Robert H Clark Photography Blog

Bryce Canyon Sunrise – Bryce Canyon National Park, UT

Bryce Canyon National Park, Grand Circle, Landscape, Landscape Photography, National Parks, Photography Technique, Photography Trips, Robert H Clark Photography, sunrise, Twilight Photography, Utah 2 Responses »

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

Last Light in the Alabama Hills, Ca. – A New Image in my Upcoming Show at the City Meat Gallery in Winchester, Va.

Alabama Hills, California, Death Valley, Death Valley National Park, Desert, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Moab Masters, Moab Paper, Mountains, Photography Trips, Robert H Clark Photography, sunset, The Alabama Hills, Twilight Photography No Responses »

Sep 052012

Last Light in the Alabama Hills, Eastern Front of the Sierra Mountains, CA

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. I know some of you have been wondering if I might post again. My apologies but I have been getting ready for a one-man show at the City Meat Gallery in Winchester, Va. I have posted the Press Release for the show below. This is one of the images that will be featured and is a twilight shot taken in the Alabama Hills located along the Eastern Front of the Sierra Mountains in California. This wonderful place is playground of granite boulders that extends for miles above the town of Lone Pine, Ca. I made the trip with two of my shooting pals, Alec Johnson and Travis Bechtel. We had some wonderful light and clouds for the afternoon shoot.

My show will feature 20 images. Each one was developed from its RAW digital state in Lightroom and exported to Photoshop for the final work. All images were printed by myself using archival inks on an Epson 3880 Printer. I want to thank my sponsor MOAB Paper for their generous gift of the MOAB Somerset Museum Rag Paper. I consider this to be one of the finest Rag Content papers to print on. It renders exceptional tonality and depth of color and was the perfect choice for my photographs. If you are in the Winchester area and have the opportunity to stop by I would love to see you. Here is the Press Release for the show:

CITY MEAT GALLERY FIRST FRIDAY ARTIST ROBERT H. CLARK

Winchester, Va. – On Friday, October 5, City Meat Gallery will participate in downtown Winchester’s First Friday Celebration of the Arts with an exhibit by photographer Robert H. Clark.

Robert H. Clark is a fine art landscape photographer based in the United States. Born in North Carolina, he is a graduate of the University of Georgia School of Visual Design, and the School of Architecture at Georgia Institute of Technology. Robert is a photographer, graphic designer, architect, and a teacher. He currently works as a media designer for the National Park Service.

In this exhibition, “Chasing Light,” Robert features his new landscape work from recent trips to the West Virginia highlands, the Navajo lands of Arizona, Death Valley, and the Eastern Front of the Sierra Mountains, California. In these new photographs Robert takes viewers on a journey featuring the high alpine landscape of Dolly Sods Wilderness, the elegant waterfalls of Black Water Falls State Park, the multi-colored canyons of the Navajo Nation, and the intriguing rock formations of the Alabama Hills in California.

Robert’s work can be found in private collections, exhibits and publications, and internationally for corporate clients. The exhibit is open to the public on Friday, October 5, from 6:00–8:00 p.m., and through November 23 by appointment. For more information, visit the City Meat Gallery web site at: www.citymeatgallery.com.

To view Robert Clark’s portfolios or learn more about his photography, visit his web site at: http://roberthclarkphotography.com/.

ABOUT City Meat Gallery
City Meat Gallery is located inside the The City Meat Building, home to Water Street Design, LLC and Reader & Swartz Architects, P.C. Exhibitors are by invitation only. City Meat Gallery participates in up to six First Fridays a year, with openings scheduled for February, April, June, August, October and December.

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

Adobe Lightroom, Adobe Lightroom Workflow, California, Death Valley, Death Valley National Park, Death Valley Photography, Desert, Lightroom, National Parks, Photography Technique, Photography Trips, Reflections, Robert H Clark Photography, Salt Flats, Split Neutral Density Filters, sunset, Water 1 Response »

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

ers allow me to balance

First Light on Bandon Beach – Oregon Coastline, Oregon

Bandon Beach, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Oregon, Oregon Coast, Pacific Ocean, Photography Technique, Photography Trips, Reflections, Robert H Clark Photography, sunrise, Twilight Photography No Responses »

Jul 122012

First Light on Bandon Beach • Oregon Coastline, Oregon

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. This image of complete calm and relaxation was taken at Bandon Beach along the Oregon Coastline. Bandon is a frequent stop over for many photographers because of the beautiful wide beaches and wonderful sea stacks. But the light here can also be amazing. To be quite honest I was hoping for some clouds with open horizons so I could shoot for color and reflections in the left over pools of water. But alas that was not to be. But in the landscape photographers world we have to take what Mother Nature gives us and feel blessed to be in such a beautiful location.

What I got when I arrived was a massive amount of wind. It was really blowing a gale and it made my afternoon scouting trip a little difficult. If this continued the evening shoot would not go well. While back at the hotel the clerk assured me the daily pattern had been calm in the mornings, lots of wind during the day, and calmer by the early evening. So I took him at his word. After all if you want to know the weather it pays to go to the local sources. The evening shoot went off without a hitch and I awoke in the early morning to some very calm conditions. This image was made just before the sun broke the horizon. Fog particulates over the ocean glowed with the yellow tones of the sun and the beach reflected the blue light of the morning sky. This formation is known as the Witches Hat though its shape is not quite as evident from my shooting location. To frame the shot I positioned the Witches Hat in the left third of the frame and used a strong leading line of water to help bring the eye into the shot. The image was made from one exposure and processed in Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Bob

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

Badwater, California, Death Valley, Death Valley National Park, Death Valley Photography, Desert, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Mountains, National Parks, Photography Trips, sunset, Twilight Photography 2 Responses »

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

The Witches Hat – Bandon Beach, Oregon

Coastal Photography, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Oregon, Oregon Coast, Pacific Ocean, Photography Trips, sunset, Twilight Photography 4 Responses »

May 082012

The Witches Hat • Bandon Beach, Oregon

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. I freely admit that I have been absent from my usual, and consistent, blog posts. Several things in my schedule have conspired to keep from my regular postings. Some of you know that as a side activity I coach pole vault at our local high school. For the past four years I have had the pleasure to coach my daughter in this difficult event and this is now her senior year. The time I have been able to spend with her is priceless and in this last year I have concentrated most of my time to get her to the state meet. I am sure most you will understand the importance of this commitment. On top of all this is the planning and details for her graduation, prom, senior trip, preparing for college in the fall, and, well the list goes on. It is just a busy time and I am wearing many hats as the summer approaches. I have also been hard at photography for quite some time and quite frankly I needed a small break and an opportunity to recharge my batteries. As they say “to much of a good thing…..”

So for this post please enjoy a twilight shot of the Witches Hat from Bandon Beach. The shot represents the many hats I am wearing right now. I do have several photography trips lined up for the early summer including a return trip to White Sands and a visit to Carlsbad Caverns. I am really excited to visit Carlsbad as I will be able to see the twilight exodus of the Brazilian Free-Tail Bats. It promises to be a unique experience.

I hope all of you are well and I appreciate your visits to the site.

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

Clearing Storm over the North Rim • Grand Canyon National Park, AZ

Arizona, Desert, Grand Canyon National Park, Grand Canyon Photography, Grand Circle, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Mountains, National Parks, Photography Trips, Robert H Clark Photography, sunrise, Twilight Photography, Winter 5 Responses »

Jan 292012

Clearing Storm over the North Rim, Grand Canyon National Park

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. As most of you know who follow this blog I have been away on a combined work/photography trip to the Grand Canyon. I was anticipating a great time with my shooting pal Tony Kuyper. We had compiled a list of places I have not been and was looking forward to bringing back some new images. Alas however that was not to be. Going back nearly a month to my shooting trip to Death Valley I contracted a nagging cough that weeks later was still with me. By the time I arrived at the canyon I was feverish and in quite a fix. I spent most of Sunday in the hotel unable to move and by Monday was in the Grand Canyon Medical Center with several IV’s stuck in my hand. The diagnosis was pneumonia. Needless to say everything was cancelled and I made the flight home two days later. Just to fill in the rest of the story I am on a new antibiotic that is working and I am on the mend.

Despite my condition, on the way out of the canyon to get to the airport at Flagstaff, I still managed to capture a few images. Well let’s just say I was bound and determined to shoot something despite how I felt. Over Monday night it snowed 8″ on the South Rim turning the canyon into a magical sight. Across the way on the North Rim it looked like nature had dropped white sugar sprinkles over the spires and buttes. A layer of clouds had dropped below the rim and was drifting among the canyons formations. As the sun rose and kissed the buttes with light the composition was complete. In this shot you can see the Cheops Pyramid (right), and the Isis Temple (left). Overhead the early morning light turned the clouds a subtle magenta. This was a special sight to see and though I really did not feel well I was bolstered, even if only for a brief period, by the experience. Nature has powerful healing forces. At least it does for me. This image will forever be linked to one of the worst trips I have had. But every time I see this image I will remember it fondly.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

Sunset in the Alabama Hills – Lone Pine, Ca

Adobe Lightroom, Alabama Hills, California, Death Valley, Desert, High Dynamic Range, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Lightroom, Mountains, Photography Technique, Robert H Clark Photography, sunset, The Alabama Hills, Twilight Photography, Wide Angle Photography 1 Response »

Jan 102012

Sunset in the Alabama Hills, Lone Pine, Ca.

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. On my recent trip to Death Valley my intrepid friends Alec Johnson, Travis Bechtel and I were kindly treated to some amazing sunrise and sunset conditions. This is the kind of light and cloud cover you hope to have for at least one shooting session. We had it everyday save for one, and that was the last morning we shot at Zabriske Point. Today’s image defines some of the incredible skies we had during our shooting excursions. The image was made in the Alabama Hills, a collection of rock monoliths and boulder fields, situated above the town of Lone, Pine, Ca. The area is known as the Gateway to Mount Whitney, the highest peak in the lower 48 states. On the trip over from Death Valley we saw the clouds build up and once we dropped into the valley on the eastern side of the Sierra’s we knew we might be in for another treat. Well, we were not disappointed. The show ramped up in the late afternoon and soon went into overload as the sun disappeared behind the massive Sierra Range. For a very brief period of time the light flattened out on the landscape but within 10 minutes into Civil Twilight the scene re-lighted and the rocks glowed with the reflected light from the sky. By this time all of us had spread out to compose and shoot. Even after an afternoon of scouting it was a hectic time as we were scrambling to create memorable images. To give you a sense of scale if you look between the “crab claw” formation you will just make out the silhouette of my buddy Travis. We only had one afternoon to spend here and for all of us it was not enough. But we left invigorated by the experience and the place.

Technical Details: As you might imagine the dynamic range of this scene was pretty intense. To compensate I made a five shot bracket at 1 stop intervals and chose two images from the set to process. The two RAW files, one for the foreground and one for the sky, were processed in Lightroom and combined in Photoshop using a Channel Mask for blending. From there it followed my usual workflow of masks, color corrections, and sharpening.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

Twilight in the Alabama Hills – Lone Pine, CA

California, Desert, Landscape, Landscape Photography, Photography Trips, Robert H Clark Photography, sunset, The Alabama Hills, Twilight Photography, Wide Angle Photography 2 Responses »

Jan 082012

Twilight in the Alabama Hills, Lone Pine, CA

Hi everyone and welcome to today’s post. The image today was shot on my recent trip to Death Valley with good friends and fellow photographers Alec Johnson and Travis Bechtel. We were already several days into our shooting when we decided to make the 90 mile side trip out of Death Valley and over to the Eastern Sierra’s. It is a fantastic landscape of boulders and monolithic fins of stone that sit at the base of Mount Whitney, the tallest peak in the lower 48. Aside from this special distinction the Alabama Hills have also played host to 1oo’s of Hollywood movies seeing the likes of John Wayne, Gary Cooper, Jimmy Stewart, and Gene Autry ride their horses through the landscape.

Our initial plan was to get there to shoot some star trails but we changed this and headed out early enough to do some scouting in the area and shoot twilight. I spent some time shooting at the more iconic location know as the Mobius Arch before moving further up in the hills to look for more interesting features. I was acutely aware of the history of this place and could imagine the “good guys” and “bad guys” hiding among the rocks ready to stage an ambush. As the sun began to set I found this interesting set of monoliths lined up towards the eastern mountains that enclose Death Valley. With the last light just kissing the mountains I captured this image. Twilight soon fell over the scene and and in the encroaching darkness I could here the pounding hoofs of horses and the ricochet of bullets played out in the valley before me.

Technical Details: The image was captured in two exposures, one for the sky and one for the foreground, and blended in Photoshop CS5

Thanks for stopping by today.

Bob

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