Red Rock Towers. Death Valley National Park, California. April 1, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.
A band of red rock towers high on a ridge in the Amargosa Range, Death Valley National Park
This is another in what might be termed the “Unspectacular Death Valley” series. ;-) As I have mentioned before, most of the terrain of this park and of similar places does not consist of high contrast, intensely colorful scenery. In reality, the color palette of much of the park is quite subtle, consisting primarily of tans and grays, with dark shadows, some reddish rock, occasionally other colors of rock, and few brilliantly colorful plants. (An exception may occur during a short period in a spring that follows an unusually wet winter, when some areas my show profuse wildflower blooms. And, of course, when shooting in golden hour light almost any landscape can become much more intense.) Over time I have come to like being in this seemingly plain landscape, even in the middle of the day.
These formations, some red rock outcroppings just below a ridge at the head of a small valley, are in an area I have visited a number of times. I’ve looked up at them and wondered how I could photograph them. This time I got a bit of help from the weather. The overall light was softened a bit by clouds, and the same cloud system gave me a darker gray sky beyond the ridge rather than the more typical plain blue sky. All of this brings out the color of the red rocks—which feel like a small, far-west outpost of Utah!—and allow the subtle colors of the vegetation to be just a bit clearer.
G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.