"Flames of Dawn"

This is the Caliente valley of the Southern Sierra Nevada foothills. I was greeted with a fiery sunrise. The only thing I could find suitable for foreground interest were these bleached lupines. The image is comprised of 5 vertical frames stitched. I exposed each vertical twice for sky and foreground, blended each individually and then used Photoshop CS3 to assemble the stitched pano, so a total of 10 exposures was needed. The Larger preview really opens up the scene. Thanks for any feedback!

Thanks for your observations. The Larger view is recommended!

Mark- Another great job assembling this shot.  Technically, looks about perfect to me.  My only suggestion might be to darken the mid and distant hill a touch or maybe add a bit of selective contrast to them.  This might give more depth to the image, more 3-d to it.  Also, the right side of the image has a lot of empty space in the FG, and since the most colorful part of the sunrise is to the left of this, maybe consider a tighter crop off the right.  For me, this keeps my eye in the most intersting part of the image.  Terrific composition any way you look at it.

Cheers, Harry

Dang Mark...  Just when I think your stuff can't get any better you bring this one out!  Spectacular presence; I feel like I'm right there on the hillside. Thanks for sharing... Mike

Thanks Harry and Mike! I will look at adding some local contrast to the hillsides Harry. Luckily, I still have the adjustment layers all saved in the original master file. I will be using this file in a Photoshop workshop I am conducting tomorrow that shows the whole process. As far as cropping the right, also a good suggestion. I only wish I had relocated myself to a lower left position when I was shooting this. I will say that I would love to retain that distant valley to the right, but in the end, the cropping of the empty foreground space is probably a good choice for improvement. Thx again!

This is one of your best!! Keep it up

Regards, Andrew Malpass

Thanks Andrew. I appreciate the positive feedback. Funny thing is, I didn't think this image worked out all that well because I had hopes of shooting from another location, but I was running late and never would have made it to my preferred spot, so I chose this as a compromise. Still, this is a grand valley and the sky was one of the best this season. Thx again!!

wowwww this is a paint! great paint.... what a wonderful color. rate 6

It's a beautiful scene.  I think Harry makes a good point:  the lighting is so uniform across the entire frame that the impact of the colorful sunrise is reduced.  A greater variation in light (darkening the hillsides and perhaps even the foreground selectively) might look more natural and make the sky "pop" a bit more.

Beautiful landscape and so well lit and composed, wishing you all of the best.

This is another masterpiece Mark.   I'm looking at it on a 30" X 2560 screen and thinking, how did he get all that detail?   And then I see it's a 10 photo composit.  Thanks for sharing your technique with us.   Aloha!

Beautiful landscape, original comp and great colors! Excellent!

Really captures the feeling of one of those wonderful still moments just before sunrise. You do a terrific job of making your color photos sing while still maintaining a relatively subtle palette, and that ability is especially important for this scene.  Are you are making prints from these large files? I hope you have, or will. 

Panorama stitching seems to have improved quite a bit in CS3. Considering that there is a fair amount of barrel distortion at 17-mm focal length, the ability to blend files together undetectably is impressive. 

Thank you Niki, Stephen, Rashed, Dominick, Ivva and Jim! Stephen, I like your idea about adding some contrast to the ridges and hills and perhaps a little burning to the foreground. At the same time, the flatter version will look better as a print. Yes Jim, stitching is an impressive feature in Photoshop! I will eventually make a big print, I have the 7800, so I can get up to 24 inches wide. This image file would produce a 47 inch long print. Thanks again everyone!

There should be another book on the landscapes of California and all your photos should be in it just as this one. Wonderful landscape, just perfect! Regards.

Hey Lester, thanks for stopping by! You know, maybe someday I might propose such a thing to some publishers. Nice of you to recommend that!

Sweet, sweet photograph!  I don't know that anything at all could or should be improved here.  This is just a treat to look at, and ever so California! Well seen and photographed, Amigo!  Cheers!  Chris

BEAR..... good to hear from you! Thanks for the positive comment. I don't completely agree. I would have loved to have had the foreground with more lupine and less grass on the right, but I think that is the only regret. Creating panos requires more attention to composition, probably better planning would be helpful. On the upside, I can make very large prints, so I want to do this more often, but not every set up lends itself to a pano. The major problem is the fact that the camera needs to be level, which influences the placement of the horizon. You know me, I really don't like centered horizons. Thanks again!

This is spectacular scenery and no small feat for a ten frame panorama, Mark. My only critique echoes that of Stephen's and Harry's above. I think some of the natural drama and light fall may be lost in the process. Splendid work, nonetheless.