Robert H Clark Photography Blog

National Parks

The Far Country – White Sands National Monument, New Mexico

Apr 262013

Storm clouds clear over the rippled dunes of White Sands National Monument.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. This is another image from my recent trip to White Sands National Monument. I made many images on this trip but this one continues to standout for me and represents the kind of photograph I visualized making, even before arriving. I have made three trips to White Sands and each one allowed me to gain a better understanding of the light and compositions that were possible. In my minds eye I wanted to shoot this grand scene. I wanted to express the leading lines of dune edge and ripples as they merged, then melted away, in the far horizon. But I needed the right light, the right composition, and the clouds to bring all this together.

The “choice of the moment” was an important consideration. Just minutes before this shot clouds blocked the light. And just seconds after the final exposures were made the sun was once again obscured. Timing is truly everything and on this day I got it right. Though this image is made up of only two exposures, essentially focus brackets for extended depth of field, I made nearly 20 shots to get it. I did not wait for the moment but anticipated what might happen by watching the movement of the clouds relative to the sun and shooting through this. I set my focus brackets and shot before the sun emerged. This gave me the advantage on knowing what I needed to do when, and if, the lights came on. And when they did I was ready. Everything came together for the briefest of moments to capture 6 frames of the decisive moment. This timing takes some practice. It is a process of slowing down, oddly enough, to watch the events in the landscape unfold. I don’t always get this right and it remains a mindful practice for me. Sometimes the difference between a good image and a great one is fractions of a second. Being ready and able to anticipate, or envision the shot, will often lead you to a wonderful result.

Camera Settings: Nikon D800E and a Tokina 16-28mm, f2.8 lens at 22mm. Image exposed at ISO 50 at f11 for 1/250 seconds. This is a two shot, focus bracketed image processed in LR 4.4 and finished in PS 5.5

Thanks for stopping by today.
Bob

In the Grip of the Wind – White Sands National Monument, New Mexico

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Apr 192013

Wind blown sand mixes with passing clouds over the gypsum dunes of White Sands National Monument, New Mexico.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. Alright, I am going to make a very generalized statement here; “I hate wind”. There I have said it. As a landscape photographer I really do like stillness. After all the wind creates blurry leaves, moving grass, blowing dust, and everything else that can seemingly ruin a shooting outing. And then there is effect the wind has on the temperature. A cold wind is certainly miserable and a hot wind no better. Yes, I do not like the wind. But guess what folks. Mother Nature sent me a note recently and said get over it. “I am going to blow and you might as well get used to it”.

I have been know to pack up my cameras instead of facing the opportunities that wind offers. The wind has tried my patience on so many occasions, rendering me a sulking and unhappy photographer. To quote Catherine the Great, “A great wind is blowing, and that gives you either imagination or a headache”. I typically suffer from the latter condition. I am working through this though because it really is my issue. The wind just does what the wind does. It comes and goes, and it blows. Its natural and necessary. The wind is kind of like Mother Nature’s maintenance cycle. She blows in a few storms to bring rain, spreads a few seeds around, and slowly changes the landscape. Nowhere is this more evident than in sand dunes. More so than water, the wind is the force that moves them. Slowly over time, grain by grain, sand dunes move.

Today’s image was made out in the Western Dune Fields of White Sands National Monument. The dunes in this area are immense and generally free of plant life except in the inter-dune zones. I ventured into this area in a windstorm. I faced my demons and marched into the fray. The wind was blowing with an intensity I have not experienced in quite a while. Quite honestly it was really howling with sustained winds of 30 mph and gusts to 50. Out here, alone, I saw geology at work. Whipped by the winds frenzy, the fine gypsum particles were gathered up and blown skyward. Ripples formed, reformed, and moved before my eyes. Sand blew off the edges and my footprints disappeared in a matter of minutes. The dunes were literally moving, and I was moving with them.

Shooting in the wind does present a few challenges. Camera motion and stability is the first one. For this image I jammed my tripod legs into the sand for anchoring support. After establishing the exposures and brackets I wanted I positioned my body as a wind-stop, or airfoil. And then I practiced my patience. Yep, you heard that right. Patience. When shooting in the wind you have to slow down. I would wait for the cycles and lulls between the big blows and fire the shutter. This was made all the more challenging as I was shooting focus brackets along with exposure brackets. I stood just back of the edge and framed this shot to capture the patterns of ripples and the subtle sweeping line of the dune as it moved towards the horizon. Shooting nearly into the sun I caught the rising sand backlit against the advancing clouds. There is both a sharp clarity to this image and a softness. All of this was merged together by the conditions and tendered by the wind. My new friend.

Thanks for stopping by today.
Bob

The Big Room – Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico

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Mar 312013

The Big Room, Carlsbad Caverns National Park, New Mexico

Hi everyone. Well it certainly has been a little while since I have posted a new image. I have been busy with several other projects including a complete revamp of my website which you can see here: roberthclarkphotography.com. I have been shooting new work and only now have I been able to start processing some of these files. So here is a new image from my recent trip to Carlsbad Caverns. This was shot in the caves “Big Room” looking up towards a series of hoodoo like speleothems. Most of the large ones you see in this image are flow stones created from dripping water sources in the cave. It has taken thousands of years for these cave structures to form. I realize that the scale here will be hard to grasp but the distance to the far formations is well over 100 yards which may help in understanding the enormous size of this room.

In all honesty I found this one of the most difficult places to photograph. The lighting within the cave is artificial, complicated, and somewhat omni directional. I had to work pretty hard to create images that “made sense” in terms of how the light fell upon the formations. As I mentioned briefly in the opening paragraph, the sense of scale, or the lack of it also creates some issues. So in composing this image I wanted to feature the large formation but use the well lit speleothem in the right background to add a sense of light and draw the eye towards the large room beyond my position.

The color of the various light sources also created some challenges. I experimented quite a bit with white balance settings in an attempt to adjust for the “wacked out” colors that the camera sensor was picking up. It was all to know avail and in the end I made the decision to process most of the images in black and white. This actually worked out quite well and the lack of color puts more emphasis on the forms and compositions.

This is a three bracket exposure with the files blended in LR 4.2 using Lightroom Enfuse. The blended file was finished in PS 5.5. The file received some extensive contrast curves and dodging and burning.
Nikon D800E and a Tokina 16-28mm, f2.8 lens at 16mm. 3 Image Bracket at ISO 100 at f16 for 8.0 seconds, 15.0 seconds, and 60 seconds.

Thanks for stopping by today.
Bob

Bryce Canyon Sunrise – Bryce Canyon National Park, UT

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Oct 282012

Bryce Canyon Sunrise • Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah.

Hi everyone and welcome to todays post. I know it has been a little while since my last post but it has been a whirlwind of a fall that has included the installation of my first one-man show at the City Meat Gallery in Winchester, Virginia, a major shooting trip to Utah, and a trip to Photo Plus Expo in New York. I am just now able to slow down and start looking at some of the files from my recent shoots. Todays image was shot in Bryce CanyonNational Park in Utah and was shot at dawn just below the canyon rim along the Navajo Trail. I found this “hoodoo wall” while scouting a potential morning shot for Thor’s Hammer, one of the more iconic hoodoos in Bryce. I made a mental note of the forms but at the time did not think too much of the shots potential. It was only while checking the rising sun angles with the Photographers Ephemeris on my iPhone that I realized I could capture the rising sun through the window openings in the wall. Scouting and pre-visualizing a shot is an important part of the photographic process. This is especially true when you need to arrive very early, before the sun rises, to set up the shot. As a general rule I like to be on-site and in place at least an hour before sunrise. This gives me time to get into position and an opportunity to watch the “lights come on”. I will always be enthralled by this phenomenon. In the darkness the landscape is seemingly a place of quiet shadows. It can be an eery time as well with thoughts of things that go bump in the night. But as the earth rotates into astronomical twilight, approximately an hour before sunrise, the eastern horizon begins to glow with the promise of a new day. By the arrival of civil twilight the landscape begins to glow with reflected light bouncing from the sky and clouds. Light at this time is generally even and shadowless allowing the forms of the landscape to be revealed. It is my favorite time to shoot.

On the next morning I made a few twilight exposures of Thor’s Hammer and then raced up the trail to set up my camera on the largest window in the hoodoo. I marked the brightest point along the horizon, the point where I thought the sun would rise, and made sure it was visible through the window. I made a few test exposures for the composition and then waited for the sun to rise. It came right on time and light burst through the hoodoos window. In order to get the starburst effect I stopped the camera down to f22. The smaller aperture focuses the light and creates the star. Additionally I wanted to make sure the sun was partially blocked by a piece of the hoodoo which aids in creating the effect and helps to eliminate a lot of the potential flare. I did have a little bit of correctable flare however since I was using my Tokina 16-28 which has a pronounced front lens element. The intense color evident on the hoodoo came from reflected light off the canyon wall just behind my camera position. The RAW file was processed in LR4.2 and finished in PS5.1

Camera: Nikon D800E | Lens: Tokina 16-28mm, f2.8 at 20mm | Exposure: ISO 100 at 1/15th of a second at f22

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

“Fire on the Flats” – Salt Creek Flats, Death Valley National Park, CA

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Jul 222012

Fire on the Flats • Salt Creek Flats, Death Valley National Park, CA

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. Today I am bringing you a little color and a little intensity. The image was shot on the Salt Creek Flats, a large expansive playa of heat tortured earth. Here in the summer the temperatures can reach well over 115 degrees. The heat leaches the salt and minerals from the soil which leaves the earth with a myriad of patterns, salt circles, ruptured soil, and the occasional pool of water. In the winter, when this shot was made, the temperature is more moderate and in fact very pleasant. Alec John, Travis Bechtel, and I spent several days exploring and shooting in the flats. It is a habit we have to shoot and scout locations multiple times in order to get to know the conditions and find interesting compositions. This was made on the evening of our second visit to this area. We had experienced amazing clouds through out the day and geared up for a potential “special event” for sunset. We were not disappointed. The clouds thinned along the western horizon and cleared the way for the sun to really light up the clouds moving in from the east. A large amorphous dragon-like cloud began to spread out over the playa and I began to look for a location to pick up a nice foreground and some water to capture the intense reflections of t he cloud. I found this beautiful round pool rimmed by puckered soil and a rime of salt. I began to shoot as the color started to happen. The intensity built till it looked as if the entire cloud was on fire. About fifteen minutes later it was all over as the flats entered the twilight zone of darkness.

How I Made the Shot: As a matter of photographic practice I often use a series of graduated split neutral density filters in my work. The filters allow me to balance the exposure in high contrast scenes such as this shot. Here the sky was well over 4 stops brighter than the foreground. So a split would allow me to expose for the foreground and hold back the sky creating a balance exposure. But on this trip I was experimenting without using filters. To capture the full range of light I made bracketed exposures-usually 5 stops but sometime 7, in the following increments: -2/-1/0/+1/+2 or -3/-2/-1/0/+1/+2/+3. In this way I was assured of having the data I needed to make blended exposures in Photoshop. I have found on recent shoots that I prefer this method as I not so intent on fumbling with the filters and instead looking at the light and watching it unfold. I can set the bracket sets on the camera and freely shoot. Back in the digital darkroom I can process the RAW files and bring them into Photoshop for blending. In this case I only needed two RAW files, one for the sky and one for the foreground, to make the final master.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

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Folds in the Earth – Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park, Ca.

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Jul 012012

Folds in the Earth • Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park, Ca.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. Zabriskie Point in Death Valley National Park might be one of the most photographed iconographic locations in the United States. The reasons for this a pretty simple; access. Just a quick jaunt up the path to the overlook and you are looking at one of the most incredible scenes in the American landscape. Like multi-colored neapolitan ice cream sinuous folds of earth rise and fall, spreading outwards to the Red Wall and Manly Beacon. To get a sense of the place please take at look at one of my past posts here: http://roberthclarkphotographyblog.com/2012/06/02/twilight-at-zabriskie-point-death-valley-national-park-ca/.

Sometimes when faced with such a grand landscape, or a landscape that has been oft photographed, you can get a different perspective by focusing on a part of the overall scene. By isolating the scene and cutting out most of the overall subject it is possible to show a unique view of a place. An effective way to do this is to use a telephoto to change the focal length of the shot. Dial in the shot, move back, change shooting positions, watch the light, look for interesting patterns, shapes, and colors. All of these methods are ways to get more creative and come away with more than the standard shot. For this scene I used a 70-200mm lens to create an image to compress the folds of earth that lead up to the Zabriskie Overlook. Beautiful late afternoon light was high-lighting the folds and created an interesting rhythm in the landscape. The light was pretty soft, tempered by some high clouds, as if the landscape was illuminated by a giant softbox. This revealed the beautiful highlights and kept the shadows open as well.

Of course I did shoot the classic shot. Who can resist when presented with such a fantastic landscape. But the next time you go make sure to try some alternative shots. Get creative. You never know what you might come back with.

Thanks for stopping by.

Bob

Liquid Light No. 3 – Salt Creek Flats, Death Valley National Park, Ca.

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Jun 162012

"Liquid Light No. 3" • Salt Creek Flats, Death Valley National Park, Ca.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. This shot was made on a winter trip to Death Valley with my shooting pals Alec Johnson and Travis Bechtel. The trip was singularly marked by some of the most amazing weather I have ever experienced on a trip. Amazing clouds, light, and color greeted our eager eyes every morning and evening. As a matter of practice for this trip we opted to focus our shooting time for the week on just a few areas. For most photographers Death Valley can impart upon you the “kid in the candy store” syndrome. The desire to hit every spot or slam on the brakes to scout all the interesting landforms is certainly understandable. But in my experience it leads to a kind shooting madness without focus and direction. The best way to experience big places is to reduce the macro scale of the landscape to the micro. Micro in this case, at least for the way I think, is a search for intimacy within the grandness. It takes some discipline but the end results are better. Except for a side trip to the Alabama Hills we concentrated our shooting to Badwater Basin, Zabriskie Point, and the Salt Creek Flats. We revisited each of these places more than once exploring morning and evening light. Make no mistake these landscapes are grand and vast, macro in every sense of the word, spreading for mile after mile as far as the eye can see. We were able to reduce the macro to the micro because we stopped and simply spent time there. We were not there to “get THE shot”, rush back to the car, and move on to something else. If you do this you will open up to the landscape and it will open up to you.

I saw these crusty upheavals several days before and became fascinated with their architecture. Why here? What forces of time and temperature converged to lift them above the white salt flats. Like small islands they seemed to float on a white tide, separate but yet anchored by their own roots into the soil. On this incredible evening I found myself back at the formations and a composition that had yet eluded me came to fruition. Stretching overhead, tendrils of sunlit fire draped the sky in a curtain of red, orange, and magenta. The Panamint Mountains were shrouded in the cool blue tones of twilight, their size dwarfed by the immense cloud formation moving overhead. The white salt glowed in the dying light. All of this became the perfect backdrop for the “crusty islands”. Here I could reveal something intimate about the landscape and layer it into a story about the place. Micro in this case meets macro.

Technical Details: This image is a composite of three separate exposures. Each exposure was processed in Adobe Lightroom 4.0 and then exported to Adobe Photoshop where the exposures were hand blended into a starting file. From there it followed a workflow that included Smart Sharpening, Luminosity Curve Adjustments, Selective Color Layers, and Dodging and Burning.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

Twilight at Zabriskie Point – Death Valley National Park, Ca

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Jun 022012

Twilight at Zabriskie Point • Death Valley National Park, Ca.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. I am trying to work my way back into a more regular posting schedule. We shall see. With a recent high school graduate, and the preparations for sending her off to her first year of college, I am finding my time limited these days. But it is all good. These times only come around once and I am enjoying all the activity.

Today’s post is from a winter trip I made to Death Valley with two of my shooting pals, Alec Johnson and Travis Bechtel. It was a fabulous trip with incredible camaraderie, great light, and beautiful landscapes. This image was shot at Zabriskie Point and features Manly Beacon, nearly in the center of the shot, and the Red Wall. I never get tired of this view. It has been photographed a zillion times but it remains one of the most breath-taking vistas anywhere. From my vantage point the landforms fall away into a series of folded textures with high points separated by twisting arroyos. Beautiful tones of yellow, pink, orange, brown, blue, and rose coarse through forms and reminded me of a multi-colored batch of Neapolitan ice cream. One of the special characteristics of Zabriskie Point is how the colors change in the light. In the twilight hours the colors can change from warm to cool hues and are often accentuated by the tones in the clouds. On this evening magenta and blue in the sky brought a slight cool hue to the landforms. Far across the valley the Panamint Mountains are kissed with the last rays of the setting sun turning the peaks a soft pink. There was no wind, only a silence that comes from complete solitude. Shooting beside my friends made this a special evening. We did not talk. We shot, observed the changing light, watched the clouds, and basked in the grace of just being there.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

Storm Light over the North Rim – Grand Canyon National Park, Az.

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May 132012

Storm Light over the North Rim • Grand Canyon National Park, Az.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. I am still embroiled in the day to day activities of my daughters last few weeks in high school. Time is really rolling now and the days are seemingly compressed with so much to do. To get away I returned to some recent files from a winter trip to the Grand Canyon. Time here does not roll at a frenetic pace. Or so I thought. I have long thought the canyon was the “energy” center of the earth. I feel so much power here and I tend to slow my movements and thoughts. I have never tired of the far-ranging views or the labyrinthine forms of the inner canyon. It has always been this way for me.

On this trip I was treated to several days of incredible light and atmospheric conditions. Storm clouds rolled over the canyon dropping snow on the North Rim. From the South Rim it was like watching a movie where natural forces collided. The relative stability of the buttes and rock formations seemed under assault as wind driven clouds dropped tendrils into the canyon, bent on covering the world with a foggy mist. Even the sun joined the fight seeking to break the hold of the clouds. So even here in a place of timeless evolution the pace can seem to quicken. My heart raced as I alternately watched the drama and composed the images in my camera. After hundreds of shots I just went on a sensory overload.

When I look at this image today I can still feel the natural power of that day. Standing alone on a finger of rock I was embraced by the changing opera of nature. Life goes on and we simply have to let it play out. These are hard words that I find difficult to live by right now. My child is growing up and I can no more hold on to her as to try and keep the winds at bay. Hard as it is to except, life goes on. It has always been this way.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Walk in Peace

Bob

Mar 102012

Twilight over the Sinking Ship • Grand Canyon National Park, AZ.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. Just a short post today featuring a recent image from a February trip to the South of the Grand Canyon. I was there for some NPS work but got out for a little photography in between meetings and surveys. To say I had some incredible weather would be an understatement. I have been to the canyon many times but I have never had the sustained atmospheric conditions I witnessed on this trip. On successive days clouds rolled over the canyon creating dynamic and dramatic light. Clouds passed over the buttes and also dropped into below the rim to drift in and out of the formations. In the evening the clouds moved up allowing beautiful twilight shooting conditions.

This image was shot at one of my “secret”, favorite shooting locations along the South Rim. A short little off-trail scramble brings you to a series of rocky ledges that affords eastern and western views within the canyon. Looking east you can see the giant mass of Coronado Butte, and west affords incredible views of the Sinking Ship formation, aptly named as it appears to be an ocean liner sinking into the water. This image of the Sinking Ship was shot about 10 minutes into civil twilight. The clouds had begun to lift and some subtle re-lighting illuminated the foreground rocks and large buttress to the right. I used these elements to frame the vista to the Sinking Ship.

Technical Details: This image is a composite of two exposures, one for the sky and one for the foreground. The two files were processed in Lightroom and opened as layers in Photoshop. The two files were hand blended using a luminosity layer mask before completing the usual contrast and color layers I typically employ.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

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