Wedding Photography in Iceland

Iceland was not where Inessa and Ragnar got married.

We travelled there together for an After Wedding Shooting and spent several days moving through very different parts of the country.

That was exactly what fascinated me about Iceland. Within a relatively short distance, the landscape could change completely. Green pastures and old turf houses gave way to black beaches, waterfalls, moss-covered lava fields, cliffs, geothermal areas and finally glaciers.

It felt less like one long photoshoot and more like a photographic journey through several different worlds.

From old houses to waterfalls

At the beginning of the trip we photographed between open landscapes, rocks and old houses built into the Icelandic scenery.

Some of them looked almost absorbed by the landscape, with grass-covered roofs and very little separating architecture from nature.

From there we continued towards the south coast.

Two of the places we photographed were Skógafoss and Seljalandsfoss.

Both waterfalls are well known, but photographically they work very differently. At Skógafoss the scale of the waterfall dominates the scene. At Seljalandsfoss it was possible to move around and even behind the falling water.

For me, locations like these are interesting when the couple does not simply stand in front of a landmark. I prefer to let the place remain visible without turning every photograph into a postcard.

Reynisfjara and Vík

Another part of the trip took us to Vík and the black beach at Reynisfjara.

The dark sand, basalt formations, caves and rocks in the sea create a landscape that looks completely different from the green areas we had photographed before.

We spent quite a bit of time there and moved between the open beach, the basalt cliffs and the caves.

The weather was changing constantly, which suited the place surprisingly well.

Some photographs are very open, with the couple small within the landscape. Others were made much closer to the rocks, where the surroundings become darker and more graphic.

We also spent time in Vík itself before continuing our journey.

Seljalandsfoss

Later we reached Seljalandsfoss.

Here the experience was completely different from Skógafoss. Instead of only photographing the waterfall from the front, we could move around it and work from behind the falling water as well.

The combination of water, dark rock and changing light gave this part of the series a very different character.

Moss fields, cliffs and Icelandic horses

One of the strongest visual impressions for me was the moss.

Large parts of the volcanic landscape were covered almost completely in it. The surface looked soft from a distance, even though underneath it was dark volcanic rock.

The contrast was very different from everything we had photographed before.

We also stopped when we came across Icelandic horses.

They are small, incredibly distinctive and somehow fit perfectly into this landscape. Those photographs were much less planned than many of the other images from the trip.

And that was often the best way to work in Iceland. Drive, stop when something looks interesting, photograph for a while and continue.

A very wet encounter with Strokkur

At the Geysir geothermal area we photographed around Strokkur.

This became one of the more entertaining parts of the trip.

At one point the geyser erupted and the wind carried the water directly towards Inessa and Ragnar.

They were suddenly completely wet.

What surprised us was that the water was no longer particularly hot by the time it came down. It had cooled considerably during the eruption and the fall through the cold air.

It was definitely not a photograph we could have planned.

Jökulsárlón and the glaciers

The landscape changed once again when we reached Jökulsárlón.

After rock, grass, waterfalls and black beaches, suddenly everything was about ice and water.

We photographed around the glacier lagoon between floating icebergs and later went out on the water by boat.

The colour of the ice was remarkable.

Some of the icebergs had an almost unreal blue tone, especially when seen from close range on the water.

For me, this was probably the part of the journey where the scale of Iceland became most obvious. The couple, the boat and even large blocks of ice suddenly looked very small within the landscape.

We also photographed around the nearby black beach, where pieces of ice from the lagoon reach the ocean.

Four very different sides of Iceland

During this trip we crossed several parts of Iceland that hardly looked as if they belonged to the same country.

There were pastures, caves and old turf houses. Waterfalls and black beaches around Vík. Moss-covered volcanic landscapes, Icelandic horses and geothermal areas. And finally enormous cliffs, glaciers and the blue ice of Jökulsárlón.

We also spent time in Reykjavík, but most of the photographs were made outside the city.

That variety is what stayed with me most.

I have photographed in many countries, but Iceland is one of the places where the landscape can completely change the visual character of a shoot within a few hours.

After Wedding Shooting in Iceland

An After Wedding Shooting works particularly well for a trip like this because there is no wedding schedule in the background.

Nobody is waiting for dinner. There is no ceremony starting at a fixed time and no group of guests wondering when the couple will return.

We could drive, stop when the landscape became interesting and continue when the weather changed.

For me, that freedom was much more important than trying to photograph as many famous Icelandic locations as possible.

The final series is not really about one place.

It is about travelling through Iceland together and allowing the photographs to change with the landscape.

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Destination Wedding Photographer