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Yosemite Falls, Autumn Rain

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Yosemite Falls, Autumn Rain

Yosemite Falls, Autumn Rain. Yosemite Valley, California. November 1, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Yosemite Falls and Valley meadow and forest in an autumn rain storm.

Another photograph from my rainy early-November weekend in Yosemite Valley. On Saturday the storm was coming in and as the day wore on the rain increased. As I photographed the nearly leafless trees in the meadows in sight of Yosemite Falls, the rain increased to the point that the Falls were almost completely obscured, although the rain also created a wonderful misty atmosphere and muted the fall colors.

A note about shooting in the rain… I foolishly removed my umbrella from my bag before I left on this trip. What was I thinking?! A good umbrella may be almost your most important piece of photographic equipment when shooting in conditions like these. Instead I ended up using an alternative set of strategies. (I did try to find an umbrella at the Yosemite Village store… but I couldn’t bring myself to buy a souvenir umbrella with big bear footprints all over it. :-) I have a nice Goretex rain hat that almost exactly covers my 5D and my lenses, so the main plan was to get everything set up and ready to shoot and then put the hat on top. While the tripod got wet the camera stayed reasonably dry – well, OK, not too wet. A little moisture on the outside of the camera body doesn’t concern me too much, though these conditions were such that I had to be pretty careful and use a towel on the camera and lens every time I returned to the car.

keywords: rain, storm, mist, fog, cloud, gray, yosemite, falls, valley, national park, tree, grove, forest, meadow, grass, fall, autumn, season, colors, red, gold, yellow, green, sierra, nevada, mountains, cliff, ridge, water, waterfall, travel, scenic, landscape, weather, stock

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Upper Yosemite Falls in Mist

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Upper Yosemite Fall in Mist
The mist of an autumn rainstorm shrouds upper Yosemite Falls.

Upper Yosemite Falls in Mist. Yosemite Valley, California. November 2, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The mist of an autumn rainstorm shrouds upper Yosemite Falls.

This photograph was made on a very rainy early November morning, when the previously-dormant Yosemite Falls had sprung dramatically back to life following two days of rain.

This was a very difficult photo to take and it has been a difficult photo to work with in post-processing. I shot it with a very long lens (400mm on full-frame) as mist and rain swirled around the top of the upper falls, most of the time almost completely obscuring the waterfall. Occasionally the clouds and rain would thin a bit and I would make a few shots. The complexity of the post processing has several parts. First, the dynamic range of the photograph is very small. (Usually we struggle with the opposite problem – a dynamic range that is too big!) For this reason I had to make some decisions about whether and how much to expand this range in post, and also about just where the “normal” brightness should be. Second, the color saturation is so weak that the photograph almost appears to be a black and white image, but it is indeed a color photograph… with extremely muted colors.

I’m looking forward to working on making a print of this one. I’m certain that it will be a challenge, but I think that it may work well as a print.

keywords: upper, yosemite, falls, valley, national park, water, waterfall, cliff, fog, mist, cloud, rain, autumn, scenic, travel, landscape, weather, sierra, nevada, california, usa, stock, tree, silhouette, high key

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Autumn Foliage and Rain, Merced River Near Cathedral Rocks

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Autumn Foliage and Rain, Merced River Near Cathedral Rocks

Autumn Foliage and Rain, Merced River Near Cathedral Rocks. Yosemite Valley, California. November 1, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Autumn foliage lines the riverbanks as rain falls on the Merced River near Cathedral Rocks – Yosemite Valley.

One more – probably the last – in the series of photographs* of this scene made from the bridge near El Capitan Meadow. In this one the rain, which had diminished to mere sprinkles when I began to shoot from this location, began to return in earnest. The surface of the river has lost is reflectivity and is cloudy in this photo. If you look closely (or inspect the print) you can see the raindrops on the surface of the water. This was pretty much the story of this entire weekend of photography. It rained most of the time, occasionally hard. I did quite a bit of my photography between showers and under improvised rain protection.

Although this was photographed near El Capitan Meadow, the rock face beyond the river and the trees is not El Capitan. It is Cathedral Rocks, a large formation that is almost directly across the Valley from El Capitan and a bit east of Bridalveil Fall. If it were located anywhere else where it was not dwarfed by El Capitan, it would be regarded as a very imposing face it its own right.

* The previous two related photographs are here and here

keywords: fall, autumn, foliage, leaves, trees, forest, grove, bank, river, bank, merced, cathedral, rocks, cliff, face, rain, precipitation, drops, grass, el capitan, meadow, float, yosemite, valley, national park, california, usa, sierra, nevada, mountains, nature, scenic, travel, landscape, stock, mist, cloud

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Tree and Cliff, Yosemite Valley

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Tree and Cliff, Yosemite Valley

Tree and Cliff, Yosemite Valley. Yosemite National Park, California. November 2, 2008. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A lone tree growing against a cliff face in Yosemite Valley near the Ahwahnee Hotel.

I often walk along the north wall of the Valley between Yosemite Village and the Ahwahnee looking for interesting rocks, trees and plants, or seasonal waterfalls – especially in fall and spring. This time I had been shooting an oak tree against this section of the lower cliff when I spotted this less colorful tree nearby and, on a whim, decided to shoot a few frames. (The conditions were "interesting." It rained all weekend and was sprinkling as I made this photograph.)

keywords: tree, fir, cliff, rock, crack, root, rock, lichen, leaves, green, brown, trunk, rain, wet, ahwahnee, hotel, yosemite, valley, national park, scenic, landscape, nature, travel, fall, autumn, california, usa, stock