Most memorable images from 2016

1. January 31

Pristine. Sunrise at Dream Lake in Rocky Mountain National Park.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 22mm, F/16, 1/3s, ISO 100.
It's a great idea to look back upon a year and choose one's favorite images. I've been going through my images from this year over the last few weeks and, although the year is not over yet, have come up with some favorites or most memorable images. Some of these are not necessarily the best images but they are images that I am fond of. The image above for example was taken on a solo snowshoe hike in #RMNP Jan 31, 2016 where I encountered deeper snow conditions than I'd ever seen in the park. I was the first person up there with pristine snow everywhere (also unplowed road to the trailhead ;-) ) and it was gorgeous. The sunrise didn't materialize much but I got some good images anyway such as the iconic tree above. I also generated several photosphere panoramas that you can see on Google maps. Be sure to drag your mouse all around as these are fully immersive 360x180 spherical panoramas and they really convey what it is like to be there.

• Here is for example Dream Lake. 
• This is my other favorite tree that you can find somewhat above Lake Emerald.
• This is me at Lake Emerald.
• On the way to Lake Hayiaha.

You can find more images from Dream lake, Emerald Lake and Lake Hayiaha in the links.

2. February 21

A river of rock. Calhan Paint Mines.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 22mm, F/8, 1/15s, ISO 100. Focus stack from 5 images to get everything in pristine focus front to back.
I visited the stunning and fairly unknown Calhan Paint mines that are hidden in a little town-run interpretive park for a sunrise on Feb 21, 2016. Since the last time that I was there 100's of very impressive wind mills were added all around it but luckily the views were not spoiled. This is truly an extraordinary place and well worth a visit if you're ever near Colorado Springs. You can find an immersive panorama that I made the same morning in this link.

3. March 13

Radiance. Matthews/Winters park.
Stitch from 4 images from Nikon 1 J4, 10-30 mm f/3.5-5.6 at 10 mm, f/4, 1/400s, f/4.0
I took this photograph on a short hike with my wife and son over Dakota ridge. I ride this on my bike often and it is a beautiful trail. Here we were hiking back to the trailhead and we came upon this scene with clouds lit by sunset light. I often like struggling trees as you can tell.

4. May 13

Golden Dawn. Chautauqua Park, Boulder open space.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 16mm, F/8, 1/30s, ISO 800. Focus stacked.
I was scouting Chautauqua park on May 13, 2016 for a sunrise photography class I would lead the next morning. This is one of the vantage points I identified there. The flowers are fantastic in spring in this place. The next morning was rain and fog the whole time which made for very different but still very interesting images as you can see next. I also hiked up to the royal arch this morning and made a few immersive panoramas there that can be experienced here and here.

5. May 14

Forest scene. Chautauqua Park, Boulder open space.
Nikon D600, Nikon 24-85 mm f/3.5-4.5 at 72mm, F/8, 1/80s, ISO 450.
I got many images like this the morning of May 14. So different from the day before.

6. June 24

Fairytale Forest. Boulder Brook, Rocky Mountain National Park.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 16mm, F/16, 1s, ISO 100.

This little micro landscape scene can be found along one of my very favorite places in Rocky - Boulder Brook trail. It is reached from the Storm pass trailhead and the nicest parts are hidden from view from the trail but you can easily hear the little waterfalls. In autumn this place gets covered with aspen leaves that make it look like somebody scattered gold coins all around.

7. June 24

Longs glow. Rocky Mountain National Park.
Nikon D600, Nikon 24-85 mm f/3.5-4.5 at 48mm, F/16, 1/3s, ISO 100.
The same day as I shot the small forest scene above I drove up to Forest Canyon overlook along Trail Ridge road and enjoyed sunset as it hit Longs peak. Truly a magnificent end of the day.

8. June 25

The ancient one. Mount Evans.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 18mm, F/16, 1/40s, ISO 100.
This image is from a sunrise on Mount Evans in the Mt. Goliath area. When the sunrise didn't materialize much, I hiked around and followed the trail up the mountain and found this tree being backlit by soft morning light. I made the sun peek through some holes in the tree branches and stopped down to f/16 to cause the sunstar to appear. This lens also has the fascinating property that next to sunstars it will show nice diffraction rainbows that are easily visible if you look at the print and even in this web sized version. You can see this image in the rotunda of the Colorado state capitol building for a few more months.

9. July 16

Ice Lake Dusk. Ice Lakes Basin, San Juan Mountains, Colorado.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 18mm, F/16, 20s, ISO 100.
This image was taken on a night I spent in Ice Lakes Basin near Silverton. This is a stunningly beautiful place with seas of wildflowers, gorgeous glacially fed lakes, and rugged peaks. I was here to photograph star trails as you can see in this image. I like this image a bit better than the star trails image due to the streakiness of the clouds. If you look carefully you will spot a yellow tent on the shelf on the right. I made a time lapse of the individual images in the star trails image but I haven't shared this anywhere yet.

10. September 30

Ephemeral Glow. Bierstadt Moraine, Rocky Mountain National Park.
Nikon D600, Nikon 24-85 mm f/3.5-4.5 at 34mm, F/11, 1/40s, ISO 400.
This image is from a wonderful fall sunset hike I took with my son up to Lake Bierstadt and back. We hiked up the Moraine which was covered in aspen trees that were in full fall regalia. I took many images but this is one of my favorites for sure. Afterwards we had a great mexican dinner in Estes Park.

11. September 30

Night on the Moraine. Bierstadt Moraine, Rocky Mountain National Park.
Nikon D600, Nikon 24-85 mm f/3.5-4.5 at 24mm, F/8, 30s, ISO 100.
This is from the same fall sunset hike as the previous image. This was way after sunset when we were hiking down. The very long exposure caused the lights from one of the RMNP busses to smear out causing the little S in the center. The dusk light really deepened the color of the fall leaves.

12. October 23

Curving. Chasm Lake, Rocky Mountain National Park.
Stitched from 3 images. Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28 mm f/2.8 at 16mm, F/16, 1/6s, ISO 100.
On October 23 I hiked up to Chasm Lake together with my good friend Jean-David to see the sunrise. We discovered many small patches of ice on the edge of the lake and I used this one as a nice foreground element. The blobs are drops hanging from the bottom of the ice. This was a glorious morning in an amazing place. I also created an immersive panorama that you can experience in this link.

I hope you enjoyed this series of images as much as I enjoyed showing them to you! Happy holidays and a happy new year to all.

hiding images

Some images I found hiding in my library from Summit Lake on Mount Evans.

King's crown. Buy a print.
High resolution composite from 9 shots. Individual shots: Nikon D300. Nikkor 18-55mm at 34 mm, f/16, 5.0s, ISO 200.

Shroud. Buy a print.
High resolution composite from 12 shots. Individual shots: Nikon D300. Nikkor 18-55mm at 35 mm, f/16, 10.0s, ISO 200.

Rocks and reflections in Summit Lake

This was taken a while ago at Summit Lake below Mount Evans. I shot much more the other way too, but right now I just wanted to show this image.


Summit Lake rocks and Mount Warren. Buy a print.
Technical data: Nikon D300, Tokina 11-16mm at 11mm, ISO 200, f/8.0, 30s, circular polarizer.

Same image on flickr.
Google+ post.

Mount Evans/Summit Lake

In recent weeks, I went out twice in the evening up to Mount Evans to do a sunset at Summit Lake. The geography of this place is not right for good Alpenglow, but under the right conditions (as you'll see below) you can get glowing clouds that bathe the entire place in crazy light. I've never seen pictures like this from this place before so this mostly was a gamble on my part. This condition only happened the second time I went there and lasted only a few minutes. It was spectacular nevertheless. I got good shots both times that I really like and I'll share them with you below. Click on them to see them in the gallery. You can also visit a set on flickr.

Blue and yellow

ISO 200, 11mm, f/16, 3.0 secs

Yellow blankets

ISO 200, 16mm, f/16, 4.0 secs, 3 stops hard graduated ND.

King's crown

ISO 200, 11mm, f/16, 25.0 secs, 3 stops hard graduated ND.

This was one of my two favorites from the first evening I went there. The King's crown flowers are deeply red colored (not visible in this scaled down copy, but will be if you order a print as the full resolution of the image will be used. My second favorite was this rock shaped like a bird:


ISO 200, 11mm, f/16, 30.0 secs, 3 stops hard graduated ND.
The shutter is much longer here because it was getting dark very rapidly.

Rolling clouds

ISO 800, 11mm, f/16, 30.0 secs, 3 stops hard graduated ND.
Far after sunset.

The second time I went there as I said, the conditions were right for a glowing sunset. Here is my favorite.

Assembled from 9 images at ISO 200, 35mm, f/16, 0.8 secs, 3 stops hard graduated ND in the top row of shots.
This will print well even wall sized. There is also a panoramic version of this here that I use as a backdrop on my monitor.

This is a detail from the above panorama that I liked.

ISO 200, 35mm, f/16, 0.8 secs

A few minutes later it looked like this:

Assembled from 12 images at ISO 200, 30mm, f/16, 5 secs, 3 stops hard graduated ND in the top row of shots.

This is an image focusing on the reflection you can also see in the above image:

Assembled from 8 images at ISO 200, 30mm, f/16, 5 secs.

All in all this was a very productive two evenings. I have far more interesting shots from this place than I put in the gallery but I did not want to overwhelm you.