Pink MileSR 163, Mile 13 Monument Valley, Utah Last year I did two trips to the Southwest and found the landscape to be both breathtaking and jaw-dropping. There's just so much amazing scenery out in Utah and Arizona and I knew I had to go back. Andy and I found a cheap flight into Grand Junction, CO and made a quick 1.5 hour drive over to Moab. The first two days we visited all around Moab, Arches and Cayonlands National Parks. We witnessed sunset at Delicate Arch, light painted with the tail of the Milky Way at Double Arch, saw a beautiful sunrise at Mesa Arch and amazing grand views at Green River Viewpoint, did a short hike to Bow Tie Arch and Corona Arch (and saw people bungie jumping off Corona!), and lastly hunted down False Kiva for sunset. By the time we got back to the hotel on Saturday night we had decided we had seen enough and wanted to head to Monument Valley, which isn't close to anything convenient, but was only 2 hours from where we were. It took us a couple hours to make our way south towards the Arizona border but we eventually made our way into the Navajo Nation and the familiar scenes of Monument Valley came into view. I say familiar because I can remember seeing these mesas, buttes, and spires from the age of 6 when I first played the computer game "Oregon Trail" on an old Apple IIGS. After stopping at the iconic "Mile 13" we drove into Monument Valley, paid the $5/person entry fee, and then drove through the 17 mile dirt road in our little (crappy) rental car. After having a weekend of boring skies, cloud had finally rolled in and we debated where we wanted to photograph the sunset! I haven't had much luck shooting east for sunset and we decided to head back to Mile 13 since the view faced southwest. It was actually a lot of fun having to run into the road, setup the tripod real quick, snap a few shots, and then run out of the way as cars drove by from both in front and behind us. Looking down at my watch I noticed that the sun had set and we only had a touch of color in the sky above "Stagecoach", "Saddleback", and "King on his Throne" mesas. To our right, further west, I could see beautiful pinks. As we waited the color started moving closer and closer to the mesas. I started screaming "KEEP COMING, KEEP COMING. JUST A LITTLE FURTHER!" Sure enough 5 minutes later the sky lit up with amazing pinks, even providing a nice frame above the mesas. The color was so bright, in fact, that I had to tone down the saturation a bit to make this actually look believable! I also debated removing the cars from the road but ultimately felt it gave the scene more place and helped draw the eye in. Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6G ED-IF AF-S VR: 112mm, f/11, ⅛ sec, ISO 100 No Filters
Double TroubleMilky Way over Double Arch Arches National Park, Utah I had seen a number of nights capes below Double Arch in Arches National Park and knew I wanted to add it to my list of places to photograph. I flew into Grand Junction, CO in the morning and drove 2 hours to Moab. During the day I scouted Double Arch and had a number of ideas on where to shoot at night. I knew that night shooting was pretty much useless as the Milky Way was going to be blinded by the moon but I rented the 24mm f/1.4 lens anyways. Andy and I met up with Phill Monson and his brother-in-law Jeff to shoot Delicate Arch at sunset. We had some time to kill before sunrise at Mesa Arch so we decided to have a try at night photography over at Double Arch. I brought along a 2-million candlepower flashlight to do some light painting and Phill graciously volunteered to do the painting while I fired off the cameras. Even though the moon was out, the tail end of the Milky Way made its way over Double Arch. I wanted to include Phill in the photo to give this a sense of scale and backed up until I could compose the photo with Double Arch, Phill, and the Milky Way all in the shot. I realize this photo isn't anything special but I had fun shooting it anyways! Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 24mm f/1.4G ED: 24mm, f/1.6, 15 sec, ISO 3200
Drought's BaneSunset in Silicon Valley California I must have had some kind of precognition into the future because I don't normally keep my camera in the trunk of my car, but after trying to photograph the fog yesterday I decided to leave my camera in the trunk "just in case". Sure enough, that time happened to occur on Wednesday. Willie and I arrived at our favorite San Jose spot just as Lukas Wenger and his wife pulled up. Jave arrived shortly after and we set off to find "the cracks". I decided I wanted setup near some still water that I had found, knowing that I could shoot east or west from here and still include both cracks and reflection in the water. Turns out the sky in the east did nothing but man… the sky in the west!!! Wilson Ng and Matt Levine showed up just as the sunset started to get good. There weren't any of those high, thin, textured clouds that we photographers normally like. Instead, the entire sky just LIT up. Lit up is probably the wrong term -- it EXPLODED with color! Rain started to fall in the west and the rain clouds started turning yellow, orange, and pink! We stood there hooting and hollering at how beautiful the sky looked. Man was that a beautiful night! For anyone who wants to find this spot, I offer you a warning: Despite knowing the safety issues here, I pulled "a Willie" tonight. Our first time here Willie got stuck in the mud and had to be rescued by another friend. Knowing this, I am normally very careful and test each step before I put any weight down. At one point during this sunset I started walking around trying to find other compositions. As I walked around this little pond of water I started to see the entire pond just GLOW with beautiful red and orange colors; I wanted to get closer. I was so excited that I started to run. I took about 2 steps and realized I was stuck … knee deep in the thick, gross mud. I was able to get myself out but it could have easily been much worse for me. If you find this place, be extremely careful that you do NOT get stuck! Seriously -- even when I knew about, I still got stuck! Cleaning up the mud was not fun, took a long time, and smells horrible! Nikon D800 w/Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8 ED-IF AF-S: 17mm, f/18, 3 sec, ISO 80 Lee Filter Holder + HiTech 0.6 ND Grad
