Photography Composition Mergers in the Eastern Sierra

Pleasant Valley, Eastern Sierra - f/4; 80-200 zoom - © Kerry Drager

Highway 395 boasts some of the more incredible scenery in the Western U.S. - with the sharp face of the Sierra Nevada rising high above the eastern California landscape. The scenery is awesome, but surprisingly, the quest to photograph something new and unique can be quite a challenge. Here's why:

This territory has been the scenic "playground" for countless outdoor photographers, including the late Galen Rowell, who lived in the area and whose legacy is preserved in his outstanding Mountain Light gallery in the town of Bishop. As a result of all the photographic "competition", dynamic images of the jagged peaks demand not only beautiful light but also dramatic weather.

A clear sky, however, dominated my recent tour of the eastern Sierra ... not quite the spectacular conditions that I envisioned. Thus, I sought out different sorts of landscape images - even ones that didn't include the region's trademark mountains.

The photo shown here - captured with both the sun and the Sierra at my back - involved a couple of factors. One was the warm light of late day. The other made use of photography composition mergers - in this case, the close-up grasses set against distant scenery. But to prevent the foreground from blending into the background, I took advantage of the contrast of light-toned grasses against slightly darker scenery, and made use of selective focus ... i.e., a narrow depth-of-field in which the tall, out-of-focus grasses in front of a crisp backdrop.

To accomplish this blur-against-sharp result, I shot through the grasses, while focusing (at infinity) on the far-away landscape. Also helping to achieve the effect: a wide aperture and a telephoto lens.

Incidentally, Highway 395's best scenery extends for about 120 miles from Mono Lake (just east of Yosemite) south to the town of Lone Pine (which lies in the shadow of 14,495-foot Mount Whitney).

For more details on selective focus, check out my BetterPhoto article:
Photography Composition Mergers with Selective Focus

That's it for now ... have a great week!
Kerry Drager

Comments

[Kelly]

Interesting angle.... I will have to try this! Thanks!
Kelly

[Kerry Drager]

Hi Kelly ... thanks so much for your comment ... glad you like it! Kerry