TR: Yosemite Valley Spring Run-Off

[Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer]

Headed up to Yosemite Valley to check out the large waterfalls given the huge winter snowpack this year. I have never been to Yosemite Valley to see the spring run-off. I figured I would share some pictures and I guess this is where you would put it in TGR.

I am really a total photo noob (until this year I have always done "auto" settings, but SchralphMacchio has helped me a bit in understanding some of the manual settings on my LX-3 so I am starting to learn on that. Eventually I would like to upgrade to a full "grown up" camera DSLR, though).

The weather was great both days with generally sunny skies and warm temps. I always love the view just past the tunnel heading into the Valley floor.



Crazy contrails in the skies – the jets were in full force on Saturday. Here Sarah poses with Bridalveil Fall off in the far distance.



El Cap along the Merced (which was flowing much higher than I have ever seen it given the time of year and the spring melting).



Ribbon Falls and El Cap – I have never seen Ribbon Falls in person as it only runs during the snow melt-off (and I am usually skiing this time of year in the High Sierra). We need to get back to the Valley more this time of year!



The Nose in mid-day light.



Posing just across the street from El Cap Meadows.



Reflection of Upper Yosemite Falls in the Merced.



Looking back at Cathedral Spires across the Valley. Interestingly, there were some pretty big gullies still holding snow that looked skiable earlier in the season (the noticeable V-bowl in the center). I wonder if these ever get skied.



We hiked out to Mirror Lake to check out the Northwest Face of Half Dome from the bottom. There were many minor waterfalls along the way that probably only last several weeks to a month.



Mirror Lake with a reflection of the edge of Half Dome. Mirror Lake itself will likely dry up later in the season so it was cool to be able to see it when there is actually a lake there.



I guess I can’t really do a trip report from Yosemite Valley without including a shot of Half Dome. When we were at Mirror Lake sitting near the shore on a rock, we saw a large cornice break off the summit of Half Dome. It was really spectacular as the loose snow dissipated in the air, but the large ice blocks fell to the base, causing a loud eruption that sounded like an explosion. I can’t image how loud the Ahwiyah Point rock fall in 2009 must have sounded. Note that the Mirror Lake loop is still closed up near Tenaya Creek as a result of the rock fall.



Fast moving water along the Merced.



It was also fun to just walk around near the base of Royal Arches, as there were several water flows coming down the face and working through the forest to connect to the Merced. I am also starting to figure out the basic use of shutter speed and exposure to capture the moving water – really cool stuff and can’t wait to get a better eye for it.





Cool clouds moving in on the summit of Half Dome with the evening alpenglow.



I was looking forward to some night-time shots of the starts and moon with long exposures, but unfortunately total cloud cover moved in at night. At one minor point, the moon did try to break through a gap in the clouds.



The next morning we headed up to Yosemite Falls – which was raging. It was so cool to see the flow so large (especially with Upper Yosemite Falls depositing onto a large snow cone at its base).



Upper Yosemite Falls in full force.



There was a very cool rainbow at the base of Lower Yosemite Falls.





Unfortunately my camera lens got misty for this shot – despite the abundance of sun it was still in the low 40s at the time (hence the down jackets).



And thanks to SchralphMacchio, I now have figured out how to use focal depth on a camera as well!

[north20]

Photo noob or not, some nice stuff here.

It's been far, far too long since I was in Yosemite Valley at all, or even more sadly, the Yosemite backcountry. Thanks for the TR!

[SchralphMacchio]

Great trip UCL! I'm sure the lady was stoked grinning ear to ear on her flight back.

These shots are hard to take sometimes when the difference between light and shadow is huge - it's more dynamic range than your camera can capture typically. Often the best technique has nothing to do with gear but everything to do with what time you wake up Really early in the morning the light is scattering off the top of half dome and El Cap is early in shadow - the river and the face are in the same light. About 15 minutes later, El Cap will have direct light off its top and right side but nothing else, not even the trees down low. Then 13 hours later the face will be brilliant golden from this angle, lit up from the left and the trees will again be in shadow. Might make for some cool and different types of shots to think about next time you're in the valley.


Nice composition and way to make use of the natural contrast here. Again, tough light for the full range so you ask yourself, what's more important here, the shadow or the highlights? In this case it's the falls so you would want to expose your histogram with nothing clipping off the right. If you had shot that RAW it would not have been that hard to put some exposure back into some of the shadow detail. I'll show you how to do that some other time


also ... it's going to be time to give up on Picassa for hosting soon. The compression really does mess with your photos.

[mtcham]

Nice shots-a polarizer may help a bit with the mid day shooting.

[SchralphMacchio]

holy shit, I had no idea you can buy a 46mm adapter for the LX3 that allows you to mount a 46mm polarizing filter or a step-up ring to something like a 52mm filter (which are really easy to find)

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...2XVRA9R6RAGDZK

Yeah UCL, for outdoors shots polarizing filters can be very clutch, especially around water, wet rocks, grass, leaves, sky ... it's good stuff.

[Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer]

Scralph - looks really cool. We can talk about this one time as this looks like it would enhance my LX-3 well.

As to your hosting point, I honestly don't think it is compression of Picassa v. Flickr. I have always thought it was a monitor thing. For instance, the pictures above look fine on my widscreen monitor at the office, but there is some pixalation (not present in the actual photos) when I view a couple of them on my Mac..... The same thing on your Flickr-hosted pictures as well.