Why I Won’t Be Photographing The Firefall In 2020 (New Restrictions Below)

Published on: by William McIntosh

At some point in the Winter of 2010 I saw my first shot of the firefall effect on Horsetail Fall in Yosemite.  It may very well have been on 500px and at first glance, I thought I was looking at lava pouring  off a cliff in a forest.  Intrigued, I read the description and was stunned to find out that this was happening during the last two weeks of February every year from a small waterfall that was located somewhere around El Capitan.

So the following Winter, I set off during late February to see

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Snowed In At Yosemite National Park

Published on: by William McIntosh

First of all, please accept my apologies for neglected my blog for a few months.  Since my last post, my daughter got married, I shot like a crazy man during the Summer,  added an online class to my curriculum, made another trip to Europe and a quick trip up the Oregon Coast, and I’m just now sitting down to catch my breath during the Christmas break.  Finding time to upload content to this blog has become more of a challenge lately, but I’m hoping to do better in 2020.

I had originally planned to get a post up after shooting during back to back to back snow storms in Yosemite last February, so I guess I’m about a year behind.  Snow in on the Yosemite Valley floor has been increasingly rare for the past 10 years or so, and more rare still have been longer weekends when I can get away from the college and shoot.  So when everything lined up and I saw “heavy snow” in the forecast for Yosemite on a day when I could actually drive up and be there, I was off like a shot.  It’s all a bit foggy now, but I must have driven

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A Stormy Day In The Alabama Hills

Published on: by William McIntosh

Last Monday I headed up to the Alabama Hills to try out some time-lapse with some stormy skies.  This was my first official attempt at time-lapse after experimenting a bit over the past few weeks. I have been heavily influenced by both Michael Shainblum and Michael Oblinski, and while this attempt isn’t remotely close to what these guys are posting, it was definitely fun to see what I could come up with as a first effort.  I’ve also been watching a ton of storm chasing videos lately and even though this was a weenie storm compared to what they are getting in the midwest, at least it was SOMETHING as we typically don’t see anything like this in North Orange County in the Summer months.

Secondly, I’ve never used Adobe Premiere before, and so I had quite a bit of fun combining footage from my GoPro and iPhone in addition to the time-lapse footage from my D750. I’m hoping to post more video content onto my youtube channel in the near future.

Horsetail Firefall Update, 2019

Published on: by William McIntosh

I just got back after spending two weeks shooting some fairly heavy snow storms in Yosemite.  I hope to have a blog post at some point in the next couple of weeks, but in the mean time, I wanted to give an update on the Horsetail situation for 2019.

As most of you are aware by now, the best color on the Horsetail Falls generally happens during the last two weeks of February.  For 2019, we have goods news, and bad news…

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A Look Back At 2018

Published on: by William McIntosh

I’m a day or two late with this as I was camping out near Lake Powell over the last couple of days with overnight lows hovering around 12 degrees.  Here’s a look back at the photos I took or edited in 2018.  Looking forward to more photography in 2019!

Discovering Beauty And Danger In South Africa

Published on: by William McIntosh

Last September I was already making plans for my vacation in Summer 2018.  I knew I wanted to hit the Southwest again, especially during July to get some Milkyway photos and to spend more time in the Bisti Badlands and possibly the North rim of the Grand Canyon, but an opportunity suddenly arose when my colleague at Mt San Antonio College asked me to accompany his group to take some photos as they competed in the World Choir Games in South Africa from July 6 – 20.  I had never been to Africa and he offered to pay my way there, so, not being a complete idiot, I immediately said yes.  With that in mind, what follows are not photos from a photography trip, but shots taken while accompanying some very talented college singers on their two week trip through South Africa.

Our itinerary had us landing in Johannesburg, competing for a week in Pretoria before flying from Johannesburg to Cape Town.  When I first got the news,

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The Many Faces Of Badwater Basin

Published on: by William McIntosh

I saw my first photos of Badwater Basin many years ago.  The vast, white hexagons spreading out to the horizon instantly grabbed my attention as I couldn’t tell if I was looking at ice, snow or sand.  It turned out to be none of those as I was actually looking at salt.  Couple that with the fact that badwater basin is the second lowest point in the Western Hemisphere and I couldn’t wait to get out there with my camera.

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Yosemite’s Horsetail Fall Parking Is Now By Permit Only (2018)

Published on: by William McIntosh

When Galen Rowell took his now infamous shot of the Horsetail Fall effect in February of 1973 there may have been a few people around gazing at the falls, but it was primarily Galen and a single Ranger who were standing in just the right spot.  Last year, literally thousands of people

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