- [Narrator] Funding for Art Wolf's Travels to the Edge is provided by... - [Narrator 2] Cannon.

(gentle music) Dedicated to inspiring photographers.

To preserve and to protect the beauty, diversity, and grandeur of the natural world.

From capture to display (camera clicking) Canon cameras, high definition video, printers, and projectors help to fuel the passion and the creativity that bring this incredible world into focus.

- [Narrator] And by... - [Narrator 3] You chase after moments.

The moment the light is just right.

The moment you see it in their eyes.

A moment of triumph, or of tragedy.

The moment a smile breaks, or when the rains come.

The moment you imagined is passing right now.

But the moment you see when it all comes together is a moment you've captured forever.

(camera clicks) - [Narrator] Additional funding provided by... - [Narrator 4] At Conservation International, our mission is to conserve and protect the world's most precious natural resources.

But equally, it is to champion a cause larger than ourselves.

(lively music) - [Art] It's a place where granite peaks touch the clouds.

Where icebergs catch the light.

And Andean condors rule the sky.

Patagonia has it all.

I've been documenting wild places for decades and I'm still seduced by Patagonia's rugged beauty.

I'm Art Wolf.

Join me on Travels to the Edge.

(lively music continues) (vocalizing in foreign language) Patagonia straddles Chile and Argentina and stretches nearly 2,400 kilometers, from the Rio Colorado in the north to Tierra del Fuego in the south.

Torres del Paine in the Southern Andes includes some of the most diverse and spectacular parts of this rugged region.

I've been coming down to Patagonia for the last 15 years.

And one of the places I love to come to of course, is to Torres del Paine.

And it's not just because of the spectacular landscapes.

It's because there's so many animals to photograph here.

One of which is the guanaco.

(playful music) These are great animals of the use, open, open plains.

One of the reasons they thrive here is they can run away from their chief predator, the puma.

(playful music continues) This is great.

This is a herd of mothers and babies.

The babies, known as chulengos, are really probably born within the last month.

They're great to photograph because they're so clean and fuzzy and pure looking.

And then to have the interaction between the mothers and the babies, they're really chilled out right now.

But I bet you, when I get closer, they'll start to move around and interact.

And that's exactly the kind of behavior I'm hoping for.

I like to stay low and really slow.

If they're sitting down and all of a sudden I'm silhouetted against the bright sky, it can intimidate them.

The more relaxed they become and remain, the better shots I can get.

As I approach them I'm constantly watching their behavior.

If they start to move too fast away from me, I'm gonna stop, sit down, let 'em relax.

But they're more interested in what's happening between the males chasing each other.

The babies are staying close.

I think it's a great situation to get some nice shots.

The fact that it's overcast right now is perfect because with this many animals, bright sunshine creates a lot of harsh shadows on the animals.

It's hard to get a great shot of multiple animals in bright sunshine.

(camera clicking) I'm choosing to use a fairly small telephoto lens because I'll be able to zoom back and take in more of the animals.

If it was just one animal, I probably would shoot a more powerful lens, like a 400, but with a group, I always tend to use the wider angles.

Incorporate more of the animals and the environment.

In the distance on the ridge, you can see a guanaco silhouetted.

He's watching out for pumas.

These are herd animals.

And when they sit, they face all different directions.

Just keeping an eye out for the odd puma that might happen by.

(animal yelping) That is a male calling.

He's moving the women and the babies around right now.

This whole valley is a series of small lakes surrounded by very luxuriant green grass.

And that is why these guanacos are here.

It's great for the babies, it's protected out of the harsh winds up on the higher hills.

This is a natural nursery for these guanacos.

Speaking of which, right now I've got two babies just staring right at me.

In fact, they're so close, I need to make a vertical shot of this.

This is a great shot.

They're just staring at me (camera clicking) all lined up perfectly.

They're very curious at this age.

That's it guys.

(Art clicking with mouth) They're looking straight at me.

(playful music continues) (camera clicking) This is fantastic action as these babies just keep running back and forth in front of me.

Fantastic (chuckling).

(flute music) I think it's important when people travel all the way to Patagonia and ultimately Torres del Paine, to actually see the peaks the park is named after.

These are very impressive, 10,000 spires of granite.

And on the other end, Cuernos Towers is equally dramatic.

(upbeat music) While I was just driving up the road, I spotted one of my favorite little animals of this park, a Patagonian fox.

So I'm gonna go down into this little low area and see if I can't find it.

This is a really nice situation with this very, very tame fox and with the beautiful backdrop of the Andes.

I'm shooting a wide angle.

It's very rare that you'd be able to get a fox this close.

I'm gonna try to reposition myself and keep the fox between the mountains and me, and also the light.

So if I can squeeze around, and I've got his full attention at this point.

Beautiful.

Now I'm getting in a position where I've got the spectacular mountains behind.

(camera clicking) Really nice sequence as he walked right in front of the mountains.

They're beautiful little foxes.

They're known as gray foxes or, in this part of the world in Patagonia, the Patagonian Fox.

In very cold environments, very windy environments, animals tend to have smaller appendages, you know, shorter ears, shorter legs, just to retain the heat.

He's never been hunted nor has its ancestors ever been hunted in this great biosphere reserve.

Whenever I'm around an animal this close or this tame, I'm keeping my voice, moving, often talking to him in very low reassuring terms.

And there's something about breaking that silence that also breaks the tension between the animal and the human.

They're really, really quite innocent in their behavior around humans.

And for me, it's a great thing, because I'm shooting with extreme wide angle with these rugged Cuernos Towers as a backdrop, it gives this fox a great sense of place.

Oh, this is really nice.

What's your name, huh?

(upbeat music continues) I found a much larger herd.

(animals squeak) I hope they're not after me.

Guanacos are strange animals, but about 15 feet, 20 feet up in front of me, there's a herd of about 50 or 60.

And this is much denser than the herd that we just were photographing over at the nursery.

They're much tighter packed and they seem so chilled out.

I think I can get a lot closer.

I'm gonna use one last trick, because the sky is so dramatic, I want to really darken it so that the animals themselves really stand out.

So I'm gonna just use this new graduated neutral density filter that I've used quite often and just frame this thing.

But first I have to take the lens cap off.

This is such a great opportunity to get this close to these wild animals.

Patagonia really delivers when it comes to that, foxes that walk right up to you, guanacos that are just chilled out.

And it enables me to use these wider angles to take the really dramatic landscapes which is so indicative of Patagonia.

So big skies, big mountains, and wonderful wildlife.

(camera clicking) (upbeat music continues) I'm walking through an ancient beach forest ravaged by the constant winds that blow down Lago Grey, or Lake Grey.

And what else will blows down this lake are enormous icebergs that have been capped by the Grey Glacier, seven miles up the lake.

And it's those icebergs that I'm on my way to photograph.

7/10 of an iceberg lies below the surface.

We're talking about an enormous mass of ice.

What's fun for me when I'm photographing icebergs is the fact that they're constantly rotating and changing shape.

Always giving me multiple opportunities with the same piece of ice.

What I love to photograph about icebergs is the way the light fractures.

And although they're not truly blue, they appear really blue.

And in this case, some of these bigger ones are amazingly blue.

Fantastic.

I love this stuff.

(water splashing) (upbeat guitar music) There's over 300 different species of birds that live in Patagonia.

And this is one of the more famous ones, the caracara.

It's a bird of prey, very, very tame.

And it looks pretty impressive when you see it by itself.

But when you see it in comparison to a condor, it's tiny.

It's an amazing bird, however.

They're full of energy and spunk and they can walk right up to foxes.

They're very unintimidated.

(gentle music) I've come down to the edge of this lake to photograph a beautiful view of the Cuernos Towers in early morning light.

And yet, it just isn't happening.

There's just no light on these mountains, unfortunately.

But what is happening is amazing.

Spectacular cloud has formed right over the top of these mountains.

And that is now gonna be my main focus.

And I guess the point I'm trying to make here is, I'm always trying to look for something that may be a secondary subject, that becomes my most important shot out of the day.

(upbeat guitar music) Wow, that looks like a pretty spectacular waterfall.

A lot of layers.

That's exactly what I like to see in a waterfall, is layers of rock and water going over, and with long exposures, this could be a very, very nice shot.

Patagonia is about big.

Big mountains, big open landscapes, big glaciers, big rivers.

And what those rivers have are big waterfalls.

So I can't wait to experience this one.

(water roaring) There's different ways one can photograph waterfalls.

Most people just tend to shoot a postcard.

What I try to do is go in and shoot the details.

In this case there's a series of waterfalls over some steps that I've zoomed in across the river.

I put a polarizer on, which takes a little bit of the shine off the water, but more importantly, gives me the ability to take a longer exposure, creating more of a ribbon-y effect with the water which creates an artistic slant on this waterfall.

(camera clicking) (gentle music) One of the challenges in this wind-swept environment is to find the serene moments.

After spending several days in Torres del Paine, it becomes painfully obvious that the only time when the wind isn't blowing is early in the morning.

And why that's important is, if I ever wanna get reflections or get a different type of shot, other than just the tight shots of the mountains, this is the time, the margin of the day when I'm gonna work.

I found this tiny little pond next to a road and I'm gonna have to get very low to try to incorporate the reflection of these Towers of Paine.

And with a tripod like this, I have the ability to move the legs independently and literally get it right down in the mud, which enables me to get the angle of the reflection that I'm gonna need.

And suddenly, what looked like nothing from a position six feet above, right down into the water looks like a very, very nice scene.

And the last thing I'm gonna need to do is use a neutral density filter where I'm gonna bring it right over the top portion of the frame.

Because invariably, reflections are two stops darker than the sky above.

And this will bring the entire image into proper alignment.

(camera clicking) (gentle music continues) And it looks perfect.

(playful music) I have found a mother and father kelp goose with eight little goslings.

The, a male is all white on the top and female is gray, but beautiful yellow legs.

There's eight little goslings that are probably hatched out within the last week.

(peaceful music) It is a matter of getting in, getting close, letting them relax to your presence.

And some of my best shots have been where the mother's standing and all the little eight goslings are standing right below it.

My last stop in Patagonia is high in the Andes in the realm of one of the world's most majestic birds.

(bright music) The most effective way to photograph condors is to take the camera off the tripod so you can pan with them.

Because when they literally come so close, they're moving very, very fast and it would be very hard for us.

This is a beautiful male coming at me right now.

Wow.

(camera clicking) Fantastic.

These are huge birds.

These are among the largest flying birds on earth.

They can fly as far as 50 to 150 miles in a single day and come back to the same roost tonight.

They just unfold their huge wings, and off they go up and higher and higher.

(upbeat music) I just love the way they come in with their 10 foot wing spans.

10 feet, that's incredible.

When the thermals start rising along the cliffs they just unfold their wings and up they go.

Effortlessly, they can be 1,000 feet above you or 10,000 feet above you.

These big males are the ones with the white collars and they have kind of a interesting head shape.

They also have white patches on the back of their wings so I can always identify 'em coming in.

What's amazing also about these birds is that their entire system of raising chicks is such that they breed only every other year and raise a chick every other year 'cause it takes so long to raise a bird of this size.

These birds in the wild will live up to 50 years, they'll mate for life.

(camera clicking) And I love it when they come down right below me so I can look straight down on 'em.

What's amazing about these birds is that they're looking for other animals reacting to what's happening on the ground.

In other words, if there's a dead animal, other animals will react to it.

They're looking for carrion.

They're looking for a dead guanaco, a dead sheep, they're not choosy, as long as it's dead.

Shooting with digital allows me to keep clicking.

In the past, the minute I had something great, I'd have to be changing rolls of film.

These birds are really built for these high Andes, and they just are amazing when you watch 'em soar right above you.

(camera clicking) Ah, nice, nice, nice, nice.

The peaks of wild Patagonia guard the fragile beauty of this isolated part of the planet.

From its unique wildlife, to its dramatic landscapes, Torres del Paine perches on the edge of the earth.

I'm Art Wolf.

Join me on Travels to the Edge.

- [Narrator] This program and other episodes from this season are available on three episode discs for 17.95 each, plus shipping and handling.

An award-winning book of Art Wolf's landscapes featured in this series and Beyond Edge of the Earth, Corner of the Sky is available for 49.95, plus shipping and handling.

To order the book or DVDs, please call 1-800-440-2651.

You can find out more information about this episode, photo tips, and other destinations in the series, by visiting our website, at artwolf.com.

(gentle music) Funding for Art Wolf's Travels to the Edge is provided by... - [Narrator 3] (camera clicks) You chase after moments.

The moment the light is just right.

The moment you see it in their eyes.

A moment of triumph, or of tragedy.

The moment a smile breaks, or when the rains come.

The moment you imagined is passing right now, but the moment you see when it all comes together is a moment you've captured forever.

(camera clicks) - [Narrator] And by... - [Narrator 2] Cannon.

Dedicated to inspiring photographers to preserve and to protect the beauty, diversity, and grandeur of the natural world.

From capture to display, (camera clicking) Canon cameras, high definition video, printers, and projectors help to fuel the passion and the creativity that bring this incredible world into focus.

- [Narrator] Additional funding provided by... - [Narrator 4] At Conservation International, our mission is to conserve and protect the world's most precious natural resources.

But equally, it is to champion a cause larger than ourselves.