doudy draw sunset

I was really hoping for some jaw-droppingly dramatic color in the clouds this particular Friday evening. I had banged-up my arm at work earlier in the week, and by Friday I had a bad case of cabin-fever from not getting out for a few days. So I decided to run over to the Doudy Draw Trail for sunset, and try to get a few shots with one or two trees I’d scoped out when I’d been there before. It’s not a terribly exciting spot, but it’s easily accessible (which I had to take into account because of my arm), and I’ve always liked the stately, barren emptiness of the landscape there… and I figured some Technicolor in the clouds would make for a cool photo.

Well, as you can see, I got a bit of color in the clouds, but nothing anywhere near jaw-droppingly dramatic. Still, I like this shot a lot. I enjoyed the quiet solitude here as I waited for the sun to set.

While I was waiting, I thought about how each day is made up of a rich variety of circumstances—whether I’m at work or at home, at the grocery store or watching a sunset, in a room full of people or driving alone in the car. And each set of circumstances I encounter are like crossroads marked by signposts. Go this way to choose joy, this way to choose discontent. This way to choose hope, this way to choose despair. Go this way to choose love, this way to choose selfishness. This way to choose adventure, this way to play it safe.

The great thing about these crossroads & signposts is that they remind me I have a choice. In a very real way, I can contribute to the creation of each moment. In all the people, events, and circumstances we encounter, the greatest gift we can give the world is to choose our contributions wisely and with integrity… and with a healthy dose of fun and adventure.

Anyway, back to this photograph. I initially found myself very disappointed in the sunset this Friday evening. I had set out wanting to photograph a dramatic sunset. What I was given instead was a moment of subtle beauty and quiet solitude. And so rather than walking away disappointed, I instead chose to enjoy the gift of that moment.

And I think I still got a pretty cool photo out of the whole deal!

Thanks for reading about stuff I’ve photographed. -Rich

meaningful, memorable experiences

Since writing my last post, I’ve felt kind of badly about a comment I made concerning “tourist shots.” I’ve been afraid that comment sounded a bit elitist. I’ve been thinking quite a bit about how the photographs a person takes as they journey through life are all part of the attempt to make a record of meaningful, memorable experiences. And although I may take the photography-part of the equation a little more seriously than the ‘average’ tourist, that doesn’t automatically mean my experience was more meaningful or memorable than, for example, the girl at Delicate Arch taking a picture with the camera on her cell phone, or the person photographing Balanced Rock through their car’s windshield. When they get home and look at their photographs, I’m sure they feel the same thrill as I do when I look at my photos and think, “I was here! I saw this! I did this!”

And just as an aside… Any time you start to feel cocky about the shots you take somewhere, all you need to do to bring yourself back down to earth is make a visit to the gift shop wherever you happen to be. There you’ll find photos, shot by professionals, which make yours look like they were taken by a six-year-old with a disposable camera. But again, that has more to do with the technical-side of the equation (or just being lucky enough to be at a certain spot and capture some exceptional lighting or weather), and not so much to do with having a personal record of a meaningful, memorable experience.

Life is comprised of a series of meaningful, memorable experiences. Experiences of joy & sorrow, pride & disappointment, love & heartache. And while those experiences unfold in a rigid chronological sequence, in our minds & hearts they sort themselves out in quite a different order of importance. None of my photos of my German Shepherd are technical masterpieces, but now that she’s gone, they’re more special to me than anything else I’ve ever shot. And while my photos from my hike up Longs Peak are undeniably rough, they mean more to me than the many other ‘prettier’ shots I’ve taken in Rocky Mountain National Park.

When it’s all said and done, what matters most (at least for us amateur photographers, since we don’t have to make our living with our camera) is the experience, and the thoughts & memories of that experience which are summoned up by our photographs.

Thanks for reading about stuff I’ve photographed. -Rich

arches national park

date of visit: 11/6-8/08

I had been looking forward to my trip to Utah for several reasons: 1) I would be on vacation! Woo-hoo! 2) I had never been to the desert before, & 3) I hoped to have fun getting in some good photography. And I wasn’t disappointed on any of those points. It was nice to be off work, of course. And being there in the desert was an incredible experience. In fact, I was on overwhelm the entire time, because the landscape & environment were so very different than anything I’d previously encountered. And I did enjoy myself immensely as I photographed at some really cool spots during my visit.

Before leaving for Utah, I’d done a bit of research by searching for photos that other folks had shot at Arches National Park. Most were ‘stock’ tourist shots (drive up to viewpoint/parking lot, get out of car & take picture, get back in car and drive on), so I tried to think of some ways I could make my shots stand out a bit from the crowd. Two things I decided to focus on were time of day & foreground interest.

Time of day really has to do with light. The angle/direction of light, and the quality of that light, is so important in photography. That’s why landscape photographers seek to make the most of the ‘magic hours’ at sunrise and sunset. Prior to my trip, I’d looked up the times of sunrise & sunset for the days I would be in Moab. I also found some helpful charts that other photographers had put together, listing the best times (sunrise/early morning, late afternoon/sunset) to get shots of each significant landmark in Arches. With all of this information in hand, plus a map of Arches, I knew precisely what I wanted to shoot & when I wanted to shoot it, even before I left home.

Trying to include some foreground interest is another important consideration in landscape photography. At Arches, your photos will pretty much always be focused on one dominant feature of the landscape (an arch or a unique rock formation), so foreground details will help create a feeling of depth & distance in the image, and add an element of interest to the composition. It was actually pretty difficult finding some interesting foreground to include in my shots at Arches, because there in the desert you’ve basically just got a bunch of rocks & scrawny bushes to work with. But I did what I could. At Arches, sometimes it's actually the background that provides interest, if you get the distant La Sal Mountains in the composition.

The photograph that accompanies this post is a shot of Delicate Arch at sunset. Time of day was important with this shot, since the setting sun bathes the arch in warm red light. You will not get this effect, from this viewpoint, at any other time. And although there’s no foreground interest in the composition (there simply isn’t any to include!), this composition with the La Sal Mountains in the background can only be achieved if you take the trouble to hike up to this spot. You can see Delicate Arch, from a distance, from a viewing area you can drive up to. To get the shot pictured here, however, you have to earn it the old-fashioned way— by making the hike up across the slickrock, up through the sand, up across the ledges, up, up, up… but oh is the view ever worth it!

Thanks for reading about stuff I’ve photographed. -Rich

loch vale hike

date of hike: saturday, 11/1/08

“The land here is like a great book or a great symphony; it invites approaches toward comprehension on many levels, from all directions.” –Edward Abbey

For those who enjoy being outdoors and also love photography, there’s no better place to be than Colorado. At least that’s my humble opinion, after moving here late in 2007. And my favorite place in Colorado to fuel my twin passions for hiking & photography is Rocky Mountain National Park.

My first visit to RMNP was this past June, and since then I’ve made fifteen return visits. (The annual pass I purchased on that first visit was a wise investment!) In those sixteen trips to the park, I’ve hiked over 100 miles & shot many hundreds of photos. No matter how many trips I make to RMNP, I hope I never forget the genuine thrill I felt on my first visit, as I thought “Wow! I’m in Rocky Mountain National Park!!”— and I hope that, despite a growing familiarity, I’ll never become blasé about paying a visit to one of America’s premier national parks.

On this particular visit, my destination was Loch Vale. I had been on hikes up Glacier Gorge on several occasions (as far as Black Lake), but I had never before been up Loch Vale. I lost count of how many times I’d be hiking & photographing in other parts of the park, and someone would ask me, “Say, have you been up to The Loch?” I got really tired of always having to answer, “No.” So before the weather got too bad this year, I decided to go ahead and get this hike under my belt. And now when someone asks me, “Say, have you been up to The Loch?” I can smile and answer, “Yep!”

When I pulled into the Glacier Gorge parking lot about twenty after six on this first Saturday morning in November, there was only one other car in the parking lot. It took me just a few minutes to gather my gear, shoulder my pack, and head up the trail. On most hikes, I’ll have my pack with both cameras, assorted filters & lenses, 32 oz. of water (this varies, depending on the weather & length of the hike), some kind of snack (most often trail mix & an apple), and also my tripod. All told, this adds up to about twenty pounds of stuff I’m lugging along with me! I have a Tamrac Adventure 9 backpack & I’d recommend it without hesitation. It has certainly performed yeoman duty on all my hiking adventures, and even went to the top of Longs Peak with me.

I passed Alberta Falls about twenty minutes into the hike, and ten minutes later (about 7am) it was light enough that I didn’t need my headlamp any longer. At the major trail junction between the Loch Vale & Glacier Gorge Trails, I bore right and headed up into new territory for me. The trail gained elevation pretty steadily, and then- after negotiating a few switchbacks- I found myself at the famed Loch. It’s definitely a location that has the scenic-thing going for it, but I found myself disappointed for two reasons. First, because on the hike up, there had been absolutely no wind at all, and I had harbored high hopes of getting a nice reflection shot once I reached the lake—but once I got up to The Loch the wind was blowing VERY hard. I thought perhaps it’d die once the sun came up (since this has been my experience on other occasions), but it just never let up. My second reason for disappointment was in the lackluster light that accompanied sunrise. With the dawn, there were a few scattered clouds off to the east, but over RMNP there was almost solid cloud cover. This cloud cover was being carried very quickly from west to east, and within a few moments of sunrise it had completely doused any direct light from the sun. As a result, the light was very flat & washed-out, not just at sunrise but on the entire hike. I don’t think I saw my shadow the entire time I was out on this hike. Not so great for photography. I wished the clouds would’ve at least been photographically-interesting ones (big, billowing, stormy ones maybe), but this was just a grim, solid, gun-metal gray cover blanketing the sky.

The photo that accompanies this post is a four-shot HDR panorama. After scouting along the shore of the lake a bit, I settled on this spot because I thought the trees on each side might frame the shot nicely and also provide a bit of foreground interest. I really would’ve liked to wait until the sunlight crept down the peaks quite a bit farther, but this simply wasn’t an option since those darn clouds were racing east to extinguish the dawn’s early light. Moments after I got the shots for this panorama, the direct light was cut off.

All in all, this wasn’t such a great morning for photography, but I did get in a nice hike. AND now I can finally say I’ve been to The Loch!

Thanks for reading about stuff I've photographed. -Rich