Tamara Stubbs. Up for Air, Fast Asleep in Icy Waters.

These crabeater Seals were asleep in the broken ice besides our ship 8 weeks into our Expedition. We were deep in the cold, icy Weddell Sea ‘gyre’, one of the world’s most inaccessible places, and close to where Shackleton’s ship ‘Endurance’, beset in ice, sank in 1915.

Whist we were stationary completing a science task, the seals that had been curiously following us for weeks, got closer still. Playing in the water on the sunny side of the ship and sleeping on the shady side. Watching the sleeping seals, you would only see the tips of their nostrils poking out at the water’s surface in the crystalizing ice, though every now and then, their heads briefly rose up for a deeper breath of air. Above the sound of the ships hum, and the bitterly cold wind, you could hear them comfortably snoring. These two heads rose up at the same time, giving me this ethereal moment.

Tamara Stubbs communicates through photography and film the world around her, in an artful, informative, and honest way. She is always seeking to recommunicate something that personally touched her, and share that experience. Tamara has made a niche in documentary science, natural history and expedition filming and photography. She has sailed to every ocean, travelled to both Polar regions, and has a particular passion for wilder places. She wants to help us to re-establish our ancestorial place, and balance, within nature.

Follow Tamara on Instagram @Tamara_Stubbs.