This is a continuation of a March 2023 sunset shoot in Valley of Fire, Nevada.
I made many images with the late day light changing as the sun sank into the western horizon with clouds moving overhead and a distant storm on the easterly horizon. I’m presenting a few selected images in this post.
To be continued,
Ken
It seems suitable, at this time of the day, that the clouds in the sky and the geology in Valley of Fire, Nevada came together to create an hourglass shape, if one has the imagination to see it.
Another late day storm was brewing over the desert, which resulted in dramatic sky for background.
I composed this image to have the rocks along the diagonal pointing towards the distant storm.
Then I thought maybe I had too much in this image, so I moved in close to the end portion of the foreground rock, keeping a portion of the little bush at the edge of the rock.
This emphasized the foreground rock, but reduced the background and the stormy, cloudy sky, which I think is not an improvement. The wider angle view is better, I think.
I like the way the rock texture looks, even on its own, but with the late day light and a stormy sky background it seems to really pop.
In this image I like the foreground shadows that contrast with the late day light on the middle ground and the background sky and the rugged geology.
Maybe the correct word is “symmetrical”, but the image is not exactly symmetrical, so I will stick with the “Symmetric” label.
I used the many linear features in the rock as leading lines in this photo, which is a cropped version of the original. The original included much more of the foreground, as I like those linear features, but upon reviewing, I thought maybe I over did it with the foreground.
To be continued with much more of that late day desert storm,
Ken
This is a continuation of a multiple part blog of a sunset shoot in Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada.
The rock features in Valley of Fire take on different looks as one moves around, viewing these from various positions.
The Funnel is my name for this location. The rock texture just seems to “funnel” one into the scene.
Light tops off the distant rocks like a sweet, golden frosting on a multilayered cake, with a dollop of whipped cream on the edge.
Everything in this image is in the previous one, but less. I moved in to reduce the scope of the image, then cropped in more in post processing to make the sky more prominent and emphasize the large rock feature at the bottom right, which was in the bottom left of the previous image. I think this makes the scene more dramatic, but that is in the eye of the beholder.
Evening sky flows and glows over Valley of Fire, Nevada, highlighting some features and casting others into deepening shadows.
This wraps up this sunset shoot, but there will be another.
Ken
This is a continuation of a multiple part blog of a sunset shoot in Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada.
In Part 20 of this blog, I included a similar photo made by standing closer to the big rock in the foreground. I think that image is more dramatic, but I backed up to included the little bush at the bottom left in this image to add a bit of “life” in the image.
It is the “rainy” season here and there is new greenery softening the hard rock desert.
Occasional small ponds give evidence of recent rains in this soon to be baking landscape.
To be continued,
Ken
On our hike back to the parking lot, we took an obvious route towards a large feature that we had hiked past on our way in. This route went alongside the rock outcrop from which the Fire Wave is formed.
That large rock feature towards which this outcrop points, is our destination for joining up with the official trail back to the parking lot.
Early morning shadow and light seem to be divided by the meeting of two different rock formations. The meeting of these two different rock deposits forms a low area, where sand accumulates and desert vegetation takes root.
I noted many small pebbles accumulated in the ridges of this rock outcrop. Initially, I thought maybe tourist were tossing these into the grooves, but now I think it is a natural accumulation. Maybe strong winds blow the pebbles along the rock face until the pebbles drop into a place that is somewhat protected from the wind.
That’s all for this hike and early morning shoot,
Ken
This is a continuation of a sunset shoot in Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada.
This concludes the sunset shoot on this day.
Until next time,
Ken
This is a continuation of a sunset shoot in Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada.
To be continued,
Ken
Photos from another sunset shoot in Valley of Fire State Park, Nevada. The day after the storm at sunset, we returned to the same area for another photo shoot. Some of the photos in this post are similar to the evening prior, but with different lighting and sky
To be continued,
Ken
There was a late day storm on the eastern horizon during this cloudy, sunset shoot. Such desert storms contribute to the slow, but certain evolution of the rock features found here. These are a few of those images.
I made many images, capturing the changes in the sky as the storm and the late day lighting progressed.
I hope the similarity of these images is not boring to the reader. It was fascinating to see how the sky changed with the storm’s advanced across the landscape and the subtle changes in the light on the landscape.
Until next time,
Ken
After a morning shoot, my son and I decided to take a short hike in another part of the park, before. the crowds of tourists began to get out and about.
It is not surprising that this area is a popular one in which to film portions of western movies. The image above is of the remains of one of those movie sets.
A portion of our early morning hike went through a slot type canyon. The many footprints in the sand indicates the number of people that have recently hiked this way.
That’s all for now.
Ken
