Places like Sedona have been photographed to death and particularly here because everything is so accessible and easy to shoot. You could shoot an amazing panoramic from your seat at Starbucks or go on a Pink Jeep tour with 10 tourists each carrying 10k worth of Nikons and Canons! The problem with this for me is everyone shoots the same stunningly beautiful photos. You’ve seen them in hundreds of calendars, travel brochures and postcards. Just Google Sedona “Images” and you’ll see all the same locations and rock formations.
So what’s wrong with that? Really nothing, just my personal philosophy that photography is a communication and not a decorative art. I believe every picture should tell a story or at least show a different viewpoint than the rest of the world sees. I spent three days riding around trying to figure out what this place said to me that everyone else was missing.
We were out of milk, so about 9 pm I drove to a nearby Circle K convenience store to pick up milk for the morning. I personally feel that we allow this kind of ugly commercialism to pollute a lot of our country’s natural beauty and nowhere is it more evident than in Sedona. As I walked out of the store, I saw my story. Across the highway was the moonlit profile of two beautiful buttes. The juxtaposition of this ugly convenience store across from this amazing almost spiritual landscape to me was the essence of Sedona. But how could I tell that story they were on different sides of the highway?
I set up my camera in the parking lot and shot a time exposure for the sky. The buttes were underexposed and became silhouetted. I next went across the street and photographed a time exposure of the Circle K, with car lights streaking by and I exposed for the lights of the store so everything else went black. I removed the lit part of Circle K image and placed it over the dark bottom of the landscape photo. I now had the visual story I was looking for.
Was it cheating? No, the story was there but couldn’t be told with one shot. If you are an art photographer and participate in print competitions, you know there are a million beautiful photos that never win a thing and some may be yours. If you want to win or just become a better photographer, you need to have a point of view and tell a story with all of your photos otherwise they’re just postcards.
PS: Help me name this photo for a LayerCake Collection!
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| Time exposure for the sky creating a dark silhouette. |
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| Time exposure for store lights and streaking car lights, then sandwiched with the image above |
