Canal Park scene in Duluth inspires international photographer

• Jumping off the Cribs

With a cool chill moving in and only a few days remaining till the official end of summer, this photo depicts a rare hot day in Duluth. The photo, by Nick Otto, of swimmers jumping from the Cribs into Lake Superior off Canal Park was a recent National Geographic Photo of the Day.

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International freelance photographer Nick Otto was visiting Duluth in July when he saw a group of young people gathered off Canal Park in Lake Superior on top of the concrete structure known as the Cribs, or Uncle Harvey’s Mausoleum.

One of the photos he took, seen here, was Photo of the Day on the National Geographic website on Wednesday.

Otto, a Minnesota native, was on vacation from his current home in China, where he has operated Nick Otto Photography for about seven years. He and his father were on a road trip, driving the Lake Superior circle tour.

“Our trip started in Duluth on a hot July afternoon just in time to see lots of folks trying to escape the heat,” Otto wrote in an e-mail from Bali, Indonesia, where he is working. On that July 18, according to the National Weather Service in Duluth, the high in Duluth was 92 degrees.

Otto describes what he did, and why:

“I shot quite a few frames while I was down there. This is my favorite of them all. I really like space in photos, and this is the frame of photo — I didn’t crop it. Even when I am shooting people, I like the sense of loneliness around them.

“My favorite aspect of this particular frame of all of the others is that there is very little motion in the water. I waited quite awhile to get that

effect. Most of the other frames had a lot of ripples from jumpers or swimmers or kayakers. I really wanted to capture the stillness of the lake to create the appearance that the swimmers seemed even more isolated, with no indication whether they were miles off shore or just off shore.

“Sometimes when you wait long enough all the elements come together, and once they did a girl decided to jump and that just seemed to complete the photo.”

Otto graduated from high school in Apple Valley, Minn., and his father lives in Burnsville, Minn. Based in Beijing, he specializes in editorial and commercial photography. He has done work for the Associated Press, USA Today, the Christian Science Monitor and the NBA, according to his website, nickotto.net.

Uncle Harvey’s mausoleum next to the Lakewalk in Canal Park was a sand and gravel hopper, built in 1919 and abandoned in 1922.

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