Purple Dawn at Alstrom Point

Purple Dawn. Alstrom Point. April 9 2014.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 16mm, f/5.6, 30s, ISO 100.

I found this image hiding in my library. It is from a trip with photographer friends that I did in 2014 to Bisti Badlands, Alstrom Point, and White Pocket. On my way back I swung by Bryce Canyon and Calf Creek Falls. The above image had been lurking in my Lightroom catalog for quite a while, me not realizing the potential of the image. I think I now actually like it as one of the best images from that sunrise. This is a while before sunrise as you can see from the stars still being visible but a purple glow was on the clouds already and a yellow glow started at the horizon announcing the coming sunrise. If you want to see more pictures, here is an earlier blog post on this place.

Star trails at Ice Lakes Basin

Back in July, I spent a night up at Ice Lakes Basin in the San Juan mountains and I created the below star trails image

From here to eternity. Ice Lakes Basin, San Juan Mountains.
composite of 360 images, Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at f/5.6, 15 s, ISO 1600

The individual images were shot 15 seconds exposure and with a 1 second delay between each other. Then I composited all the frames in Photoshop in lighten blend mode and removed hot pixels and airplane traces from individual frames. I also created the below video from these frames. On youtube you can see this in full 4k resolution.
An interesting backstory here is that I had planned to get the milky way rising over the mountain in the middle but had not checked my astronomy app careful enough as it turned out to be a nearly full moon night! A little bit of moonlight is OK but this was too much to see the milky way. It did nicely light up the entire valley though.

The many faces of Alstrom Point

My trip to the Southwest last April with a group of friends had three planned destinations. The Bisti Badlands/De-Na-Zin Wilderness, Alstrom Point and the White Pocket. I have pretty much gone through the Bisti Badlands images and posted those on my website except for a few that I am still working on. The Alstrom Point images are halfway done. For the White Pocket, I have a lot of work to do. I only posted two black and whites and the real stunners are still to come. This post is mostly about the Alstrom Point images. Alstrom Point is reached after a long drive over a dirt road and some four wheeling over a little slick rock. The location is a stunner though. You look out over Lake Powell and Gunsight Butte. We spent a single night there but even then it was amazing to see the different phases the view went through. I shot many different perspectives but the classical view is still what stood out. As always, click for bigger and for prints.

First sunset

Sunsight on gunsight butte.
Nikon D600. Nikon 24-85mm at 24mm, f/16, 1/25s, ISO 100. Grad ND filter.

The moon was out most of the night and very brightly illuminated the lake and rocks. The bright "star" in the middle is the planet Mars.

Moonlight illuminates Gunsight Butte and Lake Powell
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 16mm, f/2.8, 15s, ISO 1600.

The moonlight was so bright that it was easy to photograph the surroundings. I put my headlamp in my tent to obtain this:

moonlight lights the desert near Alstrom point.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 16mm, f/2.8, 15s, ISO 1600.

Close to sunrise, the milky way had come out very brightly and we had a lot of fun shooting images of it. I created two views - one vertical and one horizontal, by combining two exposures. One for the stars and one much longer for the foreground. You can already see the sunrise light starting to pour over. The bright star is the planet Venus in this case.

Milky Way and planet Venus rising over Gunsight Butte and Lake Powell
Nikon D600. Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 16mm, f/2.8, ISO 1600, Two exposures at 15s and 246s.

I also created a horizontal version:

Milky Way and planet Venus rising over Gunsight Butte and Lake Powell horizontal.
Nikon D600. Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 16mm, f/2.8, ISO 1600, Two exposures at 15s and 221s.

Close to sunrise, the glow started to drown out the stars but the pinks were coming out in force.

Swoop.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 16mm, f/11, 1/6s, ISO 100.

I also created some panoramics of which this is my favorite. It really should be seen much bigger in the link.

The grey before dawn.
stitched from 4 images from Nikon D600, Nikon 24-85mm at 24mm, f/11, 1/6s, ISO 100

Closer to sunrise, the glow turned red and orange:

Almost.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 20mm, f/11, 1/20s, ISO 100.

And finally the sun peeked over and gave a nice sunstar:
The moment.
Nikon D600, Tokina 16-28mm f/2.8 at 19mm, f/22, 1/20s, ISO 100.

Again, enjoy these images bigger in the links behind the images.

The Polar Vortex - Star Wings

When I was at the Bisti Badlands/De-Na-Zin Wilderness this April, we decided to leave our cameras for star trail images. The location we chose was the Wings, which is an amazing formation. We set up our cameras each in our own way. I chose a horizontal composition with the pole star being pointed at by one of the Wings. My reasoning for a horizontal image was that I could also turn it into a time lapse. I shot 30 seconds exposures on the built-in interval timer in the camera. I used my Tokina 16-28 mm lens at 16 mm, f/5.6 (to get more of the wings in focus) and ISO 1600. The battery lasted for a little over three hours. We left the cameras and hiked back to the cars to have dinner and returned for the cameras. These were extremely difficult to find as in the mean time the moon had set and this place is a complete maze. Finally with some help of a GPS waypoint and the red lights on my friends' Canon cameras, we were able to retrieve them. At home the fun started. I combined all 300-some raw images in Photoshop in batches of 10 using the lighten mode. I cloned out all the jet trails, sensor hot pixels, and a few distracting meteor trails. I then took the 30-some remaining images and combined them in Photoshop, again using lighten mode, but now using progressively increasing opacity. This created the comet effect you see below.

Moonlight illuminates The Wings formation and stars form trails at Bisti badlands.
This image is also on Flickr, Facebook, and Google+.

I also created some time-lapse movies using the individual frames. If you click through you can get to the HD versions that use a HTML5 (i.e. tablet and phone friendly) display. You can see a in the lens reflection from the very bright moon move in the frame. This disappeared in the composite image luckily.

And this is the same thing but without the pan and zoom of the previous.

I find it amazing how many planes you can see come by. The music was "composed" by me using Garageband.

Friends under the stars

From Canyonlands

This image was taken on a bike trip along the white rim trail in Canyonlands National Park. This is ISO 200, 11mm, f/2.8 and a 30s exposure. three stop filter lowering the exposure of the bottom half so we can see the milky way at the top. My buddy Craig had built a propane fueled firebox, so that we could have a campfire where we were not allowed to have one. Brought us much attention from the park rangers who could see us from the Island in the sky but didn't realize it was a propane flame instead of a campfire.