Tag: hill

Waiting for the Light

Sometimes you chase the light and sometimes you need to wait for it.

By the afternoon of the second day the sky started to clear and I started heading back home. I still wanted to stop by a few places on my way home. One of those places was a large canola field that I saw on my way to Colfax.

In the first day with no sunlight in the first day the canola field looked dull and uninspiring. But with the light and shadow spots moving across it I thought it could be interesting. With a sunlight on it the canola field was bright yellow. The kind of color my son loves because it is warm and happy.

I drove around the field looking for a composition. I could not quite anchor the composition around anything, because there was not anything in the field. And just as I almost gave up I saw and intricate play between light and shadow which shaped up the field into something that was interesting to photograph by itself.

Clouds were moving very fast. By the time I stopped the car, got out of the car, setup tripod, put a camera on tripod the cloud moved on and shadow that was shaping the field was gone.

Sometimes you chase the light and sometimes you need to wait for it (or, to be more accurate, in this case wait for a shadow). The next two hours I’ve spend waiting for another cloud to come in… and here is the photo I was waiting for:

_MG_4437

Keep on Moving

Last weekend I made a short two day trip to the Palouse – an area in Eastern Washington famous for its rolling hills covered with patches of fields. It is very beautiful and photogenic place. Some call it American Toscana.

My first day of the trip in the Palouse was dreadful. Grey solid sky, no light, little color. Just as if it could not get any more discouraging, suddenly the rain started. It was pouring down heavily. Most people would stay home in that weather. Not me. I went on scouting around.

The rain stopped just as suddenly as it started. Heavy clouds and soft light were majestic.

I even caught a glimpse of warm pink glow in the sky from a light of the Sun settling for the night.

Just one small piece of advice: don’t drive dirt roads there when it is wet. The dirt is a fine grain clay that becomes extremely slippery when wet. You’ll lose any control over your car. I am talking about it from experience.

Flower Hill

As I wrote in my previous post (Good Night, Ladybug) there is a hill close to my house that has various wild flowers blooming every year. Here are a couple more photos that I took at that hill recently.

A Tale of Light

Day 6, Dawn

It is my last day in Death Valley, to be more accurate my last morning at Death Valley since after sunrise I will be driving back to Las Vegas and flying home. I can’t wait to hug my wife and son.

On my last morning at Death Valley I decided to photograph at Zabriskie Point. Morning photos from Zabriskie Point has become cliché. I heard stories of tens of photographers showing up there at sunrise. Strangely enough with several trips to Death Valley I’ve never been there. It was about time to change that.

Surprisingly I was the only person there… That’s one hour before sunrise. By sunrise there were 9 photographers and about 15 spectators.

I took several panoramas before, during and after sunrise. The sunrise was not very impressive – there were not much clouds in the sky. Only while reviewing panoramas at home I realized that I created a tale of light of that morning – I was taking a panorama every time there was significant change in light.

So here it is, a tale of light at Zabriskie Point. (Click on the images to see them in larger size.)

6:07 Deep blue of twilight.
Deep blue of twilight

6:21 Sunrise moving across the sky.
Sunrise moving across the sky

6:29 Touchdown. The gap between horizon and line of sunrise closed. The clouds lit up.
Touchdown

6:32 Sun kissed the mountains.
Sun kissed the mountains

7:03 The light is deep in the valley.
The light is deep in the valley

Random Stops

When we go on a photo trip we typically set for ourselves a final destination – a place we plan to spend the most time photographing on a trip. While driving there it is easy to get into “get to the destination” mode. Landscapes pass by largely ignored. They don’t seem to be important or interesting comparing to what waits for us at a destination. It is like I’m in a tunnel with a light at the end being destination of my trip.

On my last trip I decided to break out of the tunnel. As we were passing some hills that appeared to be empty – there were no subject to stop an eye on – we just turned from a highway to a random dirt road just to stop and look around. And it is just amazing how much interesting we found. Hills were covered in tiny flowers and occasionally some large flowers. The dirt road was nicely zigzagging to the top of the hill. There was a tree on the top of the hill. And great view opened up from the top of the hill. We’ve spent quite a while photographing there.

Now I’m wondering if I could do great photographs at any random points along the way? In some sense it is not a great place that I’m going to that helps me to do photography, it is the state of mind that opens up the possibilities. I’m sure going to try to do more random stops on my trips and see what’s around me along my way.

Here is one of the picture made at one of such random stops:

Tree on a Hill