Cathedral Valley Storm: Waiting for the Light

Cathedral Valley Spires catch morning light for an instant!

Photographers coined the phrase "chasing the light."  "Catching the light," is another variation of this idea.  The flip side of this is "when the light's not right, shoot black and white." 

There was no light to "chase" during a recent trip to Capitol Reef.  I was 60 miles of dirt road to the nearest pavement but that would not make a difference as rainclouds blanketed the entire southwest region thanks to a hurricane near Baja California.  I hoped for a few rays of light at sunrise.  Some times sunlight will appear under the clouds at sunrise or sunset and then hide behind the clouds the rest of the day.  Sunrise did not shine through at all.  Heavy clouds blocked the eastern skies even though I could see some blue sky above.  I went to work, shooting compositions that I found with plants and rocks as foreground subjects. 

A balanced rock directly east of the Temple of the Moon caught my eye.  Here a photo of it with the Temple of the Sun in the far distance.  You can see the sky had some blue patches here and there. 

Balanced Rock with Temple of the Sun in the distance.

I captured some solid photographs as the morning developed but never had any direct sunlight.  I saw some spires in the distance and decided to take a long walk their direction.  When I got past them, the view opened up to something truly special.  I had three amazing spires lined up side by side that could be isolated with my telephoto lens.  It was awesome.  I loved it but wished there were some light to really create the magic.  Clouds were too thick. 

I decided to wait.  Maybe the clouds would move a bit.  Maybe I'd get lucky.  I had nowhere better to go so I sat down.  I even did a self-portrait of me waiting with the view in front of me.  This is what a landscape photographer does:  he waits for the right moment after getting to a beautiful spot. 

Gordon Smith in Cathedral Valley

I wasn't sure how long I would wait:  maybe an hour but probably not longer.  The view was wonderful and at moments like this it's wonderful to put the camera aside and listen to the silence of sandstone. 

As luck would have it, the sun did come out to make a brief but awesome display over the valley.  It lit up the middle and tallest sandstone spire as seen in the featured photo above.  This lucky moment lasted about 10-15 minutes.  I didn't see the sun again for about 6 hours.  By then I was in a different location.