A Grand Adventure

[misterN]

Just hanging out...

[dorayme]

Wow, my breath has been taken away! I feel as though if I stretch hard enough through my iPad I can touch it.

[TXGirl]

That pic is awesome!!

[misterN]

Wow, my breath has been taken away! I feel as though if I stretch hard enough through my iPad I can touch it.

It is quite the place--first time I had ever been there.

That pic is awesome!!

Thank you very much!

[Rocks]

Wow. That pic almost looks like a painting! Did you use a special camera effect?

[misterN]

Wow. That pic almost looks like a painting! Did you use a special camera effect?

Thank you very much!!!

That picture is an High Dynamic Range (HDR) image digitally processed from three different exposure values. In layman's terms, it's three shots--one taken as you would for a normal picture, one taken so it's overexposed (very bright-washed out), and one taken so it's underexposed (or darker). Put together in an image, it allows for a wider range of colors to be seen in a picture

...my layman's terms may have gotten a bit too in depth.

[Rocks]

Thank you very much!!!

That picture is an High Dynamic Range (HDR) image digitally processed from three different exposure values. In layman's terms, it's three shots--one taken as you would for a normal picture, one taken so it's overexposed (very bright-washed out), and one taken so it's underexposed (or darker). Put together in an image, it allows for a wider range of colors to be seen in a picture

...my layman's terms may have gotten a bit too in depth.

------
No!, not too in depth at all! There's an exhibit at the museum I'm a docent at that deals with photo realism and hyper-real looking photographs like yours, as well as subjects sculpted to look exactly like found objects. I love hearing how things are made.

[conejo23]

That is a truly terrific pic!

I worked at the South Rim one summer between college semesters. Amazing place. Worked in the El Tovar Lodge. Would bus tables until midnight, then me and a few buds would have the run of the rim to ourselves. at 2am, absolutely no one was out. We'd crawl over the fences and get out to the furthest rock spire we could hop onto (we were 20 and nuts, what can I say) and then drink beer and watch the moonlight dance off the canyon. Magical.

Your picture brings back some of those memories. Just love the way your green hat pops in the picture. And the shadowing of the folds in the bag and your sweatshirt? Very, very cool.

What kind of camera does one need to take such a shot?

[misterN]

That is a truly terrific pic!

I worked at the South Rim one summer between college semesters. Amazing place. Worked in the El Tovar Lodge. Would bus tables until midnight, then me and a few buds would have the run of the rim to ourselves. at 2am, absolutely no one was out. We'd crawl over the fences and get out to the furthest rock spire we could hop onto (we were 20 and nuts, what can I say) and then drink beer and watch the moonlight dance off the canyon. Magical.

Your picture brings back some of those memories. Just love the way your green hat pops in the picture. And the shadowing of the folds in the bag and your sweatshirt? Very, very cool.

What kind of camera does one need to take such a shot?

That sounds exciting and extremely crazy at the same time. I really like the area--sometime I think I might have to take a week trip there. As for the picture, I believe you could recreate it with any camera for stationary targets. If your camera allows you to change the exposure value, you should be fine. I own a Nikon D7000 which is a pretty nice crop sensor dSLR. The 7000 lets you set up that exposure bracket, and fire them off in quick succession, which helps to create HDR images with human/moving subjects.

[conejo23]

Thanks for that info.

If you ever get the chance, go spend time down at Havasupai. It's at the end of the Canyon, a remote Indian village with breathtaking waterfalls. You hike down from the rim, then once you're off the switchbacks, you meander across this plateau before dropping into Havasupai canyon. Hike a few miles further back and you get to a camping area between Havasu falls and Mooney falls. Let me see if I can find a good pic of one of em to show you. It's a stunning place.



If that doesn't come through, here's a site with several pictures of Havasu falls. Mooney Falls is a bigger waterfall a few miles down the trail, but not as pretty a setting as Havasu Falls.

To really get a feel for the canyon, it's one thing to bop around the top of it. But it's entirely another to get down IN it. It's something everyone should experience if possible. I've been to Havasupai twice, but not for many years. This is giving me the itch to visit again.

[misterN]

Thanks for that info.

If you ever get the chance, go spend time down at Havasupai. It's at the end of the Canyon, a remote Indian village with breathtaking waterfalls. You hike down from the rim, then once you're off the switchbacks, you meander across this plateau before dropping into Havasupai canyon. Hike a few miles further back and you get to a camping area between Havasu falls and Mooney falls. Let me see if I can find a good pic of one of em to show you. It's a stunning place.



If that doesn't come through, here's a site with several pictures of Havasu falls. Mooney Falls is a bigger waterfall a few miles down the trail, but not as pretty a setting as Havasu Falls.

To really get a feel for the canyon, it's one thing to bop around the top of it. But it's entirely another to get down IN it. It's something everyone should experience if possible. I've been to Havasupai twice, but not for many years. This is giving me the itch to visit again.

I would like to spend some time going down into the Canyon. However, one problem lies in the fact that I'm not the most adventurous type of person, not crazy and jumping past the railings and such :P That being said, eventually I hope to go down there. I can see how people can spend several days down in the Canyon.

[conejo23]

Lol, you can get a more "refined" experience these days. There is Phantom Ranch at the bottom of the canyon from the south rim where there is rudimentary lodging, and there's a "lodge" at the bottom of Havasupai, though we were young broke college kids at the time so we pitched tents a few miles south of the village near the creek. And if you don't want to hoof it up and down the switchbacks, you can take mule rides.

Funny story: our first time to Havasupai a guy brought his girlfriend and her pack was too heavy. The last few miles she was breaking down, couldn't carry it so we were taking turns carrying our pack and then hers. Not fun. All of a sudden we hear the unmistakeable sound of a horse's hooves galloping on the trail. Around the corner comes a huge horse with a teenage from the Havasupai tribe on its back. He sees our predicament and we strike a deal. We'll give him some of the booze we were hauling down there and he'll take all our packs to our camp site. At least at the time, they had prohibition down there so alcohol was a precious commodity. Turned out to be a great guy. We had him haul all our packs up to the rim on our way out for a bottle of Sauza tequila, and we struck a deal for our return trip and he met us on the rim and hauled all our stuff down and back so we just had to walk with fanny packs with some water and snacks.

You definitely don't have to be a grand adventurer to taste the canyon from the inside, and it's well worth the effort.