Death Valley Abstracts

I got back late last night (my flight landed just before midnight) from my Death Valley Photography Workshop. It took me much of today (once I woke up) to get all my images downloaded from the cards and my Nikon Coolwalker storage device. I shot 1342 images over the week. But this is nothing compared to the number of images that some of my fellow workshop participants shot. Of course we shot the amazing landscapes of Death Valley but our leaders, John and Dan, encouraged us to shoot "outside the box" and work on abstract techniques. Here are a few images that were my attempts at shooting outside the box:

This is a shot of the Bottle House located in the ghost town of Rhyolite. I think that this may have been my break through abstract shot of the trip. John was so happy to see me turn my camera "wakerjaw" to get a different angle on the outside wall of the Bottle House.



These next three images were shot at Artist's Palette, a stop on Artist's Drive. Once the sun starts setting on this location, the pastel colors of the cliffs come alive. The first is a normal shot of the cliffs. The second and third are shots in which used I the panning technique. This technique is accomplished by shooting a long exposure and panning (or moving your camera) while depressing the shutter. You can pan in a straight line (as many people do) or you can pan in a curve. With my current tripod set up, I had better control with the curvy method. I had been practicing panning shots for several days before I got these. I finally felt that I had done a good job on this tricky technique. But as I learned from my fellow workshop participants, you can shoot hundreds of these things and only get a handful that you are pleased with. So ... practice, practice, practice.









I will continue to process more of my 1300+ shots over the next days, weeks, months ... and post them every couple of days.