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Aaron Meyers  > Nature > Landscapes
The natural beauty of the land, including waterfalls, sunsets and more!
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Aaron Meyers > Bonsai Milk Milky Way over Bonsai Rock Lake Tahoe, Nevada One of the challenges in photography is to find something that nobody else has taken a photo of. Around the Bay Area there are so many amazing photographers that it's very difficult to find a scene that they haven't already photographed! One of my favorite places in Lake Tahoe is the iconic Bonsai Rock. I first saw this place a couple years ago when David Shields uploaded a couple shots from here and I knew I had to go to the place! One photo that Willie and I had never seen was a photo of the milky way over Bonsai Rock. We did some research and decided that we would head to Tahoe on August 16th. Unfortunately for us, a couple other photographers must have read our minds because almost less than week before we were scheduled to head to Tahoe a couple photographers took the exact shot we were going to take! After a long day at work in which we were both exhausted, we left the Bay Area and I drove up to Tahoe and over to Bonsai Rock. We arrived early, hoping to light-paint the rock before the milky-way was in position. Quickly we realized that light-painting gave a fake looking view of Bonsai Rock and the tree on top. After photographing the Milky Way sitting on-top of Bonsai Rock we proceeded to take several minute long exposures taking advantage of the natural light to show Bonsai Rock in our photos. Luckily there was enough light pollution to provide a nice orange glow in the background and also light up the rock. This is a 3-shot blend: an 8-minute exposure to show Bonsai Rock, a 15 second exposure of the Milky Way above Bonsai Rock, and a 6 minute exposure for the foreground rocks framing the bottom left of the photo Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 24mm f/1.4G ED: Milky Way: 24mm, f/1.6, 15 sec, ISO 3200 Bonsai Rock: 24mm, f/2, 8 minutes, ISO 640 Foreground Rocks: 24mm, f/2, 6 minutes, ISO 400
Aaron Meyers > Cathedralglow Upper Cathedral Lake Yosemite National Park, CA Many people refer to this scene as "alpenglow", since you can see the color of the sun glowing off the mountain. I, instead, have decided that this particular phenomenon shall be renamed as "Cathedralglow". Named after the sun reflecting on Cathedral Peak in Yosemite National Park, Cathedralglow occurs when the sun is just below the horizon. Thunderstorms hovering over Cathedral Peak also pick up some of the color of the setting sun. One thing that I like to do with my each of my posts is to tell the story behind the photo and this one (I think) is a good one! This particular story involves the flu, long hikes, rock bouldering, cops, meteors, and more. I woke up on this particular morning with absolutely no energy. A large breakfast didn't help either and I started to get worried because I didn't know when we would eat again. As the day wore on I felt worse and worse. I started getting the chills. I had a fever. I had no appetite. I didn't want to move. It was only getting worse. I took a nap. Finally we stopped at the general store and I bought some DayQuill and a hamburger. I took another nap. When I woke up, all of a sudden … I had energy!!!! Just in time too -- it was 5 minutes before we were set to leave for Upper Cathedral Lake! Off we went! We left with plenty of time to hike the 4 miles, scout and wait for sunset. We didn't plan that I'd be sick, nor did we realized we would get lost and find ourselves climbing up hill more often than not but we arrived at Upper Cathedral Lake with plenty of time. When we arrived our jaws just dropped. Man is this place beautiful! After climbing around, walking over rocks, and doing a bit of bouldering we found what we wanted. Except … we were 100 feet too low! Above us loomed a huge rock-cliff. From down below, the lake was too small and squished; we needed to be on top to view the lake properly. Luckily Willie and I have both rock climbed at some point in our lives and we arrived at our spot with enough time for me to take another nap. As we waited for sunset some beautiful clouds rolled in and it started to rain behind Cathedral Peak. Man were we getting excited! As the sun dipped below the horizon the mountain peak just lit up with Cathedralglow! Wow were we in for a treat! As had been typical on this day, our emotions went up and down, up and down again; much to our dismay a number of thick, dark clouds rolled in and only a touch of pink color appeared in the clouds. That's when we turned around and saw the sky behind us was on fire! I had absolutely no energy to sprint down the cliff to get a better composition so we turned and just watched the wonderful sunset with our own eyes (and maybe a few shutter clicks too). It was a long hike down and thanks to another DayQuill I made it safely back to the car. This night was supposed to be the Perseid Meteor Shower maximum and we were eager to get to Mono Lake to photograph the meteors. A park ranger, on the other hand, was not so happy with our eagerness and decided to quiz us on why it was a better idea to slow down before eventually letting us go with just a warning. We spent a couple hours photographing meteors and then I finally made it back to bed where a long sleep found me feeling much better the next morning. Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 22mm, f/16, 3 sec, ISO 100 Lee Filter Holder + HiTech 0.6 ND Grad 2 explore blend
Aaron Meyers > Another World Milky Way Above Tufa's Mono Lake, Lee Vining, CA Willie and I spent a weekend in the Yosemite high country taking photos of the Milky Way, beautiful lakes, and meteor showers. During the day we explored Yosemite while at night we spent most of our time at Mono Lake. One evening, we noticed that the Milky Way was setting directly behind us at the lake, over a couple sets of Tufa's and we just had to turn around and photograph it. There wasn't enough moonlight to light up the Tufa's so Willie grabbed a couple flashlights and light painted the Tufa's. We repeated the light painting several times until we got it right. Tufa's are salt creations left behind as Mono Lake was drained for drinking water for the Southern California region. Conservation efforts are under way and the lake level is rising again, hiding some of the Tufa's that have recently been visible. We wanted to capture as many photos as we could before these are back underwater! I debated whether or not to post this photo as I really wish there had been some of Mono Lake in this shot, but ultimately, I really liked how the Milky Way almost looks like a shooting star above the Tufa's. The following night was the peak of the Perseid Meteor Shower and Willie and I captured a number of meteors streaking through the sky! I also really liked how this photo almost looks like it could be taken from another planet -- perhaps Mars? Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 24mm f/1.4G ED: 24mm, f/1.4, 15 sec, ISO 3200
Aaron Meyers > Jungle Retreat Hacienda Concepcion, Amazon Rainforest Madre de Dios River, Peru For years I've wanted to travel to Peru to see 2 things: Machu Picchu and the Amazon Jungle. With my roommate finishing her PhD she decided she wanted to head to Peru for her graduation celebration and she invited me to tag along. We spent 2 weeks doing pretty much everything there was to do in Peru and it started with 4 days in the Amazon Rainforest! We flew into Puerto Maldonado and after a 30 minute boat ride we arrived at our jungle lodge, Hacienda Concepcion. Built within the last year, this retreat was absolutely wonderful. We all had private cabanas, complete with mosquito netting, private bathrooms, hammocks facing out onto the jungle, delicious food and amazing jungle excursions. This was by far the best part of our trip. The first night we arrived we were taken on a river tour by boat where we saw Caymen, birds, and some other animals that only come out at night. To my surprise, we also saw the Milky Way in all of its glory -- and boy was it visible to the naked eye. I got really excited because that meant I could break out the new D800 and give it a whirl! When we were back at the lodge I grabbed the camera and walked down to the area where our cabanas were situated. The cabanas were lit by very dim gas lanterns and gave off just enough light so that I could expose for both the milky way and the cabanas all in 1 exposure! Unfortunately I had left my ultra-wide lens at home, not thinking I'd need it for the trip, so instead I shot 16 images and stitched them together in Photoshop CS6. Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S: 24mm, f2/.8, 25 sec, ISO 3200 16 images stitched together in Photoshop CS6
Aaron Meyers > Emerald Jewels Emerald Bay Sunrise Lake Tahoe, California A couple weeks ago Willie asked me to reserve the weekend of March 30, 2012 for a photo-trip. About the same time, my roommate and a bunch of my friends decided to make that same weekend a Tahoe get-away/ski-trip weekend. I wanted to do both so I convinced Willie to join and we'd shoot Lake Tahoe. We had been monitoring the weather all week and it seemed like every 5 hours the report changed. A large storm was rolling in but nobody could decide when exactly it would hit. We knew we wanted to shoot Bonsai Rock (which I have previously photographed) and Emerald Bay. Planning this photo trip turned into a nightmare because we weren't sure what sunrises or sunsets would be good and we couldn't figure out if the roads would even be open. The road to Emerald Bay had been closed all week due to snow / avalanche control but finally opened as we drove up to Tahoe. Friday night we drove to Bonsai Rock and had a skunked sunset (but I did manage to get a photo that I was happy with thanks to the Lee Big Stopper, coming soon). Saturday morning we woke up at 5:15am (ouch), wiped the sand out of eyes and hit the road. I had done some research and found that Emerald Bay was not only really close to our cabin but also pretty easy to photograph. Just pull off on one of the turn-outs, find a spot that doesn't have trees, and shoot. We were the only ones on the road when we got to Emerald Bay and only a few cars passed us as we watched the sunrise. There were a LOT of clouds (as you can see) but we were lucky and an opening in the east allowed the sunrise to sneak through and light up the clouds. We were treated for a beautiful sunrise (finally Mama Nature played nice for us!). Thanks to a super massive wind that had blown in, Emerald Bay also had some neat wave action going on (which you can see in this photo). Willie used his new Singh-Ray Reverse ND Grad and was able to get a large dynamic range with very little clipping. My HiTech Reverse ND isn't as soft and was doing some ugly things to the hill on the left so I had to settle for 2 filters and some bracketing. This shot is a 2-exposure blend, although the underexposed photo was only used in the bright section on the right of the photo, above the mountains and below the clouds. Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S: 24mm, f/18, 10 sec, ISO 100 Lee Filter Holder + (0.9 + 0.3) HiTech Soft ND Grad's
Aaron Meyers > Streaking Bonsai Bonsai Rock Sunset Lake Tahoe, Nevada Ever since I first saw David Shields photos of Bonsai Rock I had wanted to shoot this location. For the past couple years I've leased a ski cabin with several of my friends for the entire winter. Being so close to Lake Tahoe and Bonsai Rock you'd think it would be easy to get here to shoot. Last year I had made it up to the eastern shore to photograph Bonsai but I waited too long into the year (it was almost May when I made my way over there) and the sun was setting more northerly than I wanted. Willie and I decided to do a Tahoe photo weekend at the end of March, hoping the sunset would still be south-westerly enough for a nice sunset. It was storming all week and we rented a 4 wheel drive SUV for the trip. Hoping to get a great sunset we departed plenty early from my cabin and arrived at Bonsai Rock pretty hopeful. Random side-story: I've driven all over California (and many parts of the United States) over the past 6 years and although I've seen "Caution: falling rocks" signs, I've never actually really paid attention to them or had any issues. On the drive to Bonsai Rock the car in front of me rolled down his window and started waving his arm, pointing to the left, signaling something that I couldn't figure out. He quickly changed lanes and that's when I realized what he meant …. GIANT F'ING BOULDER!!!!!!! There were 3 cars to my left and I had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting the giant rock. This thing would have seriously messed up the SUV. So Mr. Car in front of me … thank you! We arrived at Bonsai Rock with plenty of time before sunset. Last year there was so much snow that the lake level rose fairly significantly. Even with a dry winter the lake level is much higher than we really want for good Bonsai Rock photos. The beautiful foreground rocks are mostly under water. Willie and I spent a couple minutes looking at compositions but with so few rocks exposed we were pretty limited and found our shots pretty quickly. We had plenty of time to kill before sunset and it was partially cloudy so I decided to pull out the Lee Big Stopper and see what kind of effect I could get. I set up a 3.5 minute exposure, clicked the button and sure enough, I got a super neat pattern in the sky. The water was pretty choppy and the long exposure turned the water into glass. Perfect! Now we just need a beautiful sunset and I'll repeat this. Unfortunately we didn't get a sunset (thick clouds blocked the sunset) but I did manage to get a nice long exposure photo! Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S: 36mm, f/16, 3 min 20 sec, ISO 200 Lee Filter Holder + 0.6 HiTech Soft ND Grad + Lee Big Stopper
Aaron Meyers > Silver Haired Ancestor Startrails and Ancient Petrogylphs California After poor planning cancelled a trip to Utah, Willie and I decided to head down to Death Valley instead. We brought along my friend Zack and were pretty excited to explore and get some great photos. Unfortunately, one of us must have really upset Mamma Nature because we got skunked for pretty much every photo we tried to take. We left DV on Saturday morning and were off to find some ancient petroglyph formations that faced snow covered mountains. After finding the parking spot, going on a nasty little hike, and doing some bouldering we finally arrived at the petroglyphs. We weren't quite sure we'd be able to find it so we arrived *reallllllly* early (like at 1pm for a 5:45pm sunset). Sure enough, we found it almost immediately! What an amazing site! These petroglphys, which are about 5,000 years old and one of the only ones that face the sky, sit on top of a block of volcanic rock and dozens of petroglyphs are carved into the rock, perhaps by ancestors of the Paiute (or Shoshone-Paiute) people. It's about 15 or 20 feet tall, somewhat bowl shaped, and slightly steep, perhaps about a 40 degree slope (which made standing for photos difficult). We thought we'd be the only ones there but were quite wrong (that seemed to be the theme of the trip … just wrong about everything!). A group of locals joined us for a couple minutes and then left as another large family joined us and eventually left. For a while we had the place to ourselves and used the time to get our compositions perfect. Surprisingly, around 3pm another set of (professional) photographers showed up and we had to squeeze in so that all 5 of us could get photos. It was pretty amusing, with one guy pretty much dangling off the rock! With our tripods setup we waited for sunset. Mamma Nature had not been nice to us during the trip but the 2 other photographers had been lucky all week, getting great skies the entire time, and we hoped their luck would turn our fortunes. Unfortunately, Mamma hated us more than ever and brought in some awful big clouds that blocked the sky from lighting up and we went home empty handed. So much for sunset! After eating dinner we looked back at the skies and saw it had cleared up and thought "hey, lets go back and do star trails!" So off we go, with a whole lot of extra clothing, back up the nasty little hike and to the petroglphys. Willie brought some yellow tissue paper to diffuse a LED flashlight and we light painted the rock and then took a 30 minute exposure for the startrails. Willie manned the flashlight while I clicked off our shutters and tried to block the wind from shaking our cameras. It took a couple tries but we finally got the light painting thing down and then were able to move on to our 30 minute startrails. Yet again, Mamma Nature tried to stop us and rolled in a bunch of clouds just as we started the 30 minute exposure! It ended up creating a neat little effect, with the startrails being intermixed with clouds. I thought it made the startrails look like little silvery strands of hair! After the shot, we packed up and finally got to bed at about 12:30am. Being as crazy as we are, we woke up again at 5am, hiked back to petroglyphs for a 3rd time and tried for a nice sunrise (again, a failure). At least we got this shot and we had an amazing trip regardless! Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 17mm, f/7.1, 30 min, ISO 200
Aaron Meyers > Generational Tenaya Lake Yosemite National Park, California For the first time since 1933 Tioga Rd, the northern road through Yosemite National Park, has been open this late into January. Due to the complete lack of snow the road has remained clear and the park authorities have left it open for travel. The temperatures in northern Yosemite are right around freezing during the day and much colder at night and all of the Tuolumne Meadows lakes have frozen over to the point where people are ice-skating all over them. Willie and I decided to take advantage of this once in a generation chance and drove up Sunday morning with the plan of shooting Tenaya Lake at sunset. The weather clouds looked promising and we saw perfectly partially cloudy skies all along the drive to Tenaya. We arrived early enough and spent a while scouting around the lake. At first we walked on the outside edge of the lake but after witnessing multiple people skating all over the lake we decided the frozen lake was thick enough for us to walk on. It turns out it was over a foot thick with ice! Plenty to support us. As we waited for sunset to come the unthinkable happened -- the clouds disappeared! Or should I say … they disappeared where we needed them. All around us were clouds but in the one scenic spot on Tenaya Lake, where our composition was setup, there were no clouds! Luckily a cloud rolled in just as the sun was setting but it wasn't enough to really light up. The sky got a bit pink and I was about to pull out some color in the sky but our hopes of awesome light were dashed. Oh well … it was at least neat to spend a day in Tenaya experiencing something we'll prob. never get to do again our lifetimes! Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 29mm, f/11, 2 sec, ISO 200, Tripod HiTech 0.6 Soft Grad ND
Aaron Meyers > Rocky Lower Antelope Canyon's Dog Page, Arizona When I booked my trip to Southern Utah I never thought the following 2 things: that it would be snowing and that I'd return to Page, AZ. I had made a trip to Page a couple months earlier and taken care of Antelope Canyon and Horseshoe Bend and gotten great photos already -- no need to return so soon. Unfortunately the blizzard that blew into Bryce National Park caused most of the park to close. Since we planned to hike The Wave the following day we had 2 options: stay in Kanab, UT or stay in Page, AZ. It was only 10:30am when we left Bryce and there's nothing to photograph near Kanab so we decided we'd head to Page, pick up a permit for The Wave, and hit up Antelope Canyon/Horseshoe Bend. When we arrived at Lower Antelope Canyon I asked if there was a self-guided tour we could do by ourselves, since I already knew the place and didn't need a guide. The woman told us no, we'd have to go in with a guide and that we'd be the only ones on the 1.5 hour tour. I told her we had to go get our cameras and we could set out. When we got back and the guide realized we had tripods and fancy cameras he told us that we could venture in the Canyons for 2 hours by ourselves as part of their "photo-tour." Perfect! We literally had the entire Lower Antelope Canyon to ourselves for 2 hours -- we only saw people as we rushed out 1 hour and 50 minutes later! My previous visit to Lower Antelope Canyon had been during the morning light. While I think that overall there was "better light" in the morning, the afternoon light was also spectaclar and slightly different. We only found good light in 2 or 3 places but in those places it was even more stunning than the morning light. Morning light brought mostly oranges and yellows but in the afternoon the purple colors came out! In one photo we could capture amazing purples, yellows AND oranges. Stunning! I came to this spot towards the end of the canyon. The light was hitting the canyon walls beautifully and I noticed that the shape of this rock looked kinda like a dog or a wolf's face. You can make out the nose, eyes, and mouth in the rock in the center. I call this dog "Rocky": Antelope Canyon's spiritual guard dog! He played quite nice with us while we were exploring :) Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S: 70mm, f/10, 1/5 sec, ISO 200, Tripod NO HDR -- minor curves, dodge/burning only.
Aaron Meyers > Pink Valley View Yosemite National Park California I've been following David Shield's photos for a while on Flickr and over the past year or so we've built up a Flickr friendship. David lives in the area and we tend to be in similar places at the same time but never in the *same exact spot* at the same time. I let David know that we'd be in Yosemite this last weekend and he replied that he would be too -- at Valley View for sunset! Valley View was about the last place we wanted to shoot since it's shot over and over and over again (and I already have several photos from Valley View) so we thought we might meet up with him afterwards. Willie, Will and I scouted all over Yosemite Valley for the perfect autumn sunset location. Unfortunately mother nature was working against us and the leaves hadn't turned color yet or where they had, it was pretty ugly spot other than 1 pretty tree. We finally decided to just go to Valley View and meet David. We arrived to Valley View pretty late and had to rush to find a spot. I setup at the typical spot but I really liked that the low river exposed rocks and shrubs that I had never seen before! As the sun set the granite began to glow pink -- which was actually pretty awesome! Towards the end of the show David finally strolled over and asked if we were us and sure enough, we met David Shields! Super nice guy and I'm glad I finally got to meet him. Hopefully we can meet up again for some future shooting. If you haven't seen his photos, stroll on over to his stream! Nikon D300s w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S 17mm, f/13, 0.5 sec, ISO 200 B+W F-Pro Circular Polarizer, Hitech Soft ND Grad's Color Cast removed using recommendation from D Breezy
Aaron Meyers > Sand Falls Upper Antelope Canyon Page, Arizona I've seen many photos of Antelope Canyon and some of my friends include the "sand falls" in which sand is captured falling down off the rocks in slow motion to make it looks like a waterfall. I asked our guide if there were any of these while we were there and the last 2 spots we stopped were for sand-falls! Note that this is not a natural occurrence: our guide had to pick up sand and pour it on the rocks and the run out of the way for our photos. None-the-less, it creates a pretty impressive scene! Yes, there are tons of Antelope Canyon photos out here, but one more from me isn't going to hurt, right?! This shot is part of my Arizona Photovacation Series. On our trip we stopped at Horseshoe Bend, Antelope Canyon (Upper/Lower), the Grand Canyon, and Sedona. Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 22mm, f/11, 4 seconds, ISO 200, Feisol Tripod
Aaron Meyers > God Said "Let there Be Light" Upper Antelope Canyon Page, Arizona Of all the things we saw in Antelope Canyon I have to say that this was the most stunning. We arrived at this spot and setup our tripods due to the recommendation of our photo-guide (thanks to "Carol Bigfoot Adventures"). After waiting a minute or so with nothing to photograph or see we were a little curious what we were looking for. All of a sudden we looked up and a light ray started to come through the whole in the ceiling and through the tree. The tree broke the light ray up into more, smaller light rays. As we started clicking away the light began to make the tree glow in the most glorious colors. The more we waited the more light rays started creeping in. I'm so glad that I had a remote shutter connected to my camera while photographing this. This was one of those times where you absolutely have to take your eyes away from your camera and just witness the scene with your own two eyes. Thanks to the remote shutter I could see the amazing light enter the Canyon while still being able to click away on the camera. Because of the bright light coming from the hole in the cavern I had to blend 5 different exposures (mostly just around the tree). This is not an HDR: I simply created masks in certain areas to get the detail back in some spots. This shot is part of my Arizona Photovacation Series. On our trip we stopped at Horseshoe Bend, Antelope Canyon (Upper/Lower), the Grand Canyon, and Sedona. Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 22mm, f/11, ISO 200, Feisol Tripod NOT an HDR: 5 photos ranging from 0.4 seconds to 2 seconds
Aaron Meyers > Antelope's Heart Upper Antelope Canyon Page, Arizona Here is another photo from Upper Antelope Canyon. Page, Arizona was the first stop in our photo vacation. After shooting gorgeous light the previous night at Horseshoe Bend we came into Antelope Canyon at just the perfect time (about 10:30am) when the light was absolutely stunning. I know that Antelope Canyon is completely over-photographed but we had to capture our own images anyways. In this photo the combination of light and rocks creates a heart. I can see why so many people fall in love with Antelope Canyon, and that's part of the reason why it's so dang busy. Trying to get time to setup the tripod, compose the photo, take the picture, and make sure it came out right is darn near impossible. Thanks to "Carol Bigfoot Adventures" for the wonderful photo-tour that we had. We spent 3 hours in the canyon (was only supposed to be 2 hours). I'll prob. post a couple more Antelope Canyon photos before y'all get bored of em! Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 30mm, f/11, 0.6 sec, ISO 200, Feisol Tripod
Aaron Meyers > Lady in the Wind Lower Antelope Canyon Page, Arizona Can you see the Lady in the Wind, with her hair blowing back over the rocks? Before I discuss this photo I wanted to mention what I mean by "artograph". I personally believe, and many of you may disagree, that photography is a form of art and that each photographer can take his own artistic path in each of the photos he produces. I do not believe that photography must be realism. After all, our camera sensor doesn't have nearly the dynamic range of our eye and who can say if what our eye see's is reality? Our camera attempts to capture things as it see's, but it too makes decisions on what the scene is: it selects it's own white balance, contrast/saturation levels, etc. We then tweak those in post-processing to do whatever we want to do with a photo. Ok, now I'm rambling. Back to the point.... when I took these photos in Antelope Canyon I noticed that the white balance played an important role on the color in the photo. While playing with the White Balance on this photo I noticed that depending on what temperature I used I could either get purples, yellows, or oranges. The reason I call this an "artograph" instead of a "photograph" is because I exported this photo into Photoshop 3 times: each with different white balances, once to get purples, once to get yellows, and once to get oranges, and then blended them as I saw fit. Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 25mm, f/8, 1/4 sec, ISO 200, Feisol Tripod
Aaron Meyers > Perfect Storm Horseshoe Bend Page, Arizona I spent the last couple days on a photovacation taking photos of beautiful things around northern Arizona. My photo buddy Willie and one other friend and I flew into Phoenix and drove 5 hours north to Page, Az. We arrived in the evening, just as a storm started blowing in. We immediately went over to Horseshoe Bend to see if we could get some nice photos. Although we knew that this spot was *completely* over-photographed we hoped that the storm would give us a fairly unique shot of the bend in the Colorado River. About an hour before sunset the lightning starting getting pretty close and the rain got a little heavier than we would have liked -- we sprinted back to the car to protect our gear. Luckily monsoon season in Arizona means the storms only last about 20 minutes and we were able to head back to The Bend before the sunset light started. Fortunately for Willie and I, another storm was right behind and rolled behind Horseshoe Bend just as the sun was setting. The incoming storm created an absolutely beautiful sunset, filled with light shafts of the setting sun reflecting off the rain. The water was also calm enough to reflect the sunset in the river. We definitely had a treat of a sunset! I rented a D700 for this trip from LensRentals.com. The D700 was absolutely amazing. With my 17-35mm lens on it I could finally go really wide and this place absolutely needed a wide angle lens. We scoped out a couple locations for this shoot and eventually decided we liked this spot because it was a little bit different than most peoples photos (who take their shots a bit to the left). I liked the two rocks on the left and right from this spot -- they point into Horseshoe Bend and frame it really nicely. Couple other notes about Horseshoe Bend: It's right off the highway and really easy to get to. There's about a 0.75 mile walk along a sandy trail to get here and pretty much anyone except a 90 year old parent could make the trek. Once you arrive at Horseshoe Bend there's a really long stretch of land that you can scope out to get your shot (there's not just one or two spots). The edge of the cliffs drops 1,000 feet down and there are no railings preventing you from falling off. We got right up to the edge to get this shot. I was afraid to let go of my camera for fear that the wind would blow it off the edge! Additionally, there's no way to get rid of that little rock on the bottom (left/center) that sticks into the river. It's a huge rock (that only looks small due to the 17mm lens) and no composition gets rid of it. Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 17mm, f/11, 0.4 sec, ISO 200, Tripod Lee Filter Holder w/HiTek 3-stop Reverse ND Grad
Streaking Bonsai
Bonsai Rock Sunset
Lake Tahoe, Nevada

Ever since I first saw David Shields photos of Bonsai Rock I had wanted to shoot this location. For the past couple years I've leased a ski cabin with several of my friends for the entire winter. Being so close to Lake Tahoe and Bonsai Rock you'd think it would be easy to get here to shoot. Last year I had made it up to the eastern shore to photograph Bonsai but I waited too long into the year (it was almost May when I made my way over there) and the sun was setting more northerly than I wanted. Willie and I decided to do a Tahoe photo weekend at the end of March, hoping the sunset would still be south-westerly enough for a nice sunset. It was storming all week and we rented a 4 wheel drive SUV for the trip. Hoping to get a great sunset we departed plenty early from my cabin and arrived at Bonsai Rock pretty hopeful.

Random side-story: I've driven all over California (and many parts of the United States) over the past 6 years and although I've seen "Caution: falling rocks" signs, I've never actually really paid attention to them or had any issues. On the drive to Bonsai Rock the car in front of me rolled down his window and started waving his arm, pointing to the left, signaling something that I couldn't figure out. He quickly changed lanes and that's when I realized what he meant …. GIANT F'ING BOULDER!!!!!!! There were 3 cars to my left and I had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting the giant rock. This thing would have seriously messed up the SUV. So Mr. Car in front of me … thank you!

We arrived at Bonsai Rock with plenty of time before sunset. Last year there was so much snow that the lake level rose fairly significantly. Even with a dry winter the lake level is much higher than we really want for good Bonsai Rock photos. The beautiful foreground rocks are mostly under water. Willie and I spent a couple minutes looking at compositions but with so few rocks exposed we were pretty limited and found our shots pretty quickly.

We had plenty of time to kill before sunset and it was partially cloudy so I decided to pull out the Lee Big Stopper and see what kind of effect I could get. I set up a 3.5 minute exposure, clicked the button and sure enough, I got a super neat pattern in the sky. The water was pretty choppy and the long exposure turned the water into glass. Perfect! Now we just need a beautiful sunset and I'll repeat this. Unfortunately we didn't get a sunset (thick clouds blocked the sunset) but I did manage to get a nice long exposure photo!

Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S:
36mm, f/16, 3 min 20 sec, ISO 200
Lee Filter Holder + 0.6 HiTech Soft ND Grad + Lee Big Stopper
Aaron Meyers > Streaking Bonsai Bonsai Rock Sunset Lake Tahoe, Nevada Ever since I first saw David Shields photos of Bonsai Rock I had wanted to shoot this location. For the past couple years I've leased a ski cabin with several of my friends for the entire winter. Being so close to Lake Tahoe and Bonsai Rock you'd think it would be easy to get here to shoot. Last year I had made it up to the eastern shore to photograph Bonsai but I waited too long into the year (it was almost May when I made my way over there) and the sun was setting more northerly than I wanted. Willie and I decided to do a Tahoe photo weekend at the end of March, hoping the sunset would still be south-westerly enough for a nice sunset. It was storming all week and we rented a 4 wheel drive SUV for the trip. Hoping to get a great sunset we departed plenty early from my cabin and arrived at Bonsai Rock pretty hopeful. Random side-story: I've driven all over California (and many parts of the United States) over the past 6 years and although I've seen "Caution: falling rocks" signs, I've never actually really paid attention to them or had any issues. On the drive to Bonsai Rock the car in front of me rolled down his window and started waving his arm, pointing to the left, signaling something that I couldn't figure out. He quickly changed lanes and that's when I realized what he meant …. GIANT F'ING BOULDER!!!!!!! There were 3 cars to my left and I had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting the giant rock. This thing would have seriously messed up the SUV. So Mr. Car in front of me … thank you! We arrived at Bonsai Rock with plenty of time before sunset. Last year there was so much snow that the lake level rose fairly significantly. Even with a dry winter the lake level is much higher than we really want for good Bonsai Rock photos. The beautiful foreground rocks are mostly under water. Willie and I spent a couple minutes looking at compositions but with so few rocks exposed we were pretty limited and found our shots pretty quickly. We had plenty of time to kill before sunset and it was partially cloudy so I decided to pull out the Lee Big Stopper and see what kind of effect I could get. I set up a 3.5 minute exposure, clicked the button and sure enough, I got a super neat pattern in the sky. The water was pretty choppy and the long exposure turned the water into glass. Perfect! Now we just need a beautiful sunset and I'll repeat this. Unfortunately we didn't get a sunset (thick clouds blocked the sunset) but I did manage to get a nice long exposure photo! Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S: 36mm, f/16, 3 min 20 sec, ISO 200 Lee Filter Holder + 0.6 HiTech Soft ND Grad + Lee Big Stopper
Streaking Bonsai
Bonsai Rock Sunset
Lake Tahoe, Nevada

Ever since I first saw David Shields photos of Bonsai Rock I had wanted to shoot this location. For the past couple years I've leased a ski cabin with several of my friends for the entire winter. Being so close to Lake Tahoe and Bonsai Rock you'd think it would be easy to get here to shoot. Last year I had made it up to the eastern shore to photograph Bonsai but I waited too long into the year (it was almost May when I made my way over there) and the sun was setting more northerly than I wanted. Willie and I decided to do a Tahoe photo weekend at the end of March, hoping the sunset would still be south-westerly enough for a nice sunset. It was storming all week and we rented a 4 wheel drive SUV for the trip. Hoping to get a great sunset we departed plenty early from my cabin and arrived at Bonsai Rock pretty hopeful.

Random side-story: I've driven all over California (and many parts of the United States) over the past 6 years and although I've seen "Caution: falling rocks" signs, I've never actually really paid attention to them or had any issues. On the drive to Bonsai Rock the car in front of me rolled down his window and started waving his arm, pointing to the left, signaling something that I couldn't figure out. He quickly changed lanes and that's when I realized what he meant …. GIANT F'ING BOULDER!!!!!!! There were 3 cars to my left and I had to slam on the brakes to avoid hitting the giant rock. This thing would have seriously messed up the SUV. So Mr. Car in front of me … thank you!

We arrived at Bonsai Rock with plenty of time before sunset. Last year there was so much snow that the lake level rose fairly significantly. Even with a dry winter the lake level is much higher than we really want for good Bonsai Rock photos. The beautiful foreground rocks are mostly under water. Willie and I spent a couple minutes looking at compositions but with so few rocks exposed we were pretty limited and found our shots pretty quickly.

We had plenty of time to kill before sunset and it was partially cloudy so I decided to pull out the Lee Big Stopper and see what kind of effect I could get. I set up a 3.5 minute exposure, clicked the button and sure enough, I got a super neat pattern in the sky. The water was pretty choppy and the long exposure turned the water into glass. Perfect! Now we just need a beautiful sunset and I'll repeat this. Unfortunately we didn't get a sunset (thick clouds blocked the sunset) but I did manage to get a nice long exposure photo!

Nikon D700 w/Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8G ED AF-S:
36mm, f/16, 3 min 20 sec, ISO 200
Lee Filter Holder + 0.6 HiTech Soft ND Grad + Lee Big Stopper
See photo in original gallery.
Camera: Nikon Corporation (Nikon D700) |
more details: exif |
original size: 4256px x 2832px |
Current: 600px x 399px |
Other sizes: S • Medium • L |
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Keywords: lake tree sunset water color landscape sierra clouds mountains tahoe shore scenic bonsai nature photography nevada filter nikon long exposure lake tahoe sierranevada sierra mountains east shore 2012 bonsai rock d700 nikon d700 silicon valley photography aaron meyers photography lake tahoe photography
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