A heat induced lightning storm kicked up around 12,000 ft over the White Mountains.

Let me first start by saying that I have a lot of stories in the pipeline at the moment. Most of which are shot and just waiting to get posted, so take a second to click the orange radio button at the top right to subscribe to my feed if you are interested in stories and photography about the environment and our natural resources. A few of the things coming soon: GLORIA week, global climate change survey in high alpine environments. This is the first re-survey of North America since the initial alpine climate surveys took place in 2004. Come with to see how an international protocol is helping us get a handle on how climate change is affecting our fragile alpine environments. Also, join me on a kayaking trip to the moon. Well, actually it just looks like the moon, but like the moon, you probably won’t see a soul. Also coming soon in regular installations, a year-long road trip through Nevada, looking at her history and story through her (often obscure) state parks. Plus much more.

Now, on to matters at hand. I haven’t had so much fun working at a computer since, well, never. When I pulled up the raw image files on my computer after coming back from the White Mountains, it was like diving into an amazing book. I couldn’t stop. I had to tone all night long until I had at least a good portion of the images processed and backed up.  I have always loved the White Mountains. They remind me of other beautiful and stark locations like Mono Lake or Zion, only without the people yet. By the way, the White Mountains, and especially the ancient bristlecone pine tree groves in it, was recently declared a wilderness area. Existing roads were grandfathered in, but the slow destruction of the environment by the spread of off-road vehicle trails should now stop.  Bristlecone pines like high altitude. They start popping up around 8000 feet and continue through 11,000 feet or so. These trees are amazing; there are living specimens several thousands of years old. Even their pine needles can be up to 40 years old. Imagine, 40 year-old leaves. Imagine the stories these trees could tell, watching the world change over the last 3000 years. It is just those stories that one of my friends, Adelia Barber, is trying to tell by studying small core samples taken from selections of these trees. She also organized last weeks Global Observation and Research  Initiative in Alpine environments (GLORIA) survey of White Mountain and surrounding peaks. Their story in the next Blog installation.

Photographing among these trees is not easy and not easy on the ego. In nearby Bishop at the Galen Rowell gallery, you can see his vision of these groves and ego bruising that entails when you even think about comparing some of your best work to what hangs on the wall there. At the White Mountain Research Station, a UC run facility at 10,000 feet, you can see Ansel Adams prints hanging on the wall and you may realize that you just photographed the same tree that Ansel Adams did 40 years ago. Hell, his picture of a simple science experiment is cooler than my best tree picture. But who cares, I had the time of my life with some wonderfully uncooperative weather.

Thunder and lightning chased us off the peaks just as the light was getting good. Skies turned dark and sinister. Then the skies got better with crazy clouds, colors and rainbows and the occasional bolt of lightning. We even drove through a random hail storm at 12,000 feet in the middle of the night.  The photography was so fast and furious with the constantly changing light, that I wasn’t even sure we got anything worthy. I’ll let you be the judge though. We used Nikon d3’s and d700 digital cameras for this trip. Much of what we shot was with a tripod because of how dark and cloudy things got and the blowing wind. A sing ray split grade neutral density filter was used on many shots to hold back the sky details. Obviously all files were shot RAW and only exposure and color compensation were needed in post so far.

Despite using Nikon’s long exposure noise reduction function, built into the cameras, I think I would still prefer film for the night exposures. Even with the noise reduction activated, it mostly turned the blue and red noise specks into slightly masked, darker specks. Next time I take a film camera.  A good starting point for nighttime star trail exposures with no moon is ISO 200 at f4 for however long you want. 20-50 minutes works well. One surprise with the digital cameras was that I was able to do exposures less than 30 seconds at high ISO, say 1000, and freeze the Milky Way while still allowing time to do some light painting with my mag lights.

Bristlecone pine tree snag and north star at night.

Microwave telescope observitory and milky way galaxy at the Barcroft research station.

Storm light and clouds over the White Mountains

A dead bristlecone stump catches the last ray of light as rainbow and storm clouds form in the distance

The roots of a dead bristlecone stump catches the last ray of light as rainbow and storm clouds form in the distance

A brief hail storm caught us as we were driving the dirt roads chasing lightning around sunset. It kept us pinned down for a bit.

A brief double rainbow over a small grove of ancient bristlecone pine trees

A split grade neutral density filter was used to hold back the sky on these storm clouds over a downed bristlecone pine tree

Bristlecone pine tree with flowers and rainbow during a storm in the White Mountains

My first test shot for star trail photography in the bristlecone pine tree grove. This exposure ended about an hour before dawn, so I was able to catch a bit of blue in the sky. The bristlecone pine tree was lit with a flashlight.

Juvenile marmonts are a curious bunch.