Twilight Dunes

[Hank Christensen]

This photo was taken on a recent trip to Death Valley National Park. About 15 minutes after sunset, the dunes were cast in a beautiful blue shadow glow. I kept the contrast low to accentuate the subtle, milky lines of the dunes in the extremely soft twilight. I cropped to a 4x5 aspect ratio.

Canon 5D MkII
70-200mm f/4L
ISO 200
13 sec @ f/16

[Andrew McLachlan]

Hi Hank, I like this a lot. The blues and the dunes make multiple photographic possibilities here. Hope you will share more from this day at Death Valley. I see many graphic possibilities where the sky is excluded. I see a dust bunny in the upper left corner.

[Dennis Bishop]

Beautiful tones and composition. The peak of the dune left and above center is placed very well horizontally. The curves are wonderful, and the vegetation in the lower right was a good addition. I usually prefer warmer tones, but the blues work very well, here.

[Morkel Erasmus]

Now this is pure eye candy, Hank. Thanks for sharing, wonderfully executed and presented. The clump of grass is also adding a lot to the scene IMHO.

[Don Railton]

Hello Hank

This is a wonderful image, beautiful soft colours. I don't actually like the grass in the lower RH corner as I feel it intrudes/spoils breaks up the soft curves of the dunes..But each to their own, I see most above like its inclusion. well done anyway..

DON

[Angelika Schauf]

Fantastic structures in the best light, great work.

[Rachel Hollander]

Hank - I like this a lot as presented. The blues, rolling dunes and almost shadows in the distance work beautifully. Well done!

TFS,
Rachel

[Andrew Aveley]

Top Class artistic photography :) TFS

[Robert Amoruso]

I agree Hank with the above, well seen and executed. This type of image would work exceptionally well w/o the grass to. The strong patterns and layering (creating depth) of the dunes needs no additional elements IMO.

[Hank Christensen]

Thanks everyone for the feedback. I agree that this image would work with or without the bush - in fact I tried both in the field, but I couldn't quite get the composition I liked without the bush in the frame. Every time I tried to exclude it, I either got too high (and included unwanted sky above the distant mountains), or got too far to the left (moving the largest dune dead center and ruining the composition). Unfortunately walking to the left and shooting from a different angle meant walking up a steep dune and completely changing the shot (shooting dunes can be challenging!) In the end, I went with what nature gave me. I'll rummage through some other dune shots from that day and post one or two in a bit. You really get some amazing variety out there!

[Jay Gould]

"Nature Interpreted" would remove the bush in a heartbeat! Love the image; are the blues close to what you actually saw that day?

[Hank Christensen]

Jay - I have considered removing the bush. It will be quite a job considering the fine lines in the dune behind the bush, but I will probably give it a go just to see how well I can do. If nothing else, it will be good cloning practice.

I have reviewed the image, and believe it or not, the scene was even bluer than I have represented here. The auto WB the camera used was 6500, which I dropped to 6000 in PP. I just dropped it to 5400 and it looks much closer to how I remember the scene. I originally processed this on a non-calibrated laptop monitor, so that would explain why I actually processed it a bit too warm originally!