Detail, Last Light on El Capitan. Yosemite Valley, California. October 31, 2009. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Detail view of last sunset light on the face of El Capitan, Yosemite National Park, California.

Recently I wrote about (and confessed to occasionally) photographing icons. You cannot succumb more openly to “icon photography” than by creating a sunset photograph of El Capitan as seen from Wawona Tunnel view – but that is exactly what this is.

I had not originally intended to photograph here, but as I often do, I drove by and stopped on my way to look for another subject. When I arrived I got out of the car and walked to the overlook without my equipment, as I often do, just to take a look at the stupendous view – worth doing whether or not you decide to photograph it. Most of the time I simply enjoy the view and then get back in the car and move on. However, on this evening I noticed some things about the conditions that forced me to consider the possibility that it might be “special” enough to stick around and haul out the camera and tripod. The air was quite clear, but even more potentially interesting, I could see a few low clouds to the west and the sky in that direction looked a bit hazy – both conditions can create intense color at sunset. (If I could have ordered up revisions to the existing scene, I might have requested a few interesting clouds floating around the face of El Cap, but no one seemed interested in taking my order!)

Rather than shooting the usual “valley view” – it takes Really Super Extra Amazing Special Conditions for me to “go there” – I put my longest lens on the camera and decided to “work” details of the scene, particularly looking for boundary areas and interesting shapes and forms. By boundary areas I refer to to beautiful and interesting spots where different things are juxtaposed – a shadow and bright illumination, a soft shape or texture and a harder one, a closer subject and one farther away. As the light evolved this pattern of brilliantly illuminated cliff faces separated by a slightly curving shadow and underlined by the rising shadow emerged.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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