The Manager Part II - How I continued my project of walking in freezing snow barefoot

If you haven't read it yet, feel free to take a look at my first post on this subject, where I discuss the origins of this project and how I got the first photo.

This post will be about the next two photos in the series which were also taken in the freezing winter conditions of the Canadian Rocky Mountains.

Since I had started the project I had a few different ideas for where to go with it. I found that the first two photos of the project were really enjoyable and really did help me somewhat with the depression I was going through.

Taking the time to really focus on what I was doing, do form a clear vision of the image I wanted to create, and then putting in the work to get that photo kept my mind clear and allowed me to work on a creative outlet. With this project there is also a physical aspect as I'm always barefoot, and when it's in the freezing cold you definitely have a sense of exhilaration when you do work up the nerve to go for it.

This image below was actually the fourth, but I'm putting it first because I like the way it looks first. For this image, as well as the next one I brought my wife Sabrina along not only to take in the natural beauty but to help me out a bit with the camera. I still set up the whole shot myself, placed the camera and adjusted settings, and got the angle I wanted. The issue especially with this shot though is that I'm actually walking on quite a steep hill, even though you can't quite see it. Also, the snow here was not only incredibly deep, about up to my waist at most times, but it's on top of loose brush and branches that my feet kept breaking through. I actually got worried at a few points that I would get stuck here and be in a bit of trouble.

Several times I sank right up to my waist and hand to nearly "swim" my way out digging through the snow.

So you can see how with this one I might want some help, as I was in fact barefoot, but I knew I only had one shot at this. We were about a fifteen minute walk from our house so I didn't want to stay out too long with frozen feet.

So anyhow, I got everything ready, stripped off my jackets and boots and socks, set the camera to self timer and then told Sabrina, just hit the shutter a bunch of times as I go down and back up. The camera I was using will only to ten shots sequentially on self timer, and this one was one that Sabrina got.

The idea with this one was that I wanted to get a trail of footprints from behind me, so I walked all the way around to the right to try and keep my "down" footprints out of the image. It didn't work quite as well as I had hoped, but the feeling is there I think.

My feet got so frozen on the above photo that I was really worried I had maybe done some damage to them, as they were completely numb until we got home. Fortunately my parents have a hot tub so I hopped in there for a bit and though my feet started burning really bad they eventually warmed up and the pain went away after a few hours.

This next shot is among my favourites in the entire series.

I had this idea in my head for the Manager project from just after I first started it. I really like the idea of this guy walking barefoot in these strange situations dressed totally inappropriately, so the thought of walking into nowhere across a frozen lake really appealed to me.

Sabrina had really wanted to see a frozen lake while we were living in the rockies as well, so one day we decided to take a trip out to this lake that is not too far from where we were living. We drove as far as we could but had to hike for about 45 minutes through snowy trails to actually get to the lake, which was just fine. Except for the fact that I was carrying a bunch of camera gear and an old business briefcase.

We passed a few other hikers along the way and I really can't imagine what they were thinking we were up to 😂, we must have looked pretty strange.

The location is very beautiful, but as we got to the lake I started to have second thoughts as we could see a few spots along the shore that weren't quite frozen. The other thing was that we kept hearing these super weird noises that sounded like metal bending or something. Turns out it was probably cracks in the thick ice moving against each other or something.

Anyhow, we saw a few people on the other side of the lake going ice fishing, and some on snow mobiles towing little huts even, so we figured the ice must be plenty thick enough to walk on.

So same set up as usual. Camera on the tripod, settings adjusted, self timer, strip off winter clothes down to barefoot and start walking. This time I actually did a couple of takes, a few of them walking, a few running, some going away from camera, some towards, and this one was my favourite of the bunch.

This one maybe one of the least painful as that day wasn't too cold, though I was literally walking on ice. I found I was able to do multiple takes without even warming up my feet.

After I got the photo I packed up the gear and we sat and enjoyed the natural beauty for a while until we got cold and decided to start heading back. All in all I think this one was a real success, and I love the photo I got.

I'll be posting some more images from this project again in the future, but unfortunately these are the last of the snowy ones. After this we ended up moving to Vancouver Island, where I did a couple, and I also made some in a really cool location my friend and I explored in Vancouver.

Hope you like the project, and if you want to see more feel free to give me a follow and upvote! I post mostly photography and will be posting a lot of travel and street photos in the next little while.

Thanks for reading!

As a side note, I'm going to set the rewards payout of this and probably future posts to use @reward.app . I know that in previous years there has been a lot of discussion on the ethics of using rewards, self voting, etc. here on Hive so I'm not really sure if there is some sort of stigma about this, but the reason I'm doing it is because I'm hoping to make enough rewards in the next little while to get in on the Alpha sale of @holozing, which means I'll be reinvesting all profits here directly back into the Hive ecosystem. If you haven't heard of Holozing yet you can view the community here: https://peakd.com/c/hive-131131/trending and see what it's all about. It's an upcoming web3 game developed by notable Hivean @acidyo and I think it's going to be a hit. I recommend you check it out, and get ready for the upcoming launch, I'll be getting in on it and you should too!