Summer Memories

Going on a hard drive treasure hunt, I came across this series that I had previously thought was too extreme to even bother working on. The scene: July 14th - I finally met the amazing J.C. Leacock earlier in the day, and then ran across him again while my buddy (and occasional RMNP lurker) Dave Smith and I were out shooting close to sunset. Well, to say that an incredible sunset unfolded before our eyes would be a gross underselling of what happened. It was truly one of the best sunsets I've ever experienced while shooting in the mountains. The three of us were scurrying around looking for comps while things developed, and I hopped in my truck and blasted up the Washington Gulch road in search of some water, ANY water, to reflect what was about to occur. Not the best comp, I know, but I really wanted water!

This is a 3-image Exposure Fusion blend, with some additional shadow/highlight tweaking. I also reduced the red and yellow saturation in the sky. No photo can capture what we actually witnessed, but this is fairly close.

Uh...WOW? Glad you thought to show this one the light of day, simply stunning! I love the way the clouds inversely mimic the water. It goes without saying that the colors are stellar. Weirdly, I have NEVER seen a good much less spectacular sunset while in the mountains.

Yowser!! That is one awesome sky and reflection! Very cool!

That's some serious color! I would have been running around like a chicken with it's head cut off trying to find a comp.

I'm ready for summer already. Great colors.

Now, you really made me jealous! This is some serious stuff.
Joe Rogers

Hi Todd, now it's just down to nitpicking right? The color in the stream & sky is stunning to say the least. The shadows are perfect. I love the band of flowers middle left. My eye is drawn to the upper left of the image, where on my moniter the sky seems a too harsh inbetween the clouds, bordering white-out. For example, when I move my hand and cover the top left side of the image.... this one just blows me away. Can you blend a slightly darker exposure in there? Just a thought.

Kane, I actually cropped off the far left part of the frame for that very reason. The discrepancy in exposure from left to right was so extreme that there was no frame that didn't render the brightest portion of sky -- essentially the sky left of center wherever the clouds aren't -- absolutely white.

Wow! It was certainly worth it to find some water for the reflection. Having witnessed similar colors in the mountains I can easily believe this is an accurate representation to what you witnessed, even if these colors look unbelievable to other people. What I can't believe is that this photo was sitting in your archives for so long.

I have to admit when looking at this I was thinking the same thing as Kane about the bright sky. I can see turning this into a slightly more vertical comp by some additional cropping off of the left side (about 1/5 of the frame, taking off where the water makes it's final curve into the bottom corner on up to the brighter skies above) as a possible solution. However, it is one of those nits only a few photographer types like us would point out and the white sky really doesn't detract from the other wonderful colors of the image.

My eyeballs are burning! That is amazing color, I think it burned the pixels on my monitor.

Wow--id say you did pretty good with the water here, Todd, looks fantastic.

what I want to know is, how do you always manage to be in the right place at the right time.

Law of averages, my friend. The more you're out there, the better your chances.

W-O-W!

Stunning Todd! That red river is mouth-watering! Great choice to find the water!