Aaron Black, Special Mention, 2004 Banff Mountain Photography Competition

"I had been sitting on the idea of photographing a climber with a starscape background for some time. The idea came to fruition soon after I did the boulder problem in the photograph. I knew that the contorted body movement required to do King Tut would complement a spinning star trail background beautifully. Clear nights in Bishop, Calif., are a dime a dozen, so all I had to do was convince my buddy Axel to climb late at night when the stars would be at their brightest. He endured sub-zero temperatures in a T-shirt and complained the entire time, but we got the shot!"

Aaron Black is an intense adventurer constantly in search of new challenges. Aaron started taking photos as a teenager to colour his stories of travel and adventure, and since then he has developed his passion into a full-time profession. His work has been published by National Geographic Adventure, Climbing, Rock & Ice, Gripped, Vbouldering, Transworld Snowboarding, Snowboarder, Bike and Mountain Bike Action and appears in numerous product catalogs and advertisements. Aaron is a graduate of the Western Academy of Photography and the Eddie Adams Workshop.