Death Valley, Badwater Basin Panoramic

Death Valley, Badwater Basin

Been searching my archives for landscape panoramic images to use in an upcoming show and found today's image - Badwater Basin just after sunrise.

Fairly sure this image has crossed my path before, possibly as an iPhone panoramic, but for some reason I just never took the time to stitch the two images together....I read somewhere that a finished piece of art is when imagination and execution correspond and this image certainly fits that description - in this case my execution caught up with my imagination....

Definitely feel a print coming on...

Death Valley, Rhyolite

Rhyolite Ghost Town, Death Valley

Just me having some fun with Silver EFX Pro 2. Who knows, maybe a series will evolve.

Death Valley, Dream

Death Valley Dream

'Only by going alone in silence, without baggage, can one truly get into the heart of the wilderness. All other travel is mere dust and hotels and baggage and chatter'....John Muir

Death Valley

Zabriske Point, Death Valley

I have been trying to print for a show for the past two or three days and it would appear I am completely blocked - nothing looks nor feels right, and, the sound of ripped paper can be heard throughout the studio. This usually happens when I  do not print for awhile - it has been almost 6-7 weeks since the last print was made....

Jumping from one image to another and then another to finally playing online 'words with friends' as a distraction...just dancing around the work at hand....wondering if I can ever make a good print again....

back at it again and just finished working on a new image from Zabriske Point in Death Valley...maybe something will get printed after all...

Death Valley, Racetrack PLaya

Racetrack Play a, Death Valley    

'Man's heart away from nature becomes hard'.....Standing Bear

Badwater Basin, Sunrise

Badwater Basin, Death Valley, Sunrise

Today's image was processed in Lightroom4 only. Lightroo4 seems to run a bit slow but the upgrade has added features that one just has to pay attention to, and, I am sure Adobe will fix that quite soon.

This image is part of a sequence I am working on for a show of my landscape images, both single frame and panoramic, for September in Carmel, Indiana. Then in October the show moves to Toledo for the second annual benefit show where all the proceeds are donated to 1Matters, an organization that assists individuals and families achieve domestic autonomy.

In all likelihood this image will be part of both shows.

Death Valley - Dante's Peak Sunset

Sunset, Dante's Peak, Death Valley

'Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves'...........John Muir

Dumont Dunes #3

Dumont Dunes #3

Still experimenting with leaving the off-road tracks in the images using them as graphic elements instead of  distracting lines....I used Viveza2 to enhance and sharpen the lines in this image before going over to ColorEFXPro2 for final adjustments. I tend to use a good deal of photoshop masking with both CFX and VV2 including using the brush option in the software. 

Dumont Dunes

Dumont Dunes, Death Valley

'Artists are visionaries. We routinely practice a form of faith, seeing clearly and moving toward a creative goal that shimmers in the distance - often visible to us, but invisible to those around us'......Julia Cameron 


These dunes are new to me - first time there. I had heard about them so I sought them out last Sunday while cruising around the Death Valley area. It was love at first sight when I pulled up to these dunes - problem was they had been through a weekend of off-road vehicles chewing up the pristine sand. I decided to make a few images and see what I could do to turn the tracks into texture, which in the end I felt good about.

The areas in and around Las Vegas and Death Valley are ripe with imagery - well worth a trip if you are in the area...

Death Valley, U, We, Wash

U, We, Wash, tecopa, California

Last week, for the most part,  was spent in a hotel in Las Vegas. Being in Vegas for that long you lose touch with the outside world. Almost anything can be going on outside your 'climate and smell' controlled environment.

So yesterday I jumped in the car with a few cameras and headed out for the day to clear my head. The area just outside Las Vegas is really great for losing ones-self in a much more natural landscape so I headed out for Dumont Dunes. Little did I know that the dunes were located just outside of Death Valley. As many times as I have been to Death Valley I never traveled Route 127, and now that I have, it is on the list for another day of more extensive exploration.

The Dunes were really interesting but more suitable for a sunrise when there is less chance of tire tracks covering the sand from off road vehicles.  I did, however manage to make a few images that will be processed on another day.

Today's post was located near a trailer park just outside of Tecopa, California, a small town that is home of the Tecopa Hot Springs. Usually I content aware out the wires but for this image I thought they they needed to be left as is....some sort of a last connection to civilization. Actually sights like this are not uncommon in this area of California....a surprise around every turn..

Death Valley, Badwater Basin

Sunrise, Badwater Basin, Death Valley

Sometimes it happens that you are in the right place at the right time....I was in death valley with a few friends a year or so ago and we were shooting a sunset from atop Dante's Peak. I can't remember what our plan was for the next morning but after looking down on the basin from Dante's the plan quickly changed. I have been to Death Valley 4-5 times now and had never seen the basin with that much water --- so the next morning at sunrise there we were mucking through the basin waiting......well worth getting up at 4AM......

This image was made using a Phase P65+ on a Mamiya 645 - 80MM Schneider Lens.....Processed in Lightroom4 and PhotoshopCS5.

This image is part of a Death Valley Series I have been working on.

 

Mesquite Dunes

Mesquite Dunes, Death Valley

'Joy in looking and comprehending is nature's beautiful gift'.........Albert Einstein

Death Valley Sunrise

Sunrise, Death Valley

'How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains!'....John Muir

Death Valley, California

Death Valley Landscape

'In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks'....... John Muir

Death Valley, Zabriske Point, Black and White

Zabriske Point, Death Valley

Yes he is at Zabriske Point again...Looks like I inadvertently tripped into figuring out a black and white landscape workflow that I might like.....but beware that these covnersion were done in Silver EFX Pro 2 and not yet attempted in a LAB BW Conversion....so stay tuned....Maybe I even get a body of work out of this....

You have to admit this is one hell of a location....

Death Valley, Mesquite Dunes 13

Death Valley, Mesquite Dunes #13

'Choose only one master - Nature'.......Rembrandt

Zabriske Point 4, Lightroom 4

Zabriske Point 4 - LR4 Beta

I have become totally immersed in the Lightroom 4 Beta the past week - watching several instructional videos while working on images.

Today's image was processed using only LR4. Adobe has made some really powerful changes in this beta version. The first thing that jumps out is that you can add clarity without fear of the dreaded halo. The sliders in 'basic develop' are highly intuitive and parametric, meaning they are capable of making much more precise adjustments to the image - somewhat like a parametric sound equalizer can dial in a certain frequency to fine tune a venue for music (of course I mention music)...Another change is the brush and graduated dialog has noise, moire, temperature and tint sliders to allow for more dialed-in local adjustments.

Today's image was processed using just the Basic , Detail and HSL dialogs.....processed above and original below....

Original Zabriske LR4 Beta Test

Use the link below for Adobe video tutorials on LR4.

Julienne Kost

Zabriske Point - Detail

Zabriske Point, Detail

It seems like there are endless ways to portray this location in Death Valley...Just when you have what you consider the one there are still more to work with....Death Valley has become a constant source of images, Dunes, Zabriske and Badwater Basin.....One thing for sure is that these natural locations need protection in the years to come....

I do remember this image as I went off to a different spot for the sunrise that morning - had watched these same shadows the morning before and made sure I was in the right location to catch them the next day...Proves the point that you need to go back many many times to catch the character of any locations...

Death Valley, Mesquite Dunes 2

Death Valley Dunes, Stovepipe Wells

'Come forth into the light of things, let nature be your teacher'.....William Wordsworth

I have been to Death Valley on four separate occasions and have made around 5000 images in various locations. All in all the sand dunes are up near the top of my favorite list and also the most difficult. Get there at the wrong time and there are footprints from the many visitors. The best time for me is sunrise, which is even better if a high wind blew away the footprints overnight. If not one needs to get as far out as possible to avoid people and prints...not always as easy as it sounds.....

Death Valley, Rhyolite Ghost Town

Rhyolite Ghost Rider Sculpture 1984

Rhyolite is a ghost town in the Bulfrog Hills about 120 miles NW of Las Vegas, near the town of Beaty, Nevada. Rhyolite was founded in 1905 as one of several mining camps during the gold rush. Somewhere around 1907 Rhyolite had electric lights, water mains, telephones, newspapers, a hospital, a school, an opera house and a stock exchange. It is estimated that between 3500 and 5000 people lived there. It collapsed very quickly and by 1920 was a ghost town.

This sculpture posted today is one of many at the Goldwell Open Air Museum, the most distinctive being a re-creation of The Last supper. Well worth a visit if you are ever in Death Valley...