A groups of artists recently journeyed to the North Pole to make some pictures. That’s their ship, above. You can read all about the voyage in The New York Times, but here’s a quick parse:

We are 14 artists, 2 scientists, and a crew of 4 sailing as close to the North Pole pack ice as we can get away with. Aboard the M/S Noorderlicht, a hundred-year old Dutch schooner, we left Longyearbyen one week ago in the Norwegian territory of Svalbard, the most northerly point in the world with regular air service, for several weeks traveling the Arctic through open sea and sheltered bays, stopping along the way to respond to the landscape in uniquely artistic ways.

WOW. That’s kind of amazing. I happen to know one of the artists on this voyage, Willy Somma, and am happy to report that she and the others returned safely. There was, however, a bit of a problem with Willy’s gear, specifically her tripod. We won’t say who made said tripod, but it wasn’t Induro, and there were issues. For example: it was heavy, it slipped all over the ice, and the grips froze in place in the cold weather, so it became nearly impossible to manipulate. Frustrating.

I asked Willy which tripod she’d bring if she were to go to the North Pole again, and she chose this one, the CT414. It’s a BEAUT.

The largest of the new 8X CT-Series, it can easily hold Willy’s Large Format camera.

These tripods are light and strong, and have some amazing features. These two would have been helpful in the North Pole!

As it was, Somma leaned on railings and such when her tripod was acting up. She got some pretty amazing shots.

The Money Shot.

The Northern Lights looked white in person, but came out green in the images.

I love these, they feel like paintings.

Of course, they’d probably be sharper if Induro was on the case.