Finding the right time and place to shoot high quality skiing images in the Lake Tahoe area is not as easy as it seems. Global warming, combined with the winds that accompany most of our storms means fewer shootable powder days each year. Here we made due with the conditions we had, which were rarely powder. The key to getting good images of skiing, skiing powder, jumps, hucks or lifestyle in and out of the ski resorts depends a lot on who you work with. Sometimes it is enough to take lifestyle and travel pictures of your friends doing what you do, other times, you really want to find a group of solid riders and plan things out.
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Churches cabin in a 10 minute exposure, lit with handheld flashlight
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Roughly 30 second night exposure with hand-held flashlight used to fill in foreground
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Skiers and snowboarders warming up inside church's cabin, with fisheye lens
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black and white portrait using available light and nikon d700 at church's cabin
Church’s cabin is a great historic hut, left over from one of the original snow scientists in the United States, who developed the method of determining water content in snow among other things back in the 40’s roughly. The location is a deeply guarded secret among locals. Imaging hiking several hours with tons of gear only to find it occupied. Bad Juju! The next ski action photographs are probably not the best I’ve done. The conditions were poor, lots of ice and firm snow, but the riders, many from Moment Skis, made right here in Reno, Nevada, stomped their often painfull looking lines in spite of conditions.
Photo of Moment ski rider on backcountry spine
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image of skier doing backflip on a natural jump in the chutes at mt rose ski tahoe
image of skiier jumping a cliff in lake tahoe area
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after the fall, skier surrounded my backlit snow
Finally just getting a shot that expresses the joy of riding powder or being outdoors in winter is always fun. On the next two images, I was trying to get photos for an advertising campaign at Mt. Rose Ski Tahoe, a Lake Tahoe area ski resort that sits on the east shore of Lake Tahoe. In years past, I have got them great images with the Washoe Valley and desert as background, which it is for most of the resort. But the challenge this time, was to find a few small areas where we could place the resort among the mountains and/or lake tahoe, so it could visually compete with the likes of Squaw and Heavenly. Not easy considering the views that way are few and far between. Here are a couple of lake tahoe action and powder ski images from that shoot.
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image of deep powder skiing on the boundaries of mt rose ski tahoe
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backcountry skiing or hiking to find a great lake tahoe view at mt rose
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photo of skier reflected in goggles
For more images or a searchable database of action and adventure and landscape photography from the Lake Tahoe and Reno areas, be sure to click back to my website and find the stock photography search link at top. Or click to search for lake tahoe action and adventure stock photographs.
[I don’t think this posted my first time]
Wow Scott! What photos! I was telling a geocaching friend today about my memories of Church’s Cabin. He challenged me to find a photo of it. Eureka! I struck gold with your post! That’s the woodstove we lit! The wooden bench I slept on with my young daughter! You can see the graffiti on the walls! Awesome!
Even better, it’s the cabin in winter! Actually, I never even saw the concrete exterior shown in your photos! The snow was so deep that year that the cabin was COMPLETELY covered in snow when we arrived, except for the flue pipe sticking up. (No “bad juju” of finding it occupied for us.) So of course we only dug out just enough to get inside, and I only saw the door and a few inches of concrete on either side, not the whole building.
You’re absolutely right in your comment “location is a deeply guarded secret among locals.” I was forbidden by my ex-husband to EVER give anyone a clue as to where it might be – saying “chocolate” out loud was expressly forbidden. In fact, he told me the name of the pass was “Secret Pass.” I know realize he told me that name on purpose, because he wanted the location to stay, well, a secret!
Sadly, I’m crushed to read on another blog that the cabin was shut down by the Forest Service. My memory of the joy of finishing hours of digging, at long last finally opening the door, and finding a stocked pantry of canned goods, all kinds of utensils and useful items, lots of mice turds – but also a broom to sweep them up (our gift to the cabin was mousetraps), plenty of books to read and wood already chopped and ready for the stove will never be repeated in my lifetime. It’s now nothing more than a priceless memory. Well, it always was.
Yeah, I don’t know what their problem is. Last year, when their budget had been all but decimated, they somehow found the funds and time to padlock not only this cabin (they say they are considering the historical importance of the location, as this was technically one of the places where snow science in the US was born) but also shuttered one in the Martis drainage. I hope nobody heads up there in a snowstorm looking for shelter.