There are some places that are hard to reach or it’s had to get a permit to photograph them. But if you want to shoot “The Wave” in Arizona, there’s a pretty unique permit process. You need to sign up for a special lottery that only ten photographers can win each day. photographer Todd Dominey was one of the lucky winners. In this fun and informative video, he shared his experience and a bit about the application process itself.
The Wave is located in Northern Arizona, just across the border from Utah. It’s managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and the permit to shoot it is “the Willy Wonka Golden Ticket of landscape photography,” as Todd jokingly calls it. Twenty photographers in total can visit and shoot the location each day. Permits for ten people are issued via the online lottery, but there are also ten permits for those who show up in person. You can try and take photos without a permit, but be prepared to pay a $5,000 fine, which is a lot more than $7 you’d pay for the permit.
This process looks like a great marketing stunt if you ask me. I think it’s a great way of building hype around this attractive location. But knowing the Instagram era in which we live, it makes perfect sense to limit the number of visitors. The Wave is a fragile geological formation that took millions of years to form. So if influencers rushed in every day to take tons of selfies, it’s very likely that something would be destroyed or that someone would get hurt or even killed.
You can find more information on a dedicated The Wave website. And if you’d like to try your luck in the online lottery, follow this link. And let us know, have you photographed The Wave? Was it worth it?
[How to See and Photograph The Wave / Plus…Is it All Hype? via Light Stalking]
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