Monday, July 23, 2007

The Wonder of Opabin Plateau

This is an image I made back in 1991 of the Opabin Plateau area with Moors lakes and Mt. Huber in Yoho National Park ( I love that name ). It was one of those perfect early fall or late summer days in September, lots of blue sky with no clouds, the larch trees were a brilliant orange, ready to drop their needles at the very peak of perfection. On this trip I was shooting black and white film , 4 x 5, which is what I usually would be shooting , although I it was a perfect day for color photography and would have made some beautiful post cards, my vision was in black and white, I used a yellow #8 filter to slightly darken the sky but to also make the needles on the Larch trees almost a pure white, the needles being yellow and the yellow filter thus passing the color through, actually over exposing, giving me the balance of white that I needed to make a good black and white print.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, I think I'd like that spot too! Those trees must have looked beautiful. Shame you didn't take a colour pix, but...this one is good (forgive my presumption). ;o}

Howard Grill said...

I think this is a fantastic shot. I really like the way the foreground two trees frames the remainder of the image. The whiteness of the needles gives it an almost otherworldly impression....almost infrared looking. Color would be nice but the uniqueness of the tones here really makes the black and white stand out. Bet it is more unique looking as black and white than it would have been in color!

Gary Nylander said...

Thanks for the comments, Janina and Howard, I really wanted to shoot the image in black and white, I never did have any color film with me anyway, that's the challenge of making a good black and white image to take something in color and make a great black and white print !

On a personal level , even though I made the image in 1991, I can still remember the vivid colors of the day which seem as real to me today as if I was there.

Gary

Unknown said...

Great shot as aways

Peace - John

Gary Nylander said...

Thanks, Craig !