La Sal, Utah boasted the presence of 339 intrepid souls in the 2000 census. It sits astride Utah Highway 46 a few miles east of US 191 (South of Moab) and a few miles west of the Colorado state line where the road designation changes to Colorado Highway 90. Just inside Colorado, the road drops off the plateau, a part of the La Sal Mountains uplift, and into the broad valley of La Sal Creek on its winding way to the Dolores River. Across the valley, the rise of the plateau wall continuing eastward gives substance to the interior machinations of the Earth as it struggled to birth the great igneous blisters growing to the north.
A focal length of 300mm, medium telephotoland, allowed me to isolate an eroding section of the plateau wall, revealing the great runs of rock strata once submerged beneath an inland sea; strata now dotted with juniper and pinyon. It also allowed me to eliminate the sky as a distraction. An aperture of f/20 provided depth-of-field, given the camera-to-subject distance; and a shutter speed of 1/8th second at ISO 100 gave me an overall medium exposure. As I was caught up in the process, I had in mind the possibilities of this composition as an impressionistic rendering using various techniques available in several programs, in this instance a doouble exposure and PhotoShop.
While this Image is not of public lands, it represents a view into a private ranchland where vast open spaces are often the norm and the distinction between such land and public lands administered by agencies like the Bureau of Land Management is often blurrred. Beauty is always Beauty, wherever it is found.
I LOVE this! Beautiful. How did you get the craggy parts sharp in the middle and the rounder areas blurry?
Hi Nancy. Thanks very much for joining us and for your kind comments. It’s great to hear from you! Since my adjustments we all global in nature, I think the answer to your question actually lies in relativity. What I mean by that is that the elements of the image that are not part of the craggy places are already somewhat soft and rounded, while the craggy area is obviously quite pointed by comparison. When I made the adjustments that were made, the effect was to create greater softness and roundness in the soft round areas and even though the sharp areas were softened a bit, they remained sharp in comparison. I positioned that area near to a so-called “power point” so that I could draw notice to them in contrast to the other areas of the image. I appreciate you noticing and drawing them to our attention. Stay safe.
Monet would love it! It is a fun image to look at; I couldn’t help but smile. Impressionistic and surreal. But, without those colors, it would be a whole different story. Thanks for finding, capturing, and sharing.
Hi Nancy T. It’s always good to have you with us; and I’m really glad that this image made you smile, ’cause I had a feeling you and photo-impressionism were made for each other. I highly recommend Patterson’s excellent work on the subject; and you are so right: the colors of the rock strata were the first things I noticed when we went around the corner and looked over at the plateau wall: lots of warmth set off and punctuated by the cool green. Hope to catch up with and talk to you very soon.
Walk in Beauty.
Thanks very much to the two Nancys for joining me for this conversation. Perhaps photo-impressionism isn’t for everyone, but images of this kind are wonderful exercises in creativity and are a great amount of fun to create and to have as alternatives to the images that our visual fields usually create and offer to us. Imagine if we all saw the world through “photo-impressionist” eyes at all times! How different “reality” would be for us. Have an excellent week and walk in Beauty.
Don, this is a wonderful image. It is gentle, inviting, and respectful – if that makes sense – of this fragile environment. I really like the bands across the top. It make one wonder “how far up or out can this possibly go?” You’re created intrigue. Thanks!
Hey Ray. It’s always good to hear from you, no matter when! Hope you are well and enjoying the Beauty of our amazing spring. Intrigue is a great photographic ploy and I appreciate your description of how the intrigue manifests here. The decision to soften the edges certainly gives a different feeling for the usual sharpness of the Redrock; and I agree that softening does have the effect of increasing the sense of fragility. Omitting all sky was easy enough since it was a completely blue sky day and there seemed to be nothing to be gained from adding any blue to the scene. It’s easy enough to think of the Redrock Country in terms of harshness and austerity so that we remove it from the realm of respect and gentility; and if softening the edges allows those considerations to become part of the discussion, then it’s a wonderful outcome in my humble estimation. Have an excellent week.