Mammoth Peak Reflected in Tioga Tarn. Yosemite National Park, California. July 22, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
Mammoth Peak in sunset light, reflected in the still surface of Tioga Tarn, Tioga Pass, Yosemite National Park.
This view of Mammoth Peak on Kuna Crest in the Yosemite High Country from the Tioga Tarns at the top of Tioga Pass is a classic Sierra Nevada scene. The foreground tarns are lush green in the early summer after the snow melts out and fall into shadow early in the evening as the sun drops behind the ridge between this area and Gaylor Lakes. Mammoth Peak, however, has an almost unobstructed line of sight to the west, so this peak continues to hold the sunset light until the last possible minute. (Don’t let the peaceful appearance of the scene fool you – I was being devoured by clouds of mosquitos as I made these exposures.)
In order to deal with the extremely large dynamic range between the Mammoth Peak snow fields in direct sun and the very dark shadows of the nearby forest I resorted to exposure blending and a few other post-processing techniques. With exposure blending, I make two exposures, one optimized for the brightest areas of the scene and the second a slightly longer exposure to capture a bit more of the shadow detail. In post I began with the darker frame, since that presented Mammoth Peak the way I remembered it. Then I placed to other exposure beneath it and used a mask layer to reveal some of the lighter areas from the lower layer.
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Thanks, everyone! Joshua, thanks for your comment. Oddly, the mountain wasn’t the main subject in my mind – I really wanted to depict the quiet water and reflection in the pond itself. :-)
Dan
Respect for not taking a reflection photo where top half of the frame is exactly the same as bottom half.
I like the placement of the rock in the corner. The grass definitely contributes a lot to the character of the photo, too.
Worthy of Grizzly Adams…..
Need a gear lugger? ;-)
Thanks to both of you. This is a favorite location in the Yosemite Sierra, and I can never pass by without at least stopping for a moment.
Michael, I’m a big fan of exposure blending in my work. I don’t even own GND filters at this point. I’ll have to write something about this here at the blog at some point to explain this a bit more.
Dan
Beautiful shot! Do you prefer exposure blending over using something like a graduated neutral grad or do you use both techniques depending on circumstances?
Beautiful image Dan!