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UltravioletPhotography

Desert Dancer is Dancing in the Desert


Andrea B.

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I'm on a field trip, so I may not be around too much for the next couple of weeks. B) B) B)

 

Go make some UV photographs while I'm gone !! :D

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Andrea, very beautiful photos!

Not to divert from your photos, but for some reason your second photo brought to mind an old TMSB shot that Ben Lincoln did, so I had to look it up.

I guess it was the shape of the hill and the flowers that was somehow reminiscent, although there are similarities, it was an entirely different location.

http://www.fotozones.com/live/index.php/topic/38447-big-bend-uv-visible-ir/?hl=tmsb#entry315314

 

Keep posting your pics.

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Bjørn, yes, that is Desert Gold, Geraea canescens.

 

The flower coverage is both spectacular and subtle. The Desert Gold stands out, but there are also wide spreads of pink Desert Verbena, lots of little daisy-like "belly flowers", and vast amounts of Brown-eyed Primrose. I do wish I could come back in a week or two and see other varieties.

 

Got some documentaries of floral UV-signatures. Rather windy & cloudy at times yesterday. All three filters landed in the dust at least twice. But managed to save the UV-Nikkor from a topple. The typical events of field work!! I had to wash the legs of the tripod later so they would slide again today. And spent an hour brushing dust off all cams and gear and polishing up filters. Lenses did well - I have lens hoods on all to help with dust and topples. It was so dry early in the day that the D750 had one or two Errs from who knows what. Reseat and Reboot cleared everything up.

 

Rained rather steadily (but lightly) in the evening - rain is an exciting event for DV.

 

I was a little heavy handed with the editing last night I see!!

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... All sounds like a normal working day of the UV field photographer .... Don't step on the filter(s) while they are on the ground, that'll help too :D

 

"I was a little heavy handed with the editing last night I see!!"

 

We are left in no doubt that yellow is the dominant colour of the valley floor, indeed. And that the sky is a glowing cyan.

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Bill De Jager

You beat me out there, Andrea! I had hoped to go over the holidays but didn't make it, and now my goal is late March. It's been a couple of years now, and a lot longer since I was there when there were significant numbers of flowers.

 

Aside from that, nice shots that really give a sense of what it's like when the valley blooms! I'm looking forward to seeing a lot more including UV photos.

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We are left in no doubt that yellow is the dominant colour of the valley floor, indeed. And that the sky is a glowing cyan.

 

:D The colours are real enough. Currently there really is that much bright yellow. If anything the skies are a deeper shade. Sometimes there's very intense light here.

 

I was mostly referring to my heavy hand on the Photo Ninja Detail slider.

I cannot control myself with that thing and tend to turn my photographs into illustrations. :wacko:

I think our eye does see that kind of detail, but I'm not sure the photographic gestalt can support that level of detail. But then I may be holding on to some idea of what a photograph "should look like" based on too many museum visits where the only photographs shown were made from film.

 

****

 

So yesterday a few raindrops fell just as I was finishing up with my last flower of the day, a bitty little as-yet-unidentified asteraceae. The Baader UV/IR Cut filter got splashed with raindroppy dust. I blew and whooshed on it to no avail. Tried a hot-breath shirt-tail polish, but no good. I was desperate so decided to lick the d@mn3d filter clean. Is it a surprise to anyone that This.Did.Not.Work ?? This little episode has had me ROFLMAO ever since. Note to Future Self: Never Again Attempt to Remove Dust from a Baader UV/IR Cut by Licking It Clean When In the Desert. Fortunately, a little bit of Formula MC and a microfiber cloth restored the shine later that evening after we returned to the HotL.

 

I have only lost one lens cap. And I think it is in the rental car somewhere.

 

****

 

Today I had a chance to make a couple of Triplets of the Badwater salt flats with UV, Vis and IR. So I can try some Lincoln-esque stacking eventually. (I had actually looked at Ben's Death Valley multispectral work just prior to this trip!) There is so much to see & shoot here that I could easily spend a couple of weeks trying different non-floral-signature styles.

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Gravel Ghost :: Atrichoseris platyphylla

I drove about 33 miles to look for some Gravel Ghost to shoot. I did find a few. Of course, a backup patch with several blooms was later discovered growing just by the hotel. The plants only leaves form a flat(-ish) basal rosette.

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Furnace Creek Inn, Death Valley Natioinal Park, California, USA

This is just a small corner of the lodge with terraced palms. It was quite windy.

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Desert Gold on Rocky Flats - 1

The bloom area drawing most visitors is in the southern portion of the park. However, north of Furnace Creek there is also widespread bloom.

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Desert Gold on Rocky Flats - 2

Just rocks and flowers, rocks and flowers.

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Late Afternoon Moon :: Artist's Canyon, DVNP

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Abronia sp. :: Desert Verbena or Sand Verbena

There is a bit of range in the colouration of these Verbena. Some plants are pinker than others, some paler - perhaps due to age? Some are more obviously pink and white-centered than the ones shown here. There is some Camissonia in the foreground.

 

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Bill, I'd get out to DV fairly soon before the flowers bolt and go to seed. By late March I'm not sure much is left here. (Check online.) But other areas may have bloom then. Of course, Death Valley is spectacular even without the flowers. Quite an amazing place!

 

Col, Bjørn, Andy, Steve thanks for your comments!

 

 

Hello from Below Sea Level

The intrepid amateur botanist with Desert Gold at her feet. I could not get a comb through that hair because it was so full of dust! The rental Kia to the left there turned out to be a very good little SUV for this trek, although underpowered as are all rentals. Nice ride, quiet, very maneuverable, well finished interior.

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Bill De Jager

Andrea, normally late March would be the peak of the bloom in the low-lying parts of the valley. This year widespread blooming of annuals started in January which is unheard of. We are already in a new world climate-wise and this is just one symptom out of many I've been seeing in recent years in my state. So who knows what will happen? Even if I miss the valley floor blooms (which I have seen before), flowering will spread up to higher elevations in following months, albeit with different species including more perennials. On one trip long ago in late May, I stood on top of Telescope Peak at 3366 meters elevation, with snowbanks nearby, and the next day drove past Badwater in (rather mild for the date and location) temperatures of 43 C. There is an enormous range of climates and ecological conditions in the area.

 

I loved the photo of the gravel ghosts because that's my favorite desert annual. I was intrigued by the name when I first read about it back in the mid-1960s on my first visit to the valley, and I finally got to see a very large number of them in bloom in the early 1990s during a good spring. It's not as showy as the desert gold but it's a really cool-looking plant.

 

I am so envious!

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Thank you, Steve. :)

 

*****

 

I have a fondness for those old California blacktop roads with the tar graffiti. And for amusing myself with compositional fiddle-faddle. But our purpose here is to observe the band of yellow flowers across the gravel and rocks in this flat plain north of Furnace Creek in Death Valley. We were on our way to see the Stovepipe Wells area but did not expect to see more masses of Desert Gold.

 

 

Triangles I

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You can see sand blowing in the distance.

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Triangles II

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The strong winds were kicking up a bit of a sand storm off the dunes near Stovepipe Wells. So I did not venture onto the dunes myself like this brave and, no doubt, gritty pair. I thought the dunes quite spectacular in IR.

 

Sand Storm in Infrared 830

Click up to 1200 pixels width.

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Goodness, the infrared sandstorm picture is nifty. It almost looks as though the colors have been inverted in a visible light photo (except that would produce black sand!).
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Thanks, Andy!

 

*****

 

So we were headed towards Badwater in Death Valley when a certain Officer Ki O. Tee of the California Department of Agriculture stepped out into the road to flag us down for inspection of all edible cargo. Anything not properly documented was to be confiscated for distribution to needy desert canines so it was all in a good cause. After a bit of back and forth discussion about whether we were packing meat that day (we were not), he decided to let us continue on.

 

 

Stop right there! I'm trotting over to inspect your car.

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Give me all your food!

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Pleeeeease!!!

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Aw, c'mon. Look how friendly I am!

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Oh well.

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Later one of the park Rangers told us that some of the coyotes have learned that if they behave like friendly dogs, some people will feed them. Stepping out into the road to stop the cars and put on their friendly dog act does not always end well for the coyote.

 

These photos were taken through the closed car window by my SigOth.

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Bill De Jager
Andrea, that coyote may be a distant offspring of the coyote that long ago stole one of my shoes from just outside my tent! This was at Stovepipe Wells back in 1992. I tried to follow the tracks into the dunes but lost them in a morass of crossing tracks. Fortunately I had a pair of boots I was able to wear for the rest of the trip.
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Trickster Coyote says: I stole your shoe for your own good! Boots are better for fending off rattlesnakes.

 

(Andrea sez: I've seen two rattlesnakes in 30 years. Where the heck did they all go anyway?)

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Andrea, at least this coyote wasn't trapping cars with an ACME Car Catcher™ and a lot of TNT. He looks wily enough... Do any roadrunners live in Death Valley?
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:D Pretty wily indeed to get the cars to stop. People were even getting out of the car. I'm all like DON'T.OPEN.THE.DOOR!!!.DON'T.OPEN.THE.WINDOW!!! for fear my city guy from da Bronx doesn't know that these animals are still wild. I was worried he would want to pet it. :lol:

 

There are indeed roadrunners out here. On the Desert Wildflower Safari of 2012 we saw one in the area around the Furnace Creek Ranch rooms where we were staying. I have not seen one on this trip however.

 

I had forgotten about "Death Valley Days". Thx for the utoob link!

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