunches for each day, and when booking accommodation book outside of Reykjavik if possible.

I think 3 full days is no where near enough time though, and I found myself on a very tight time line to see all the places I wanted in time. and a few more days might of given me the chance to see the aurora as well.

pixbyjohn

I advise that you go with a few other photographers as you need to travel quite a lot to get to places of interest for photography. 15 of our camera club members went in October in 2015. First day we went on a coach tour with a local guide who was also a photographer. He brought us to super locations which we would never have found by ourselves. Then we hired 3 people carriers for 3 days and split into groups and went our separate ways driving from Reykjavik every morning and returning each evening. Distances between places of photography interest is quite far.
Daylight was between the hours of 07.30 to 19.30 approx. in October. We had no snow then.
The landscape can be quite dull and uninteresting if the weather is wet and misty.
The waterfalls are amazing as are the hot springs.
The Blue Lagoon is a must visit, only 1 of our groups went there.
We caught the Northern lights on 2 nights on the harbour in Reykjavik.
Average cost of meals is about 3 to 4 times higher than Ireland.
Skogafoss Waterfall, Iceland by Pixbyjohn, on Flickr

pixbyjohn

Aurora Reykjavik, Iceland by Pixbyjohn, on Flickr

Mickmac91

Myself and 4 more did this last august/september for 7 days.

we rented a car and drove the whole way around the island in 7 days, spending the 7th night out in reykjavik. we spent the week camping except for the one day midweek, where we stayed in a house we found on bookings.com because of the rain!

for the whole holiday we spent about €650, including fuel from west cork to dublin airport, flights, car rental and tent + sleepingbags and car charger adapter rental. it also included food, tho it was rough and ready, we lived for the week on tuna sandwiches and fruit, cereal and 1 hot meal every day.

while its not a luxurious way to get around, it was one of the best trips ive ever been on. The photo opportunities were brilliant as you spent the whole week outdoors with your camera close by. plus the campsites mostly had wifi, power and showers onsite, so all you were really missing was the central heating!

the original plan was to get a campervan. that wouldve been much more comfy, ill tell you that for nothing, but they book out weeks in advance so if you want to go that way, make sure and get it early.

HOWEVER... if we had gotten that we'd never have been able to travel where we did. most of the roads we travelled were gravel, and i could only imagine how little progress we'd have made if we had the campervan instead of the Rav4. and the country is 100% worth travelling all around instead of doing the golden circle. we did that on the last day in the space of a few hours.

I can give you a whole list of places id recommend going to see if you do decided to spend 7 days there. But id only make 2 real recommendations.

1. get a camping mat for under your sleeping bag if you do go camping. the cold comes up through the sleeping bag during the night and makes it very hard to sleep.
2. if your planning on travelling the whole country, go for 10 days if you can at all. we did it in 7, but we did the whole south coast in a single day, from Egilsstaðir to Vik. including some stops to see the glaciers and black sands and everything.

if you like scenery tho, youll absolutely love Iceland.
https://www.facebook.com/mmcsphotography/photos/a.977872512305132.1073741829.964772760281774/1128990110526704/?type=3&theater

ednwireland

i might as well have shot black and white on the beaches !

amazing place need to get back sometime (i was ther in 1999) must dig out the prints

rdsopix

pixbyjohn wrote: »

I advise that you go with a few other photographers as you need to travel quite a lot to get to places of interest for photography. 15 of our camera club members went in October in 2015. First day we went on a coach tour with a local guide who was also a photographer. He brought us to super locations which we would never have found by ourselves. Then we hired 3 people carriers for 3 days and split into groups and went our separate ways driving from Reykjavik every morning and returning each evening. Distances between places of photography interest is quite far.
Daylight was between the hours of 07.30 to 19.30 approx. in October. We had no snow then.
The landscape can be quite dull and uninteresting if the weather is wet and misty.
The waterfalls are amazing as are the hot springs.
The Blue Lagoon is a must visit, only 1 of our groups went there.
We caught the Northern lights on 2 nights on the harbour in Reykjavik.
Average cost of meals is about 3 to 4 times higher than Ireland.

Love it - thank you!

tylercollins

Sherryman, did you ever get to Iceland or look into the photography tours? I'm running a tour out there in September this year which is now sold out, but I do have another tour planned for January 2018. If January 2018 is too early I will have probably 3/4 more tours in 2018 which I'm yet to release details on.

If you want some advise on doing a self drive tour then please feel to drop me a PM, I've been heading there now since 2015 and can offer you all the advice you need

firemansam4 wrote: »

Hi I was in Iceland for a 3 day solo tour in January, it was a great
I know a few photographers on facebook who are also organizing photography workshops in Iceland this year but you would have to go by there dates, Tyler Collins photography and Rodney O Callaghan photography are 2 I can think of, but there are probably many more photographers running workshops over there this year.

Thanks for the mention Fireman Sam

Tiriel

Please be aware no advertising of services in here..

tylercollins

Tiriel wrote: »

Please be aware no advertising of services in here..

I'm not advertising, no links etc, I've offered to give advice if he still needs it, I've stated about my workshops as showing my credibility for offering advice