Kayaking Photography

By: Chris Eyre-Walker

As a professional adventure and outdoor photographer, I'm always thinking about maximizing my time and opportunities in remote locations. For instance, when I was planning my trip to Iceland I knew I wanted to bring a kayak along with me. But of course, there are limitations to everything.

On a photo trip like this there’s always a few things to consider: How much gear will fit? How will it be transported? How can we make the most out of each location we plan to visit?

The collapsible Oru Kayak was the perfect answer to a lot of those questions. We could easily check it on the plane, pack it inside the vehicle, and it would allow us to go to just about any location we wanted to get a shot.

From a visual point of view the Oru kayak is interesting to capture as well. In Iceland where all the volcanic rock is usually dark or completely black the white kayak stood out perfectly without feeling unnatural. Additionally it’s probably the most beautiful piece of outdoor equipment I have ever had the chance to capture and alone its design and elegance are visually pleasing. There’s nothing quite like it and the design alone is a work of art.

We took it out 3 times in Iceland. Each time in a completely different location. Each time with the intention of capturing something unique.

I filmed two episodes of my new video series Adventure Photography On Location in Iceland about capturing images using the Our kayak.

EP03 - Kayaking Into Sunset

Probably the most incredibly sunset I saw in Iceland and this is probably the perfect example for the versatility of the Kayak as it was a last minute decision to stop alongside the road and turn this sunset shoot into a kayaking shoot. And within minutes we had the kayak ready to go and nature pretty much did the rest.

EP07 - Kayaking The Glacier Lagoon

A shoot I had in mind from day one of the Iceland project. I had done a few test shoots in Belgium, but what we didn’t know was how it would hold up in the freezing waters of the glacier lagoon.

Fortunately the Oru Kayak is incredibly insulating and in none of the previous locations the kayaker got cold so we did the test. The whole shoot took about 2 hours with about 1.5 hours of kayaking time and without getting cold!

The Iceland project was amazing experience and I’m glad I chose to take the Oru kayak as it really helped me capture images I wouldn’t have gotten otherwise.