A great image serves as a passport, allowing you to transport to a place and experience its unique essence, distinct textures, colors and light. With their exceptional skill and extensive experience, travel photographer Teal Thomsen and cinematographer David Markun have mastered this art of capturing people and landscapes with their lenses.
You might have seen the married couple’s work with Belmond and Four Seasons hotels, on Netflix’s Dancing for the Devil and in the 2021 Oscar-winning short film Two Distant Strangers. Forbes Travel Guide caught up with the talented twosome during a recent visit to Cognac’s Le Logis (home to Forbes Travel Guide’s L’Académie corporate retreat), where they photographed the 16th-century chateau and surrounding vineyards, to get a snapshot of the duo’s creative process, find out their bucket-list destinations and gather some tips for aspiring photographers.
What was your impression of Le Logis?
Thomsen: It’s like a fairytale, a storybook chateau surrounded by vineyards on a hill. The hospitality is just absolutely next level. The staff was so kind and welcoming, and the food was amazing.
Markun: They curate such amazing, unique experiences. We ate dinner in different places every night. We had cocktail hour in different locations each time, lunch was in different settings, and they were able to create these beautiful, unique little experiences.
Do you have any favorite photographs or images from your visit?
Thomsen: Definitely not. There are thousands. There are terabytes of footage. It would be crazy to have a favorite. My favorites would be the photos I shot inside the chateau in the mornings because it gets stunning, strong morning light. And then all the exteriors at sunset. Shooting outside during golden hour, David and I ran around like chickens with their heads off nonstop. Like at every angle, the light was stunning.
There’s nothing better than natural light.
Markun: Totally. That dictated a lot of our shoot, and I got to give a lot of credit to Robert [Louey], our creative director, who was adamant that we soak in the light and see it. Teal and I are so used to hitting the ground running. Whatever location, whatever place in the world we go to, we pull out our cameras, and we’re ready to go. Robert’s like, “Sit and watch the light for a bit when you get to Le Logis.” It sounded hilarious, but truthfully, it dictated a lot of our shoot.
Staying there for a few days allowed us to study the light. In the same way, they curated these different experiences, we were able to curate different light patterns and say, “Oh, the pool actually will be better at 4 o’clock, a little bit before sunset.” It was cool to let that be the process that naturally dictated how the photographs came to life.
France is beautiful, and it holds so much magic for people. Is there something that stands out that visually defines it for you?
Thomsen: For me, a lot of it is the light. I had to shoot in Saint-Tropez once, and I just remember the light bouncing off all the warm-colored buildings, making everyone look beautiful. Every person was stunning because the light was hitting them. But also, it has a certain magic because there’s so much history and all the architecture and buildings. There are so many stories within that it lends itself to visual storytelling. Walking around France is different from walking around L.A. You get different kinds of information here.
How would you describe your work’s styles and influences?
Thomsen: My goal is to make it feel transportive so you can feel like you were there. I lean toward warmth and natural light in every frame. I tend to go for color, but being transportive is the primary goal, so I’m not shooting wide frames of a landscape or a room. I’m shooting what it feels like to sit there so that you might see the edge of the desk with your coffee on it, the open window with the drapes blowing and the view out the window — not just the view.
Markun: My style of filming is mainly documentary-based. I shoot series and films, travel the world and do different stories. I always like the idea you’re in service of your subject, trying to tell the story through the subject’s eyes.
As a documentarian, your job is to feel the lens, the perspective, feel you’re there, but you’re also trying to do so through your subject. I also pride myself on doing elevated documentaries — not using a Handycam but technology and real cinema tools to tell a story and, not make it larger than life, but bring out the best of it.
Is there a place where you felt photos couldn’t do it justice?
Thomsen: Yes. Namibia, for example. There was no way to fully capture the vastness of the landscapes and how tiny you felt in this desert land. I tried to do it through humans in the frame for scale, but it doesn’t do it justice.
Markun: Steepness is difficult to capture. We often shoot motorcycle commercials in the Himalayas and Ladakh, India. And I’m like, “We’re up at 15,000 feet. How do you make it seem like we’re at 15,000 feet?” And you’re riding on a crazy, single-track road with a gigantic steep drop-off. It isn’t easy to get the perspective to show the sheer intensity of the natural landscape.
Any bucket-list destinations?
Thomsen: My bucket list is never-ending, but Bhutan and Antarctica are at the top of my list.
Markun: Somewhere extreme because I love seeing how people adapt. Whether it’s people living 14,000 feet up in Ladakh, India, or people in Alaska riding their mountain bikes in zero-degree weather, or people in Quito, Ecuador, living at the top of a crater, it’s fascinating to tell those stories of people in extreme environments because it gives you another appreciation and respect for humanity.
Do you have any advice for amateurs looking for a good travel photo?
Thomsen: Think about foreground, middle ground and background. Don’t just shoot the view. Shoot like what it looks like from where you are. Include a little bit of the window frame.
Markun: Follow the light. Everyone always wants to take a photo in front of the sunset. If you have a really good camera, a backlight and maybe a bounce card, it could look good, but otherwise, it will just be like a silhouette. We take the phone and then say, “Maybe face this way for a second.” And everyone’s like, “Why would I face that way?” But get the good light to hit you for a second, and then boom, this is the better photo. Just trust the light.
Thomsen: When you’re just shooting the view or the sunset, everyone will have that picture. Shoot from your perspective, it’s going to be different.
