Took a brief side trip to Zion National Park, Utah when I visited
Las Vegas for business earlier this year.
The Kolob Canyon scenic drive, what I consider to be more scenic of the two scenic drives in this park was closed due to the weather. So spent a few hours driving around the Zion Valley scenic drive in the heart of Zion National Park.
My previous trip to Zion was in the summer of 2007 and it was great to witness this beautiful park in the winter with snow capped mountains.
All pictures were shot with EOS 1D Mark III + EF 24-70mm F2.8 L USM on Gtizo 3541LS and Manfrotto 488RC2 Ball head.
My primary landscape combo is a EOS 40D mated with a EF-S 10-22mm F3.5~4.5 USM, but sometimes this combo is just too wide. In turn, this turned out to be an extended shoot-out with this combo for landscapes, and the images are crisp and sharp, partly due to the low ISO capabilities of the EOS 1D Mk III and sharpness of the glass. Previously I have used this combo for portraiture and candid photography, and never really had an opportunity to use it at smaller apertures.
Shot in aRGB and converted to Gray-scale using Adobe Photoshop CS4 and Nik Silver Efex Pro, as the dynamic ranges are very wide and strong contrasts between the skies and red rocks were highly distracting. To view them in color, click
here.
Also made a little side trip to
Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area while waiting for a friend to fly-in.
© Shri Chandrasekharan Photography