When you visit Banff National Park in the Canadian Rockies, one of the most spectacular views and photo opportunities you will find easily accessible is Peyto Lake. You will find it along the IceFields Parkway a bit past Bow Lake heading toward Jasper National Park. There is a fair amount of parking there. From the parking lot, you’ll walk uphill about a half mile and come to a viewing platform from which you can look out over the lake and take a classic photo. Anyone can just walk up and get that shot. If you want a photo of Peyto Lake that really stands out that you might want to hang on your wall, you’ll want something unique about it.
When can you snap a unique Peyto Lake photo? Sunrise and sunset most any time of year can be pretty good. If you don’t mind staying out all night and can get up thee when the Norther Lights are blazing you can get a great shot. One of my favorites is during the transition between spring and summer or fall and winter. Peyto lake like many of the lakes in the Canadian Rockies is a glacier fed lake and has a stunning light blueberry blue color. If you can get to Peyto Lake after a heavy snowstorm in the spring after the lake has melted or in late fall after a heavy snowstorm before the lake has froze over you will be treated to an absolutely spectacular view that will make for spectacular winter scene photos. Fortunately these mid spring and late fall times of year tend to attract fewer crowds than the height of summer. Aside from the cold and the likelihood of trudging through potentially deep snow, it is a spectacular time to visit the Canadian Rockies. It is much cheaper and easier to get lodging in the park at this time of year.
This particular Peyto Lake panoramic photo was taken in mid November. At the time I was bouncing around between Banff and Jasper and REALLY wanted to catch Peyto Lake after a big snowstorm because the lake had not frozen yet. A couple days before taking this shot I’d driven up to Jasper. A massive snowstorm hit while I was in Jasper. It was such a big snowstorm that the IceFields Parkway closed for a couple days after the storm and I was stuck up in Jasper.
As soon as it was clear that Parks Canada was ready to open the IceFields Parkway, I prepared to depart Jasper as soon as the road opened and make a beeline down to Peyto Lake. Upon arrival I was the only person there and had to trudge through about 2.5 feet of snow to get to the overlook. I had no snow boots and hiked in a pair of trail runners. The wind was still howling, I had a ton of heavy panoramic photo gear on my back and it was a bit of a struggle to get up to the viewing platform. The viewing platform was covered in feet of snow.
While the crowds are typically minimal that time of year, I figured I’d have to work fast. Chances are at least a few people would make the trek up there from Banff to see the sights. The plan for this shot was to shoot a gigantic multiple row panoramic shot that would contain hundreds of individual photos and could cover the side of a bus and still be extremely sharp.
With an Induro Carbon tripod, a Nodal Ninja pano head, a Canon 5D MK II and a Canon 70-200mm zoom lens I had all the gear to crank out some amazing shots and set to work getting everything setup. It was important to ensure everything was leveled and balanced so as to stay stable while shooting 200+ shots to stitch together for a giant winter panoramic shot of Peyto Lake right after a late fall snow storm before the lake froze over.
By the time everything was setup, the clouds began to lift. Once the whole landscape was viewable, I set the proper zoom on the 70-200 lens to ensure there would be enough texture in all frames of the panoramic photo for it to stitch easily, quickly determined the horizontal and vertical edges of the scene I wanted to capture and then started clicking away. A cable release was used to help minimize any tripod shaking or vibrations that might cause the elements of of panoramic view to be blurry or not stitch properly.
As I do with most any cool scene, I shot this one a few times. Particularly when it comes to a panoramic shot of this size and complexity, I find it a good idea to run through and shoot it at least twice in case something doesn’t line up, the camera misfires, or something goes wrong with one of the shots. After shooting close to 64 gigs worth of images a few people started to wander up. As is often the case, one guy paid no attention to me, walked right out in the pristine snow in the foreground where I was shooting and ruined the scene. Fortunately I’d gotten enough shots to feel confident I got the panoramic photo I wanted to get before he hiked up.
With the shots in hand, I headed back to the car to warm up, drove back to the lodge at Lake Louise and fired up Hugin (stitching software) to work its magic. Once everything was stitched, a little final editing was done in Paint Shop Pro.
Like many other panoramic and standard photos you may see on here, it takes a LOT of work, luck and expense to come back with something that may make for a spectacular wall art piece. In this case it was a drive from Philly to the Canadian Rockies, days of food, lodging and gas in Canada while waiting for a snow storm to roll in before the lake froze, a moderate hike and about $5,000 worth of camera gear. This Peyto Lake panoramic photo was one of the most expensive, challenging and time consuming photos to get simply because of the location, distance traveled and the weather that needed to unfold for the scene to even be there.
Leave a Reply