Dream and Emerald Lakes

It's been a while since I've been up to Rocky for sunrise, so I figured I'd go up to Dream and Emerald Lakes since I've never been up there. I was more interested in getting up to Emerald, so I bypassed a great sunrise at Dream with nice calm water.

#1 - Looking east about half way around Dream Lake.

#2 - This is a 21 photo stitch of Emerald. I was limited by my crop sensor and 18mm as my widest angle. So, I decided to get about 180 degrees of my surroundings. I took three horizontal rows of photos, seven across. I know, it was probably a bit much, but I wanted to see what it would do. I need to brighten the foreground in this still. My computer keeps stalling when opening this file, making any edits next to impossible.

Wow, that's a lot of work in #2! I'm not surprised that this photo is choking your computer, since it's probably over a 500MB file. Just think if you tried doing this as HDR, which is probably what it would take to bring out the full photo potential! I have to give you credit for the massive effort, though.

Seems like a lot of work! Nice comp though, even if much of it is in shadows, gives a nice feel for the place. Now that youve been there--you gotta go in Winter, that's the right time to visit those lakes.

Great work on both, Charley.

The first is high drama, and the second has the beautiful light and detail, which means your hard work really paid off.

Charley, these are both phenomenal! Great work on the stitch, but I also really like the stark graphic quality of the first one. Good for you, getting up there for sunrise.

Thanks, all. There was a lack of clouds, so I just started shooting!

Here's what google earth shows from my position yesterday.

I really like the mood of the first one....plus the light reflection on the lake. That is a TON of work on the second one. I like it, but would love to have a link to click and see it big as inteded...the detail is probably awesome!

Wow, that third one is even better!

I really like the graphic quality to #1. Maybe a touch more detail, but the lines are dynamic. The second one is a monster! Your balance in exposures is very well done, as well as your comp.