Jeff Lewis (LewisDot)
Water on Fire | Lower Young Lake, Yosemite
An exceptionally fiery sunset from Lower Young Lake, Yosemite NP.
I shot this on a three-day backpacking trip into the Yosemite Wilderness. I’d just lugged a 40-pound pack up 9 miles and 2,400 vertical feet…in the pouring rain. Thunder bellowed constantly for three hours. This wasn’t a typical Sierra afternoon thunderstorm; it lasted for nearly three days. I did get poured on during the hike out to Tuolumne Meadows the next day, though I managed to get far enough east the third day’s rain.
However, there is one thing most Sierra storms have in common: they typically clear up at least partially just before sunset. This one did so just enough to leave a small window for the sun to fire up the clouds and produce an awe-inspiring reflection in the lake. I braced the camera on a rock and shot three long exposures to get as much of the scene as I could.
By the way, the one thing you nearly always lose in mountain landscape shots is scale. The mountains in the background rise about 2,000 feet above the lake.
The least desirable weather often yields the best sunsets; don’t give up and walk away!
Canon Rebel XSi | Canon 17-40mm f/4 L USM | HDR from three exposures
Water on Fire | Lower Young Lake, Yosemite
An exceptionally fiery sunset from Lower Young Lake, Yosemite NP.
I shot this on a three-day backpacking trip into the Yosemite Wilderness. I’d just lugged a 40-pound pack up 9 miles and 2,400 vertical feet…in the pouring rain. Thunder bellowed constantly for three hours. This wasn’t a typical Sierra afternoon thunderstorm; it lasted for nearly three days. I did get poured on during the hike out to Tuolumne Meadows the next day, though I managed to get far enough east the third day’s rain.
However, there is one thing most Sierra storms have in common: they typically clear up at least partially just before sunset. This one did so just enough to leave a small window for the sun to fire up the clouds and produce an awe-inspiring reflection in the lake. I braced the camera on a rock and shot three long exposures to get as much of the scene as I could.
By the way, the one thing you nearly always lose in mountain landscape shots is scale. The mountains in the background rise about 2,000 feet above the lake.
The least desirable weather often yields the best sunsets; don’t give up and walk away!
Canon Rebel XSi | Canon 17-40mm f/4 L USM | HDR from three exposures