While camping in the Dominguez Canyon National Conservation Area a few weekends ago I took this picture of a boulder. It is right along the main trail into the canyon and always catches my eye. I have photographed this boulder before and I wanted to find a new approach to the same subject. I decided to mix it up a little by using a mix of natural and artificial light.

Here is how I made this image. The night was a bust for the usual “golden hour” or “sweet light” that I usually look for in the evening that lights-up this red sandstone canyon. It was rainy and stormy. I wanted to emphasize this stormy sky so I underexposed the sky by two full stops darkening it and emphasizing the it’s heaviness. This of course also darkened the boulder, canyon, and walls. So I added two-stacked 2 stop soft gradient neutral density filters keeping the sky dark while allowing more light in for the for the canyon and walls. I set my camera’s white balance for tungsten. This gives the sky the saturated blue color. I then placed two SB28 strobes to light the boulder. One is to the right of the boulder behind a small rock on the ground and it has a full CTO tungsten correction filter. This filter corrects the light from the strobe so that it does not have a blue cast and looks normal. The second is to the left of the boulder. It has a 1/2 CTO correction filter on it and I hand held it pointing it at the middle of the rock. i did not have a second full CTO with me. As a result there is a slightly cooler or blue cast to the light from this strobe. Both strobes are triggered by Pocket Wizard remotes.

What do you think? I would love to see your comments posted below.