Fall Trip '07: Telluride, Colorado

Fall Trip '07: Dallas Divide to Telluride, CO

Fall Trip '07: Uncompahgre National Forest, Colorado

Fall Trip '07: Arches National Park, Moab, Utah

Fall Trip '07: Late Start... Through Nevada to Utah

Day 1: I’m four days late getting out of the house due to a legal response that took longer than expected and a new form arriving that required some research. I haven’t heard back from my divorce attorney for a couple of days but she knows I’m packing to go, so I decide to get on the road. By the time I have everything ready and loaded in the truck it’s 6pm.

As I enter the freeway I noticed it is damp on the edges. Apparently a rain shower has moved through. The weather forecast for the next few days isn’t great. Whether I head northeast to Yellowstone and Grand Teton or southeast towards Colorado, the next few days may include rain and snow showers, and nighttime temperatures as low as the low 20s. I’m surprised to see as I climb the western slope of the Sierras that there are patches of snow as low as 4000 feet. As I continue the snow blankets the ground, then gets deeper, then it starts to snow. Soon I’m driving through a blizzard with 4-5 inches of snow on the sides of the road! By Donner Summit it’s dark and traffic has slowed to a crawl due to black ice on the road, and everyone’s going slow down the steep descent towards the Tahoe Basin. On the other side of the freeway a tow truck has about 75 feet of cable out and is hauling an SUV out of the snowy thirty foot deep trench between the eastbound and westbound lanes.

I decided that I’d better stop a few miles ahead in Truckee and rethink my plans. My mother is off traveling, but I stop by her place to pick up my snow chains and a couple of logs. It has stopped snowing, and some stars a visible above. I decide that the storm is local and that I want to get on the road so I can get somewhere by the following night.

I drive as far as I can into Nevada before I get tired. The sate seems endless. Some of the hills alongside the road have dusting of snow on them, but the road is clear so I make decent progress. When even the quirky radio stations can’t hold my interest any more, I pull over at a rest stop and stretch out in my down sleeping bag in the back. I’m about halfway across Nevada. Depending upon whether I turn north or south at Salt lake City, I should be able to make it To Wyoming or Southern Utah by the following night.

Day 2: I wake up before dawn, and see the sun’s light coming on the eastern horizon. Instinctively I look around to see if there’s anything to take a picture of. The surrounding hills have a blanket of snow on them, and there are enough clouds that the sunrise will be interesting if enough sun can get through. I’m awake, the sun’s coming… I might as well get to work.

I turn on the car to get the heater going, slip into some clothes, and hop into the front seat. There aren’t a lot of vehicles on the road this early, so I simply stop on the shoulder as I see good light and interesting subjects. At one point the sight of a tree seems noteworthy.

By the time I reach the Utah border there are more cars on the road, and the Bonneville Salt Flats are on the other side of the westbound lanes of the freeway, so I pass through without a shot. Someone has some trucks and trailers out on the salt flats, and they have marked a straight track across the flat surface. Perhaps they’re in pursuit of a speed record? At Salt Lake I decide that Colorado is a safer destination, since there are warmer, lower elevations nearby in New Mexico and Arizona if the cold and snow is too intense. If the storms have knocked the colorful leaves off the aspen in Colorado, I can explore slot canyons in Southern Utah instead.

I stop a short distance south of Salt Lake City in the town of Provo for supplies, and I notice that people are traveling in packs… 4… 5… 6… and it’s mostly housewives with their children. Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore!

Checking the map, Arches National Park in Moab, Utah not far from the Colorado border, seems like a good target for sunset. It looks like I can arrive about an hour before sunset, which will give me time to get into the park and get set up somewhere.

Unfortunately the sun is setting just as I arrive; I had failed to account for the time zone change and the nearly 1000 miles that I had traveled. It’s a huge loss; the broken clouds from the recent storms were dark red and magenta tones, over a landscape of red sandstone, with snow-tipped peaks in the distance. I drive into the park anyway, and snap a couple of shots in the fading light, plus a couple of star trail photos. Now that I’m here, I’ll come back for the entire next day to get some decent shots.

Fall Colors: Selecting a Destination

Here I am packing for my next photography trip. My ex scheduled a court date for exactly the middle of my planned trip. What a coincidence.

I'm examining the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Region 2007 Fall Color Report to see where I should go with the 2 weeks I'll now have instead of the 4-6 I was counting on:

NEARLY ALL THE FORESTS WHO SENT IN A REPORT THIS WEEK AGREE THE FALL COLORS WILL BE REACHING THEIR PEAK COLOR BETWEEN THIS WEEKEND, SEPTEMBER 29th & 30th, AND THE FOLLOWING WEEKEND, OCTOBER 6th & 7th.

With favorable weather conditions, the color should continue to intensify during the next 2 - 3 weeks. With even a little more luck from the weather, there could be good color into the last week of October in some areas.

I'd better get moving!

As I was dropping off some legal documents to keep me out of hot water while I'm on the road, The Doors were playing, and Jim Morrison seemed to be urging me out the door.

Ah keep your eyes on the road,
Your hands upon the wheel.
Keep your eyes on the road
Your hands upon the wheel.
Yeah, were going to the roadhouse,
Gonna have a real good-time.

...
The futures uncertain
And the end is always near.

Let it roll, baby, roll.
Let it roll, baby, roll.
Let it roll, baby, roll.
Let it roll, all night long.

Shoot Fall Colors Like a Pro

Here are some of the things that I do to capture nice Fall shots:

1. If the sun is shining, use a circular polarizer and carefully orient it to cut glare reflecting off of the leaves. It'll expand the color in your shot, improve saturation, and enable a more accurate and appropriate exposure. It can make the sky a deep shade of blue as well, which looks good alongside the bright leaves.

2. Shoot close/detail shots early to avoid wind, especially if you're shooting aspen trees.

3. Shoot in RAW format if possible to enable you to adjust white balance of your shots towards warm as appropriate to reproduce the warm yellow, orange and red leaf tones you experience.

4. Use a small aperture such as f/22 for maximum depth of field.

5. Try some shots of backlit leaves, as they can be very intense in color.

6. Pick some westward and eastward views and plan ahead to catch sunrise or sunset over colorful trees.

7. Pick up some of the most colorful and interesting leaves you find and put them in your pocket. Arrange them as a still life shot on a rock, or when you come to an interesting object (stump, rock) or stream scene, scatter them around to enhance the color in the shot. In a pool in a large stream or river, sometimes you can find a circulating eddy to throw leaves into to take long exposures with the leaves swirling around.

8. Use a tripod.

9. Get into a dense stand of trees and shoot straight up towards the sky.

10. Try some 10-20 minute night shots under a full moon. You'll get Fall colros shots with star trails!

11. Shoot a lot of Automatic Exposure Bracketing sequences with 1 1/3 stop to 2 stop spacing. Even if you're not using HDR postprocessing software yet, you can come back 1-2 years from now and benefit later from your investment of time shooting today.

Yosemite in the Rain

Evaporating rain condenses into clouds as wind currents pass the two thousand foot face of Yosemite's El Capitan. It takes most climbers about 3-4 days to climb Yosemite's El Capitan in good weather. On this rainy weekend, many spent a couple of extra rainy days and cold nights on their small cot-like shelters suspended on the sheer face. In a particularly bad storm, the summit attempt can take climbers the rest of their lives. The descent involves a short hike to a 600 foot rappel.

I enter Yosemite Valley through the smoke of a control burn, and arrive at the Upper Pines campground at 2am, and hit my brakes to avoid hitting a large black bear crossing the road towards another campground. The bears in Yosemite have learned that people mean food, and that people are careless and leave their food out on tables, in campfire pits, and store it in vehicles. Bears roam the campgrounds at night, and rangers patrol the campgrounds all night as well, shining spotlights around the tents and tables to find the bears and to see if anyone has left food out. Signs announce how many cars have been broken into, and that season's running total of damage to them. The score for this season so far involves over 1300 incidents, several hundred vehicles damaged, and over $75,000 in estimated costs. In other words, there are several problems between people and bears every day.

Fortunately the light rains over the past couple of days have stopped for the moment, and I have the tent set up and the kids into it by 3am.

"Photo of the Year"!

A few moments ago I was building my "Places Visited" links in the right margin of this blog, and as I entered the very last link to my Zion National Park, I saw my "Delicate Veil" shot with an extra award under it: "POTY" - Photo Of The Year!

It's one of only two shots that I have on my own wall at the moment printed at 20" x 30" size, and as good as the online thumbnail or file may look, with the way the light is distributed and with its blend of geometric elegance with natural lines and texture, it seems to look better the bigger I print it. More than the photo, though, the site is unreachable by most people, so although it's in a busy area of Zion National Park, when you get into the small 8 foot round alcove that this 12' waterfall has carved out, you're in an entirely isolated environment, a coccoon of rock and thunderous sound, a private cathedral dedicated to you and your thoughts.

The award doesn't involve a large cash or equipment prize, a book and free site membership (for life!), but the site is populated by many creative, talented, and dedicated photographers, and it's an honor to have my work recognized alongside theirs.

Coincidentally though I was wondering if I would be able to renew my paid membership next month. It may be the best site on the Internet to find quality examples of the shots that I can aspire to find as I visit new places, but without any income, I was thinking of getting on the road again and vacating my apartment to save money. For the second time in a couple of months photography site membership dues have been taken care of, right when I needed to renew. Fate, destiny, divine providence, or just dumb luck, it's one whopper of a coincidence. Perhaps the forces calling me to get on the road are all part of that big picture. I can afford to indulge in hope for at least another month and see where that path leads.

Photo Contest 2nd for Nicole Sullivan

September 19, Roseville, California - Nicole Sullivan placed 2nd in the "Color, Under 18" category in the Roseville Photo Contest today. Major Jim Gray presented Nicole with her award, and she was interviewed for the Roseville cable TV channel.

Asked how she captured her shot, she replied, "Well we were going out fishing that day, and when we got back to the car we saw this beautiful sunset. We pretty much always have our cameras with us, so we took some pictures of it." This is Nicole's second consecutive time placing in the contest.

"Active Sole" Blog Nominated for Award!

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Lessons Learned: Photographing the 2007 Great Reno Balloon Race

The Great Reno Balloon Race is an annual event that attracts over 100 pilots and their crews to Reno, Nevada each year. I enjoyed attending the Great Reno Balloon Race for the first time this year. My main regret is that I wasn't able to move around much or very quickly due to an ankle sprain, but I'm recording additional thoughts here so I'll remember what I'd like to do at the event next year.

The first thing on my wish list for next year will be to try to go to Friday and Sunday events. I attended Saturday this year and after getting up in Truckee around 2:30am and exploring the Reno/Tahoe area until sunset, I was too tired to make it before dawn again on Sunday. Who knows if I'll have Friday free next year, but anything's fair game on a wish list.

For this year's event I arrived by 4:30am and started taking pictures as the balloons that were to participate in the Glow Show were inflating, with a 30 second exposure. I set the ISO up a bit, and the shot turned out surprisingly well, with the contellation Orion appearing in the shot as a bonus.

The 5am Glow Show only had two or three brief times when all four balloons were lit at once, so you really had to be ready for it. I'd like to get a straight-on and a diagonal side angle, so I'll sprint to a new location after the first all-balloon glow. The rest of the time while they're alternating which balloon burns I'll run in and catch shots of the crew and of the propane flames.

For the Dawn Patrol flight, again there were few times when all balloons were lit at once, so plan for your location and framing for those two shots and catch them quickly while you can. I tried some time exposures hoping to get the balloons all lit over time, but the wind moves them too fast and those shots are blurry.

As the balloons were preparing for the mass ascension, I really liked my position by some modest wetlands northeast of the field towards McCarran Blvd. The rising sun cleared the horizon just as the first balloons were airborne, so it was a great angle to get the warm early morning light hitting the balloons. Next year I'll probably start closer to the balloons and get the pilots walking inside to inspect the canopies, get the flames and the inside of the balloons, and get some detail shots of the colorful balloons crowded together, then head back out to get the whole field of action. The cars parked up on McCarran Blvd. however had my same angle but gained an interesting birds-eye view looking down on the field. Some people scooted under the chain link permimeter fence... maybe it would be worthwhile to wear grubby clothes to gain access to that higher perspective for a shot or two. I guess the only other thing I'd like to get around this time would be a shot or two towards sunrise, so I'll have to weigh shooting from the West side 10 to 5 minutes before the sun rises against wanting to be on the East or Northeast side of the field a few minutes later. If it's a boring clear sky I can probably skip sunrise, or maybe I can try both on different days.

Then as the Mass Ascension got underway the wind carried balloons towards the East. The wet area I was near provided some nice reflection shots, but frankly the lighting was not ideal... the balloons were drifting past my position towards the rising sun, and although it was behind a tree the shady side of the ballons lacks color saturation. (The haze in the sky from the Plumas fire also detracted from the overall color, but I'd rather than err towards realistic color than to unrealistically correct or oversaturate.) Next year one thing I can do to react to this would be to move to the far/east side of the large pond that lies due East of the takeoff field. It was calm and would have offered more sturated colors of balloons lit in full sun, plus their reflections. I'll have to move here early in the Mass Ascension because the balloons quickly drift overhead and continue Eastward.

Next the ballons started playing various games and contests, with the key weather change being a change in drift direction westward, so the balloons come back over the field. I can stay down by the pond or continue around the field clockwise, as I see from other pictures that there was a small decorative pond or fountain to the south of the field that might offer yet another reflection site and the sun moves towards the south, following it around and shooting northward can keep the balloons well lit.

One thing I forgot to do after the Glow Show and Dawn Patrol was to set my ISO back down, so my shot from the 6:30am Mass Ascension on are slightly grainy. I did determine some time ago that for hot air balloon photos turning a polarizer to cut glare on the shiny fabric can be critical to getting a proper exposure, increasing color accuracy and saturation, and cutting haze in the sky. The benefit didn't seem as noticeable as usual in the smoke-filled sky on Saturday. I also held a graduated neutral density filter in front of my lens for the reflection shots to bring the exposures of the direct and reflected areas of the scene into balance.

I guess the last thing I'll do in the future is not head down to Virginia City for the International Camel Races, and to take it easy during the day so maybe I can return for the next day's balloon flights.

I had been thinking of heading to Albuquerque for the International Balloon Fiesta Oct 6-14, but I think I may try to return to Reno's event next year instead!

From Virginia City I headed back to Truckee via Lake Tahoe so I could catch sunset from the Sand Harbor area. I arrived back in Truckee around 8:30pm. After being on the move since 2:30am, I was ready for a break.

Lessons Learned: Photographing the Lunar Eclipse

For the August 28 lunar eclipse I decided to go shoot by Mono Lake, where there would be no light pollution and at an elevation of about 7000 feet there would be minimal atmospheric interference. I spent the previous night in Yosemite Valley and travelled to the South Tufa access point at Mono Lake to spend the night of the eclipse. To plan for the eclipse, here are some links that I used.

Lunar Eclipse Photo Examples and Shooting Advice:
http://www.mreclipse.com/LEphoto/LEphoto.html

Aug 28 Lunar Eclipse Phases & Times:
http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/LEmono/TLE2007Aug28/TLE2007Aug28.html

I really liked the example of a wide angle lunar eclipse sequence in a particular setting, so I set up one camera to leave with one wide perspective, and I used another to capture zoomed shots of the moon at various phases of the eclipse.

I did a fair amount of exposure bracketing, but I had some focusing problems during the darker phases of the eclipse. In my case I had added a 2X teleconverter to my lense which forced manual focus, so I assumed that I simply wasn't focusing accurately enough. Examining the shots on my computer the next day, the stars revealed that the real culprit turned out to be the rotation of the earth. My 70-200mm lens doubled via a 2X teleconverter to 400mm is equivalent to 640mm on a 35mm camera, so in the process of magnifiying the detail of the moon I was magnifying the motion of the moon as well. With the moon 10,000 times less bright during the eclipse, about a 15 stop shift darker, and the 2X teleconverter also cutting my lens's widest aperture down 2 stops from f/4 to f/8.0, I could focus on the moon sharply at any given instant, but the exposure times were simply too long as both the moon moved and my position moved (the surface of the earth rotates at over 1000 miles/hour). As I examine the shots in more detail it'll be interesting to see at what exposure time the motion becomes too great at that level of zoom.

Update: Using the "500 Rule" to determine an approximate maximum exposure before the stars and moon start to "drag", divide 500 by the effective focal length of 640 mm and you get 500/640 = 0.78.  So any exposure time under 0.8 seconds or so will produce a photo without that apparent motion blur.

A different issue I've found related to moon shots and image stabilization is that when I bracketed I wanted to use Photomatix HDR software to combine multiple exposures to really bring out the moon's detail. Unfortunately the IS system seemed to re-acquire a new lock on the moon in between shots, which moves each shot slightly and destroys the alignment of the shots relative to each other. Normally HDR software can attempt to restore alignment across multiple shots, but the information in each shot is so different that there doesn't seem to be enough information for the software to use to perform alignment automatically. I guess I'll have to use Photoshop skills to superimpose, align, and blend multiple shots.

My biggest challenge however turned out to be one that I had anticipated: battery power. What I hadn't anticipated was shooting in yosmite all day then catching a nice sunset in the Mammoth Lakes area before heading over to Mono Lake. I started the night with neither of my cameras fully charged, and having to do a little battery shuffling and charging during the night cost me a couple of key shots from the sequence I wanted to complete. Lesson learned.

The still partially eclipsed moon set over the crest of the Sierras near 13,000 foot Mt. Dana, I enjoyed a nice sunrise at Mono Lake, then I spent another day shooting Yosemite under some nice, dramatic clouds. I started getting a little tired after 36 straight hours of photography, but what a great trip!

With clouds over Yosemite and water levels low and calm on the Merced River, I had a particularly productive time there. Here are a few of my favorite shots.

The turnout opposite Bridalveil Falls is a great place to stop right before sunset as the softening golden light of the setting sun brings out the color in the valley's granite. Bridalveil Falls and the Merced River in Yosemite Valley are at extremely low levels following a winter season of low snowfall.

I wasn't sure if the reflection was going to be strong enough, but as it turned out I really like how the rocky bottom of the river shows through in the darker areas of the reflection. Some people think that all you have to do in landscape photography si show and trigger the shutter, but in this case a circular polarizer at partial strength, a graduated neutral density filter hand-held in front, auto exposure bracketing 3 shots plus HDR processing and Photoshop color adjustment were all needed to create this result

I go to Yosemite a lot, but this was my first visit with a really wide lense. Being that deep in a valley, the extra coverage sure helps, especially if you're trying to double it the Valley's landmarks with a reflection!

I call this photo "PapaBearazzi." Fortunately this bear had plenty of ripe apples to keep him full, but at night the bears roam the campgrounds, like giant dogs, looking for dropped table scraps. I've rarely seen bears wandering around during the day in Yosemite, but on this day I saw 2, and the night before my father stepped out of his tent and almost tripped over one!