Golden Face
Golden Face
Candle Wax
Candle Wax
The Story Behind This Photograph:
Taken at Royce Lake in the John Muir Wilderness, California on July 16, 2017
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Skyline
Skyline
Behind the Scenes of this Photo
Taken at Temple Crag and 2nd Lake in the John Muir Wilderness, California on July 1st, 2016.
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Shepherd’s Pie Surprise
Shepherd’s Pie Surprise
The Story Behind This Photograph:
Taken at Thousand Island Lake in the Ansel Adams Wilderness, California, on June 14th, 2014 while on assignment for the Nikon D750 Camera.
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Magic
Magic
The Story Behind This Photograph:
Taken in Gardiner Basin in Kings Canyon National Park, California, on July 19th, 2018
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Stuck
Stuck
Behind the Scenes of this Photo
Taken at one of the many beautiful lakes in the Gardiner Basin in Kings Canyon National Park on July 20th, 2018.
I almost lost my shoes to the accumulated muck on the bottom of this lake. Kinda like stepping in a six-inch deep layer of snot. I don’t know what that stuff was for sure, but I’m assuming it was made of the decomposing bodies of other photographers who got trapped in it.
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Smoky Spectrum
Smoky Spectrum
Behind the Scenes of this Photo
Taken from near Minaret Vista in Mammoth Lakes, California, on July 9, 2017.
Over the 2016-2017 winter Mammoth Lakes received a large amount of snow, to put it mildly. This meant that many roads in the area, such as the road to the Devil’s Postpile National Monument and Minaret Vista, remained closed long after they typically opened. So on the final morning of a High Sierra photography workshop we roused the participants extra early and began the 45-minute walk from the road closure to the Vista.
We arrived to find a decent amount of snow lingering in hard crusts all over the top of the ridge and ambled around it looking for good vantage points. Despite the huge snowfall and massive quantity of spring runoff wildfires had sprung up in the previous weeks throughout the Sierra and we saw the Long Valley Caldera to the east sitting thick and heavy with smoke. As the sun rose above the Glass Mountains it lit the clouds above a deep crimson and turned the smoky haze in the valley shapes of burnt oranges and yellows. With each ridge closer to us the haze grew less, which allowed the natural colors of the forest to shine through, creating a breathtaking spectrum of colors.
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Barely There
Barely There
Behind the Scenes of this Photo
Taken from somewhere in the Alabama Hills, Eastern Sierra, California on February 17th, 2018.
On a clear weekend in mid February a friend and I camped in a place that is endlessly fascinating, the Alabama Hills. Aside from being one of the oldest and most interesting rock formations in the US, the ‘bama Hills serve as an excellent vantage point to gaze at California’s high peaks. Williamson, Russell, Langley, Le Conte, Lone Pine Peak: these mountains dominate the skyline for dozens of miles in any direction. And of course, you have the tallest of them all, Mt. Whitney. Although Whitney is tucked back in, nestled in its mountain throne, and doesn’t look quite as imposing as the more easterly summits, one only has to zoom in with a telephoto lens to see the magnificence of the peak, along with its two attendant needles.
On this trip I wasn’t really planning to do any serious photography, but after checking with my favorite app, PhotoPills I saw that a tiny crescent moon (4.3% full) would be setting over Mt. Whitney, as seen from one of the dirt roads in the area on February 17th. I thought it would be cool to shoot an extreme telephoto image of the crescent as it sank behind the mountains, and positioned myself to do just that.
But after the sun went down and the sky began to darken the moon’s disc became easily visible. What a gorgeous sight that was: the tiny sliver of sunlit moon blazing like a beacon in the sky, then the paler, more subtle disc making itself visible like a visual aftertaste. Knowing the sky would be pitch black by the time the moon actually sank behind the mountains (meaning I’d lose the silhouette of Whitney), I lined up this wider shot, capturing the crescent moon, the full moon disc, the inky blue sky, the silhouette of the mountains, and even a few of the brightest stars. This is a single shot, no compositing, taken with a Nikon D850 and 200-500mm lens at:
ISO400
f/5.6
2 sec
320 mm
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Chalice
Chalice
The Story Behind This Photograph:
Taken from somewhere along San Joaquin Ridge near the town of Mammoth Lakes, California, on September 6th, 2017
The moon moves surprisingly fast. You’ve probably noticed this a time or two yourself: the moon is sneaking up over the horizon, huge and beautiful and orange. Then before you realize it it’s floating high in the sky in a pool of inky blackness. And when the moon is about to set it seems to go faster still. It’s a blink-and-you-miss-it kind of thing. The other funny thing about how the moon moves through the sky is that it doesn’t go in a straight up-and-down line. Rather, from where I live in Mammoth, it almost seems like the moon traverses a 45° incline: As it drops lower in the sky it appears to move an equal distance to the north. Both of these things make it tricky to position the moon exactly where you want in a photo. In fact, you have to be mobile and agile and be willing to chase the moon a bit in order to sneak it into the perfect position. In this case the moon began to approach this wonderfully craggy notch in the Minaret ridgeline but I could see it wouldn’t quite be positioned perfectly in the slot. So I scooped up my tripod and lens and sprinted northward through the pumice to get in position. As the moon sank toward the notched I continued to fine tune my location as well: 20 feet to the north. No, too far, back 10 feet to the south. Perfect. The moon dropped into the notch and I was able to take this single photo before it slunk out of position again. Luckily my efforts paid off and I had managed to time things just right: with the mountain chalice holding the full moon.
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Window to the Sky
Window to the Sky
Behind the Scenes of this Photo
Taken in the Pioneer Basin, John Muir Wilderness, high Sierra Nevada mountains in California on July 11th, 2014
At the tail end of a 5-day backpacking trip through the John Muir Wilderness I woke up to that rarest of Sierra sights: clouds in the sky at morning. After shooting the blazingly colorful sunrise near the shores of the lowest Pioneer Basin lake I was amped up and excited to continue photographing. I wandered up Mono Creek looking for interesting compositions and came across this bend in the stream. A deep, wide pool caused the creek flow to slow down to a snail’s pace, allowing perfect reflections to form in the surface of the water. The clouds overhead diffused the morning sunlight on the landscape and with the help of a GND I was able to capture the painterly light bathing the scene.
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Backlight
Backlight
The Story Behind This Photograph:
Taken at Minaret Vista in Mammoth Lakes, Sierra Nevada, California on September 3rd, 2016
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The Emerald Mirror
The Emerald Mirror
Behind the Scenes of this Photo
Taken at 3rd Lake, North Fork Big Pine Creek, Eastern Sierra, California on July 1st, 2016
On an overnight backpacking trip to Temple Crag I was treated to a fantastically vibrant light show. The crazy pink and purple hues of sunset mingled with the deep turquoise waters of Third Lake to produce nearly a full rainbow of colors.
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Who is Josh?
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