Selvskryt is Norwegian for bragging, literally “self-praise”. Something I’d normally try to avoid, but today I’d like to show some things I’m really proud of 🙂

First all all: Turboka. An ambitious (voluntary!) project by Troms Turlag (the local leg of the Norwegian Trekking Association), Ti på Topp (which is run by Troms og Finnmark Bedriftsidrettskrets) and Tromsø Fotoklubb to write a hiking book for day trips around Tromsø. Everyone could send in pictures, and I sent LOTS. It helped that I’ve been very active this summer, climbing 17 out of the 20 Ti på Topp mountains for example. I also went to some places especially for the book, as the photo editor regularly sent me a list of places they needed more photos of. Fun! I almost always take a set of photos from the top of a mountain, to later stitch together as a panorama. These panoramas are now the opening photo (spread over 2 pages) for each chapter in the book! Here is one example…

<img class="aligncenter" src="http://images.hanneketravels.net/fastlandet.jpg"

And as if that wasn’t enough honour, they asked me if I could take the cover photo! Wow! This was less than a week before I was leaving to the States, so I kept my fingers crossed the weather would cooperate. Fortunately, I didn’t have to do everything on my own. Pål Jakobsen, the main editor, had arranged models and chosen a location. We woke up to fog on the morning of the shoot, but it disappeared by noon, as forecasted (phew 😉 ). We went up a VERY steep slope on the north side of Tromsdalen, I was so glad that we had a 6 year old with us to keep the pace down 😀 I was nervous, as I don’t normally work with models, and I was so scared to mess up this big assignment 😉 but I am proud to say I pulled it off, and this is the result (click for a larger version):

(the photo on the far left isn’t mine, and the photo editor (Jens Kristian Nilsen) did all the hard work stitching the panorama!)

The book is in the shops now, and it’s simply fantastic! More than 500 photos from lots of different photographers, and so many amazing trips… I am already makings lists for next summer 😛
Click here to preview several pages in the book.

But that wasn’t all… I also got one of my aurora pictures published in the European Meteorological Calendar for 2013. This calendar is published by the Deutsche Meteorologische Gesellshaft. It’s A3 sized – don’t think I’ve ever seen my photo printed so big! They picked my photo after it came 4th in the European Meteorological Society photo competition earlier this year. You can see more details and a short story about each months’s photo here.

And there is more… I also got 2 photos in the Tromsø calendar published by Tromsø Fotoklubb 🙂 One of Ian on his way to the toilet on our trip to Nonsbu in crazy weather (one of my most successful photos which won a few competitions, and it was taken with a compact camera through the window of the cabin :D) and a photo of Polaria (the museum in front of Paul’s institute) mirrored in a huge puddle of water.

GIVEAWAY!
I have 5 Tromsø calendars to give away as a thank you to all of you who read this bragging post all the way to the end 😛 Leave me a comment if you’re interested in a Tromsø calendar! If I get more than 5 comments, I’ll do a draw on Monday 12 November 🙂