When I got into the studio this morning, I opened my stuff and pulled out my Netflix movie envelopes. Keep in mind that my queue has been long for a long amount of time. I’ve pretty much forgotten what I’ve put on the list. And I’m frequently surprised when I open the envelope. Well, today was one of those days.

After a couple days of really cool (and somewhat dangerous) ice formations on my back porch, I chuckled to myself when I saw the title of the first movie – “Chasing Ice.” It’s a documentary about how the glaciers are receding all around the world. And my thought was “Sure, and now they’re all covering Chicago!!!” Timing is everything!

The movie is a beautiful. Environmental photographer James Balog started by photographing the beauty & majesty of glaciers & frozen formations. As he continued over the years, he could see that the glaciers were slowly disappearing. And he set out to document the geological change. He deployed time-lapse cameras to capture a record of the world’s changing glaciers, compressing years into seconds to illustrate how these ice mountains are disappearing at a breathtaking rate. The videos are amazing, beautiful & sad. The comparisons between years are shocking.

The movie starts out with some breathtaking photography – which I’m sure is the reason I added it to my Netflix queue in the first place. Soon enough you become enthralled by his passion & adventure to capture the glacial changes with time-lapse photography. Regardless of which side you are on in the Global Warming debate, these images are hard to dispute. I’m just glad I rode my bike through Glacier National Park when there were still glaciers there!!!

Click here to see the official trailer for “Chasing Ice.”

And here are just a few of the stunning images from the documentary…