Lately I've been addicted to Alpen Glow. That's the light you experience about 15 minutes after the sun drops below the horizon....at anywhere from 12,500-ft to 14,000-ft. This is some serious clean light. Such soft, diffused light; any camera and lens can handle this stuff with ease (with a tripod.) No need for blending, no need for dynamic range adjustments in PP. How about a 6-8 second exposure; good to go.
Shot this one from the ridge south of South Snowdon Peak, in the Crater Lake area. We camped at treeline and had easy access to the 12,700-ft area we needed to shoot. The image is a tight zoom (45mm)of Pigeon Peak, Eolus Massif, the Animas Mountain Massif, and the great Jagged Peak area; most definitely the most rugged area of Colorado.
I lowered the shooting angle to eliminate the massive shadow from the great Animas River Gorge; thus concentrating only on the foreground rocks and the beautiful mountains in the background.
Canon 5d2
Nikon 14-24mm at 18mm, f19.
Single Exposure
Another; more zoom, more light. Light perspective. The light zapping the foreground rocks, rips across the massive Animas River Gorge and lights up the massive Pigeon Peak and Eolus Mountain.
Posted by Howard Cihak on August 10, 2011 at 12:18 AM
Beautiful image, Kane. he lighting is superb.
Posted by Scott Bacon on August 10, 2011 at 8:35 AM
Beautiful! Get me there!!
Posted by Paul Martin on August 10, 2011 at 11:10 AM
Very, very nice, Kane. Despite the nice clouds at sunset (proper), the alpenglow image sings. Can I ask what you used as the color temperature? I can find it tough to balance the blues in the sky and the warmth of the foreground when I try similar shots; I've recently resorted to double-processing the RAW file and combining them later in photoshop.
Fneh. I'm due back to start teaching again, and images like this make me want to keep going with my summer...
Posted by Art Escobado on August 10, 2011 at 4:30 PM
Fantastic Shots!
Posted by Jody Grigg on August 10, 2011 at 6:50 PM
Man are you reading my thoughts.........I am sure you did a better job than I could anyway.
Man I always enjoy these high alpine scenes of yours my friend, and you always compose them so well. I love how you turn a scene that would seem boring to most, into such a great view. Anyhow, I guess what I am saying is that I love #1.
Posted by Dan Walters on August 13, 2011 at 7:24 PM
Kane, thanks for that. Somehow, at 5700K, that seems a lot warmer than what I'm getting at 10,000' to 12,000' in Utah and Wyoming. I don't know if that's a difference in the atmosphere, or I just need to get that little bit higher.
Congratulations on some really good work over the last six months or so!
Discussion
17 repliesShot this one from the ridge south of South Snowdon Peak, in the Crater Lake area. We camped at treeline and had easy access to the 12,700-ft area we needed to shoot. The image is a tight zoom (45mm)of Pigeon Peak, Eolus Massif, the Animas Mountain Massif, and the great Jagged Peak area; most definitely the most rugged area of Colorado.
I lowered the shooting angle to eliminate the massive shadow from the great Animas River Gorge; thus concentrating only on the foreground rocks and the beautiful mountains in the background.
Canon 5d2
Nikon 14-24mm at 18mm, f19.
Single Exposure
Fneh. I'm due back to start teaching again, and images like this make me want to keep going with my summer...
Congratulations on some really good work over the last six months or so!