Sometimes the simple, minimalist shots resonate with us. This scene was found on one of the reservoirs not far From Truckee, California. The particularly wet/humid Spring we've been having has been great for broken couds at sunset, while moderate temperatures have minimized wind.
I headed out late to squeeze in a few more scouting days before my upcoming Mountain Light Workshops trip, so I stopped a couple of hours down the road in Hope Valley. After a couple of mediocre stops I found this large, steaming vernal pool with a moderately large rock in it for foreground interest.
Moving to a different side of the pond I was able to catch the rock with different mountains as a backdrop.
A vertical orientation provided yet another interesting compositional variation.
As my alarm went off in the Hidden Valley Campground in Joshua Tree National Park, it looked like it was going to be completely overcast, so I almost didn't get up. I figured that I might still get some decent cloud reflection shots at Barker Dam, so I got up anyway and headed the short distance to the trailhead. It's a good thing that I did go, because the clouds started breaking up rapidly, just in time for a decent sunrise show.
After catching some nice sunrise cloud shots at the trailhead, I headed down the trail towards Barker Dam. A short way down the trial the sun came out briefly, illuminating the rocks and offering tree silhouettes.
When I arrived at the reservoir, there were some stunning cloud reflections that I could quickly capture by moving around the edge of the water.
Lake Tahoe is 12 miles wide, so even on a dawn that doesn't offer a lot of color you can take expansive wide angle shots or zoom in on a subject to fill more of the frame with what color you do have.
To successfully capture great images in a locaiton that you've never visited or haven't visited in a while, a lot much of your success depends on being in the right place at the right time. With dawn color well underway by 5am and sunset running past 9pm, logistical efficiency such as staying in a convenient location plays a role as well. I've been to this park before and I have a good photography guide to the park, but the days I've spent this week will set me up very well to crank out good shots on my next return. Hopefully I'll get some scenic weather!
This last dawn in Mount Rainier National Park offered the most intersting sky, at least for a few minutes.
The Paradise Ridge area still has about 10 feet of snow on the ground, but there were patches of flowers in places elsewhere.
I accidentally woke up around 4:30am, so it was easy to drive the rest of the way here in time for a very early dawn. There was new snow on the ground down by June Lakes, but it hadn't stuck to the road so driving wassn't an issue. At the South Tufa access to Mono Lake, nothing to speak of happened at sunrise, it was very gray and featureless, but then the storm started to break...
Mount Dana, at over 13,000 feet, always makes a nice subject to contrast with the exotic limestone tufa towers at Mono Lake.
This grass is green in the Mono Basin for only a few weeks. What a nice contrast to have the fresh snow on the peaks in the distance! The roads towards the right side provide a nice sense of the scale here (click on these photos to view larger copies).
Tioga Pass had just opened, and with the periodic distings of snow over the past few days, the vernal pools in Tuolumne Meadows contained plenty of water.
This was my first sunset on the Oregon Coast, and it looked like there would be too much cloud cover and nothing happening. Then suddenly a hole started appearing, and I loaded up my gear, grabbed the tripod, and rushed down the stairway and onto the sand.
