Tahoe Light Photography » ski photos

Lake Tahoe ski photography at Mt. Rose Ski Tahoe

admin — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 23:38:40 +0000

As the midway point of what really has been an epic season so far, I thought I’d post up a few of the recent shots I have done for Mt. Rose and also open up a call for models. Most of the early season, I have to admit to being a little lazy photographically. We had so many great storms one on top of the other that all I wanted to do was ski, un-encumbered by my heavy camera gear. All through December and January we hiked the backcountry, tracked at the resorts almost by ourselves and generally had a great time. Then came the long dry spell. At last, finally a little motivation to get back to work. We took advantage of the long dry warm January to actually shoot these spring skiing promo shots. That’s right, skiing in a bikini in mid January. Now the storm cycles are back and my biggest restrictions are the un-predictability of bluebird mornings and the need to get a hold of good riders real fast. So feel free to hit me up in the comments section if you ride well and have some spur of the moment availability these next few months. Otherwise, enjoy.

A last minute shoot the otherday when it unexpectedly cleared up and left us some blower Tahoe powder.

Another deep tahoe powder shot at Mt. Rose

I'm still a sucker for the powder 8's

Switching gears for a little mid-winter spring skiing

Carving up the groomers and looking good at it.

One of the promo shots being used by Mt. Rose.

Tahoe ski photography

admin — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 20:02:19 +0000

This is what I call a two-fer. I had this location on Incline peak scouted for this shot on a clear day. Unfortunately when that clear day arrived, my wife was the only person available to hike up there with me. Fortunately she is a good photographer, so I schlepped the cameras up, set up the shot and had her pull the trigger while I skied the line and we ended up on the cover of this year's Lake Tahoe winter recreation guide.

My how cluttered our digital lives are getting. I remember when the internet made things quicker and easier. We had search engines for looking up stuff instead of going to the library, and we had email instead of mailing letters and waiting weeks. When did it all get so complicated? Just trying to keep up with letting anyone at all find me and my work now requires hours of web updates, managing my mobile searchable archive of stock images, keeping up with the facebook posts for our wedding photography business, keeping up with the summer blog posts for Reno Mountain Sports, which sponsors me as a semi-pro freestyle kayaker, and who knows what else. Time flies by in a whirlwind of shooting and sitting and I am only just realizing that I have been ignoring my main stock photography blog for nearly a year now.

Well, the other day it snowed on us and today dawned the coldest day yet, so I figure it is a good time to get pumped up about skiing and post some of my favorite ski images from the lake tahoe area from last season. Some of this work comes from the advertising work I do at Mt. Rose and some just for fun. Ski photography is really tricky. You can have great riders, and great snow and a great sky, but they rarely all come together at the same time. I think we had only two really deep bluebird powder days all last season. Most of the powder days were cloudy. One took me completely by surprise and I found myself up at Mt. Rose early during what was predicted to be a cloudy and stormy day, staring at 2 feet of snow and blue skies with no riders in site. After a quick phone call to the resort’s PR folks, we decided it would be worth a try to get something, so I grabbed some skiers out of the line and a couple of patrollers and we tried to make some shots. They were good, but still nothing like having a couple of pro riders there who can hit their marks and look good doing it.

Enjoy the photos, here is a quick link to my archive of winter stock photographs which you photo buyers out there can feel free to search.

Mt. Rose added a new dimension to their special events by hosting the first (that we know of) snow boater cross on the west coast. I was both competing and photographing this event. This shot of Jr. World champion kayaker Jason Craig was used by National Geographic Adventure for thier best adventure town blurb on Reno

A sunrise backflip on skis near the Mt. Rose summit. I had hoped Moment skis might be interested in trading one of these shots for some gear since my skis are getting busted up, but no bites yet.

Another big air shot on Moment Nighttrain skis

Even the little tykes love the backcountyr. Here 7 year-old Blaise poses on his custom kiddie Moment skis, handmade in Reno.

Well, we are in the wild west, so Moment rider Jared and I decided to screw around one day and borrowed a six shooter and some cowboy gear for this shot that we thought might be interesting.

JJ Shiller at the subaru freeskiing world championship competition at Kirkwood 2010

I was experimenting with my Go Pro camera set to shoot still photos to see if I could get an interesting angle on powder skiing. It didn't quite work, but next snowfall I know what to do to make it sing.

These are a few shots from the pond skim at Mt. Rose ski tahoe. I did the photography for them, I was also the forerunner for the course.

This year I was the forerunner for the course, which was a good thing because it was a very cold morning and we had the original start area so high up that I flew across the water, caught huge air on the exit and barely stopped before I crashed through the gate on my first run. We made a few adjustments and got it nice and friendly for the competitors. You can have a look at my POV video of the first few runs here.

Carving the groomers at Mt. Rose. This is a variation on one of the photos they used for a highway billboard and as their facebook icon for a while.

Mark riding rails at Mt. Rose ski tahoe.

Schmearing that turn

We wanted a few shots from Mt. Rose to show the beautifull falloff into the dry desert of Washoe Valley. Just a note to you budding pro riders out there, you can have super cool modern clothes and that is a good thing, but about 70% of what buyers choose to publish from my images involve red or yellow. Just food for thought.

Looking for the light in the backcounty near Donner Summit.

A little backcountry skiing with some great Lake Tahoe views

admin — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:10:07 +0000

Well, I have been waiting basically all winter for a nice, cloudless sunrise with some soft snow and I finally got it. Only problem is that most of the skiers I work with, riders for the Reno-made Moment Skies, were off in Salt Lake City for some skiing and a big winter sports tradeshow thing. So even without some great riders, I decided I would roust my wife out of bed at 4am and test out a couple of locations for next time. Monique is a photographer as well, so I attempted to be the ski-model standin. We used google earth to determine where first light would hit and I set myself up on top of a rock above Mt. Rose highway. Sure enough, the sun rose right in my face and I skied down a field of soft pink snow. Next we went up to Incline peak to get some standard shots with a lake view. For want I want up there, I’m hiking up a telephoto lens next time to get closer to the action and fill the background with the lake. Any of these pictures and many more stock images from the area can be keyword searched from my online archive of Tahoe area action and lifestyle photography. Now all we need is one more nice soft clear Tahoe sunrise…. I am also always looking for talented young skiers and riders who don’t mind getting up early or staying out late to get the shot. Feel free to contact me via the contact link above to talk about ideas.

I was up top scoping the light on a 15 foot jump with Monique waiting at bottom to get a few pictures as I came down to see how the red snow at dawn photographed. When I can get back with some riders throwing tricks off the rocks, at sunrise, this area could be really good!

Crossing the frozen Incline Lake on skis

This is one of many cool shots with snow covered trees we grabbed while skinning up Incline Peak.

Cresting the summit of Incline Peak on skis with Lake Tahoe in the background.

Me standing on top of Incline peak preparing to jump off the ridge. This shot worked fine, but I need a telephoto to make anything good out of the cornice drops.

Backcountry skiing off the top of Incline Peak with sweeping views of Lake Tahoe

I made a couple of quick turns around Monique to see if we could get anything, but the clouds were moving in quick and the Lake was turning grey. I'll just have to head back.

Winters Creek lodge at Mt. Rose Ski Tahoe

admin — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 03:18:18 +0000

Mt. Rose hired me recently to shoot the dedication of their new Winters Creek lodge that replaced the old wooden slide lodge at their ski resort in the mountains above Reno. Their main requirement was that they needed pictures of their torchlight parade, something they have not done in years. Lucky for me I happen to know the proper exposure for a moving flare, because we only got one shot at this. A big thanks to the ski school boss in charge of the parade, John, for altering the plan to come down only one run at the base and split his skiers onto both sides of the mountain at the last minute. That really helped make the shot and fill up the foreground. Using our Nikon d3′s and d700′s, and one d300 on a remote on the roof, I sketched out a plan that involved many exposures. Since running the camera for several minutes while the parade made its way down the mountain would end up over-exposing a lot of the torches, as well as building up a lot of digital noise in the shadows. I opted for a sequenced string of 30 second exposures at iso 200/f8. Another exposure for the lodge (for the shot from below) and yet another to capture a faint deep blue of the dusk. All of these shots were then put together in a sequence, similar to a sequence shot of a skier going off a jump and the results were just what I had planned for. We also were asked to capture some views of the lodge and people using it, but since the party was on, we had little control over lighting or posing and just captured the moments in a pure photojournalistic style and hoped for the best.

Torchlight parade during the dedication of the Winters Creek lodge at Mt. Rose Ski Tahoe, made up of 5 images.

The winters creek lodge at Mt. Rose ski tahoe at dusk. Should be fun for some Apres ski come spring.

The interior of the new Winters Creek ski lodge at Mt. Rose ski tahoe.

The interior of the new Winters Creek ski lodge at Mt. Rose ski tahoe

The interior of the new Winters Creek ski lodge at Mt. Rose ski tahoe. They can make it look nice inside for weddings and special events, and the view can't be beat.

Table detail

Detail shot of coffee cups laid out.

The bar of the new Winters creek lodge all done up for special events.

They got the outdoor firepit working for the first time at the new Winters Creek lodge at Mt. Rose.

The photos from the remote roof camera of the torchlight parade down the slopes of Mt. Rose.

Just to have a different view, I had my wife shoot the torchlight parade from on the hill, looking back down at the new Winters Creek lodge at Mt. Rose. Despite wearing lots of lights and glowey things around her, the skiers in the parade said they were pretty much blinded by their flares and it is only dumb luck somebody didn't run into her standing in the middle of the run.

Spring mountaineering photographs on California’s Mt. Shasta volcano

admin — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 19:43:52 +0000

By Scott Sady

Well, I thought I was done with skiing for the season but a friend of mine was putting together a trip up Mt. Shasta on father’s day weekend. Since I had been up the mountain several times before, they invited me to tag along. With last year’s poor snowfall, I didn’t get much of a spring touring season so it sounded like a good idea. Shasta is a 14,162 ft volcano that rises up from the flats of Shasta City a few hours from the Oregon Border along I-5. This is probably one of the most popular mountains for aspiring mountaineers as it has a relatively safe and unexposed route from the base to the summit. Many people make this their first 14er. In Shasta City, at the Fifth Season store, you can rent everything you need for the climb on the spot. Mostly you need proper clothing and camping equipment for winter, crampon’s, ice axe and lots of common sense. Despite the relative ease of certain routes on the mountain, the weather can change in an instant going from clear to 10 feet of visibility in a matter of minutes. Needless to say it was crowded on father’s day. We took the popular avalanche gulch route and over-nighted and Helen Lake. I have been up this way before mid-winter and early spring and seen very few people. The tent city at Helen Lake had about 60 campers this time. The early morning assault looked like a line of ants climbing up the mountain. To add a little excitement to the adventure, I humped my skis up and my Nikon d300 camera. The snow was complete ice off the summit, but the camera came in handy.

Four am is the usual start time for a summit assault from Helen Lake. Though if you are skiing, I would suggest starting around 6 instead for some soft snow on the way down.

Some photographs by led headlamp as we prepare to climb from Helen Lake

Pre-dawn photographs from the "tent city" at Helen Lake on Mt. Shasta.

A string of pre-dawn climbers look like fireflys on their climb up to red banks from Helen Lake.

Sunrise from red banks looking down at climbers coming up from Helen Lake.

A group of climbers stop to take a self portriat as the sun rises on top of Red Banks on Mt. Shasta's avalanche gulch route.

Looking back at thumb rock from near the top of misery hill

Amanda working her way up misery hill with thumb rock in the background

Snow coverage was thin on Misery hill. Not much for skiing but great for views of the valley full of clouds.

The summit log on top of Mt. Shasta. I've been to many mountains and signed lots of logs, but each day would fill 4-5 pages on this thing with the amount of people reaching the summit.

Looking back at the saddle between the top of Misery Hill and the summit of Mt. Shasta. Castle crags can be seen in the background.

Red banks and the small figures climbing it with thumb rock sticking up behind. This photo was from my ski route down the lookers left route from the top of Red Banks