Land of the Sun

Sorry to be away for awhile. If you have any questions, critique or comments on this photograph I'd be happy to discuss. This was taken near Death Valley on the bed of a remote desert water hole that dried to reveal very deep cracks. The cloud motion comes from a very long exposure at sunrise.

Thanks for commenting.

striking as always and in the easily recognizable style. dramatic composition, nice warm tones. glad to see you back.

The movement of clouds adds much to the visual impact and gives "life" to the barren scene. May I ask how long exposure this was ?

23 second exposure. I'd already had the camera on blub while shooting even longer than 30, hence the odd number. The clouds were really racing on this morning! I used 5 stops of ND to make it work that long at dawn, ISO 50.

Great movement in the sky. Nice work with filters, lighting is excellent as always. Quite "another world" like feel to this. The lines in the mud are impossible not to follow.

Hi Marc, very well returned. For me it is always a pleasure to review your work, despite probably I can't critique it a lot. In this case, I like very much how you composed with the first two lines in the fg, as ways to the distant mountains. I'm a little bit surprised by the range of focus. This and the clouds movement make it a little bit oniric image.

Kind regards.

Interesting capture it imparts a sense of time passing, love the lines. Thanks for sharing, hopfully we'll get to see more of what you've been up to lately. -- Jeff

I really like the light, with the foreground still in shadow while the sun is just hitting the very rugged mountain in the background. The clouds really catch the eye, and I think this would be spectacular even without the long exposure. At the same time, the contrast between the very slow process of producing cracked mud and the swift movement in the clouds adds yet another element of interest to the photo.

Truly striking image. I am curious what made you decide to stop the exposure at 23 seconds. Even the shades in white are visible. Composition so dynamic with unnoticeable distortion and taken at such low light for the foreground, and still so sharp at the foreground means a very meticulous execution. It would be interesting to know how you managed both.

 

+Lalit

The clouds make me dizzy. A little overdone perhaps. The color of the mud at the very bottom of the photo looks strange. Maybe my monitor, not sure. Love everything else. Great Job! Dean

Thanks, Dean. I noticed that too after I posted it. Something about the shadow adjustment layer I threw in there seems to have gone a tad magenta up front. An easy fix.

wonderful image those forground craks give the image wonderful depth, well done Rich.

Marc:

 

Great to see you posting new images again. Really like the classic Adamus mood lines you have here.

 

Needless to say, this is much better than anything I got on my trip (pun) to Death Valley.

Very dramatic interpretation Marc. The depth is amazing. My eyes are telling me that this could be a blend of two images shot at different focal lengths to increase the available depth. As I recall, you have blended images of different ISO settings to solve flower motion problems and I was wondering if this is a similar treatment. It is somewhat dizzying and I feel the need for a Dramamine tablet. That aside, the image is quite successful because of the vast depth and how it almost conveys the opposite of immense scale by enlarging the cracks and reducing the distant mountains!

Gary - I didn't get anything as good as you from our trip in the Redwood forest :-)

 

Mark - No blending here. These cracks were absolutely huge. I'm actually about 2 feet away from the nearest focal point. I shot this at f/18 with DOF throughout.

The sense of movement is what I think is strongest in this image. Not just the clouds, but with the flow of foreground lines as well. Very dynamic. My only critique would be regarding the strong vignette. I'm a fan of using these myself, and I don't think it looks necessarily bad here, but it's almost overpowering in this case, especially on the foreground playa. I'm wondering if this was a conscious decision.

 

Anish

What a wonderful photo this is. The first thing that strikes me is the movement in the sky, then the DOF, light and colours. This together with the tecture and sharpness in the forground makes this to a wonderful image to look at. Cheers, LKV.

Fantastica. Antonio

Oh yea, I was waiting to see this one! This is awesome Marc! How wide are those cracks again? More than an inch in most places? I have an idea...

its a trip it really is amazing work marc did you use a nd grad filter for this one? I also wonder how wide those cracks are probably not even a inch and here it looks like 10 inches or so amazing work!!

The cracks were as wide as any I've ever seen. About 2 inches and 1 foot deep. I used a 3-stop GND moved slightly during the exposure.

I love this texture and the effect of the long exposure on the coluds!! lots of compliments!!

Hi, Enrico