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This image was produced using many of the processing techniques covered in my Tonality Control Video. It's available here: www.zschnepf.com

This was the scene that greeted me after my snowshoe hike up Tumalo Mountain last week. It was a very cold, crisp, and pristine morning. Exactly the type of morning I was hoping for, although I could have done without the strong wind. As you can see, Mount Bachelor had an incredible luminous glow even in the predawn twilight. It took my breath away.

These were challenging conditions to photograph in, I used a number of techniques to help me capture this challenging scene. Tripods like to sink snow this deep, cold, and soft, so I rigged the the tripod feet with snow baskets from old sets of ski poles. This allows your tripod to sit well on top of the snow securely. The strong wind was making it very difficult to get a sharp image at these long exposures. I used a couple techniques to allow for tack sharp exposures. The first was put my body directly in the way of the wind, creating a decent wind block for my camera rig. The second was to use natural wind blocks like frozen trees or snow banks.

Mount Bachelor is my favorite mountain to ride on my snowboard, and Tumalo Mountain is my favorite mountain to back country snowboard on. I've been trying to get these shots for a while. I'm pretty happy to finally have some good ones in the bag. I was sorry I had to leave my board in the car on this trip, but I could not afford the extra weight on this trek if I wanted to make it in time to get these shots, maybe next time.

You can read more about this trek on my last post.

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