The Landscape Less Travelled: Camel Rock

One of the things I try to focus on as a photographer is getting out to unique local landscapes and finding my own story. With a career like Galen Rowell had it's pretty hard to find something he didn't already hit out of the park.. but such subjects do exist! ;-)))

This location is a really interesting remote geological formation right on the Colorado-Wyoming border. With continually dynamic (and windy!) conditions, it's a good bet you can get fantastically energetic clouds like this with just about every visit to the hardly photographed Wyoming basin country.

There are those seminal images that folks like Galen and Ansel put out that now seem like a required rite of passage for a landscaper to dutifully repeat. And not to take anything away from these incredible places, but we have a lot of magical locations in all of our backyards just waiting to have a passionate photographer tell their story. I urge all of my friends to find those local places and help create a new generation of advocates for their appreciation and stewardship. Find your local haunt and tell its story!

Image Notes: Not a lot of post on this one, basically a single frame. One trick I used to help pop the clouds was to create a black and white version in SilverEfex and then blended that layer with soft light blend mode masked to pop the sky with just a bit of contrast and lumno adjustment on the foreground.

WyomingBasinBasinsLandscapeNatureTravelRocksRock FormationCamel RockLocalNotHDRSkyscapeCloudsCloudscapeFallAutumn2012AMichael Menefee