Milky Way over Death Valley Mesquite Sand Dunes  by jyokota

Milky Way over Death Valley Mesquite Sand Dunes

Taken on the first night of a photography workshop that @Taffy found for us. We'll be posting a lot of similar photos as we were often standing side by side. Still, it always surprises us how differently we capture the world, too! I especially liked the angle from which you see the flow of the tree's branches draping down to the sand. Light painting done by instructor James Brandon with a red head lamp. FIRST Lightroom processing, but very minimally. I initially thought SOOC was great, but James had me bump up the exposure, contrast and saturation by two little clicks each, and of course, it vastly improved the final image even with such subtle edits.
Wow...VERY cool....fav
January 21st, 2015  
i am speechless.There are no words to describe how I feel about this.WOW and FAV goes without saying!
January 21st, 2015  
Wow...just wow! Well done! It's going in my favorites, of course.
January 21st, 2015  
splendid
January 21st, 2015  
Headlamps rock. This is amazing. Truly awesome. Glad you got to go! Fav!
January 21st, 2015  
That's amazing! Very cool!
January 21st, 2015  
Breathtaking!! What a fabulous course and what a wonderful opportunity to see this Junko!! Huge Fav!
January 21st, 2015  
Congratulations on a splendid shot. What a great time you must have had.
January 21st, 2015  
Superb shot
January 21st, 2015  
Stunning shot of the Milky Way! Your workshop sounded fabulous. I would love to do one like that. Do you know if the photo workshop offers other
courses in California?
January 21st, 2015  
This is fabulous -- I love the way this one turned out!
January 21st, 2015  
@redy4et Hi Elizabeth -- yes, he does courses around the country. His website is: http://james-brandon.com/workshops/
January 21st, 2015  
Obviously -- a fav!
January 21st, 2015  
Absolutely stunning, and a clear fav.
January 21st, 2015  
Fabulous image, great composition, love how clear you captured the milky way - fav
January 21st, 2015  
Wow, wow, wow. Fav
January 21st, 2015  
INSTANT FAV!!! Exquisite .
January 21st, 2015  
Same as Kerry! Wow again, fav.
January 21st, 2015  
STUNNING!
January 21st, 2015  
This is just incredible!!
January 21st, 2015  
Looks unreal, Fabulous!

January 21st, 2015  
Wow, this is fantastic. You seem to have had a wonderful course. I'm jealous! Big fav for this one.
January 21st, 2015  
Beautiful!
January 21st, 2015  
oh yes, this is just beautiful............a whacking great fav :)
January 21st, 2015  
Fabulous image and fav!!
January 21st, 2015  
Wonderful shot, what a composition. Fav
January 21st, 2015  
Stunning, a fav
January 21st, 2015  
This is truly wonderful. Instant fav. This sounds like an excellent course.
January 21st, 2015  
Stunning.
January 21st, 2015  
Jo
A fabulous shot. Fav
January 21st, 2015  
Oh this is wonderful! So envious of both you and Taffy! You both did such good jobs. Just a little envious here.
January 21st, 2015  
Yes, really special. Could be use to remind other of the special place that nature has in our world.
January 21st, 2015  
What on earth???? This is so ridiculously stunning! And reading some of the above comments, I see I'm not alone in my jealousy :)
January 21st, 2015  
Beautiful. Love the subtly painted tree in the foreground. Great composition
January 21st, 2015  
Gorgeous.
January 21st, 2015  
crikey! that is fantabulous...
January 22nd, 2015  
Stunning picture. Congratulations on making the Trending Page. Well deserved.
January 22nd, 2015  
This is phenomenal Junko! Huge fav!
January 22nd, 2015  
Awesome! fav!
January 22nd, 2015  
Blown away... such a shot. Wonderful. I will just shut up and fav this shot.
January 22nd, 2015  
This is such a cool shot. Looks like hands reaching up to this amazing sky full of stars. I am so in awe of Taffy's work and look forward to seeing more of yours as well. Sounds like a fabulous workshop. So this tree was there but you just changed it up in Lightroom? I would get so lost in a workshop like this, I am still mostly using Auto on my new camera and doing nothing to my photos. FAV
January 22nd, 2015  
This is really gorgeous! Very interesting to hear how you did it. I'm looking forward to seeing more of your pictures from this workshop. My husband and I frequently take the same subject with the same lens and end up with very different pictures. It's always interesting how individual each photographer's vision is.
January 22nd, 2015  
This turned out really gorgeous....FAV, of course! Really interesting to hear of this workshop and see your Milky Way shots right after I attended a seminar with another photographer who does the same kind of work. Ours was a classroom format without the field instruction, but it was still fascinating to hear about how he scouts the sites, how he does the light painting of the foreground objects, what camera and lenses to use, and how to post process them. It was amazing to see him just tweak the contrast a bit, and get the MW to become so much more vibrant. Great work....looking forward to more of yours and Taffy's photos.
January 22nd, 2015  
this is beautiful! what a stars!! like that you noticed the fact that a camera can look great sooc and whit just a few adjustmens in LR can be even better ;)
January 22nd, 2015  
fav! Stunning image, looks like star dust, so pretty. I commented on Taffy's shot that she didn't have noise and nor does your shot. How do you manage that? Or is it simply that your camera handles noise much better than mine?
January 22nd, 2015  
really amazing capture.
January 22nd, 2015  
Wow, this is absolutely stunning!!!
January 22nd, 2015  
Wow - somehow I missed this shot, so I'm pleased to have found it - clever stuff - fav!
January 23rd, 2015  
Just beautiful. Thought of you as my daughter made Green Tea Dongo for her class last night!
January 23rd, 2015  
Mama, this is AMAZING!
January 23rd, 2015  
Spectacular shot - an amazing experience for you two.
January 24th, 2015  
Fantastic! Fav!
January 24th, 2015  
Replying here, too... this was an easy "share." I love this shot... it was spectacular.
January 24th, 2015  
Just stunning! Would love to take such a gorgeous shot someday!
January 24th, 2015  
The night sky alone makes a mesmerizing image but the addition of the tangle of tree branches adds a fascinating feature. Fav!
January 24th, 2015  
Wow!
January 25th, 2015  
This is just amazing and stunning, wow!
January 27th, 2015  
Just seen this on the TT, what a fantastic image, big FAV!
January 30th, 2015  
Congrats on TT. I don't understand why your photo came in at number 20 when you had more faves than others. IMO should have been much higher in the rankings!
January 30th, 2015  
Congrats on TT - this is fabulous and a fav!
January 30th, 2015  
Congrats on TT...can't believe it was #20. Deserved to be 1 IMHO:). You done good!!!
January 30th, 2015  
Awesome shot! Congratulations on TT!
January 30th, 2015  
wow!! This is my fav of the TT!
January 30th, 2015  
Congratulations Junko on making the Top Twenty with this amazingly beautiful shot!
January 31st, 2015  
this really is wonderful
January 31st, 2015  
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Sincere thanks for your comments and favs -- I was so surprised when Taffy texted me today to tell me I made it to TT . . . me??? Well, thanks to my good workshop teachers James Brandon and Brian Matiash and to this supportive community for viewing it, commenting on it, and having it. What I did best was to choose this particular angle from which to photograph this tree, but it was done with James doing the light painting! Thank you for appreciating the effort.
January 31st, 2015  
@rosiekerr and @taffy -- no doubt it made it to TT because you two helped share it ! Thanks.
January 31st, 2015  
@jyokota I was excited to see the shot on TT -- I loved the way you framed the tree off center and really gave primacy to the sky.
January 31st, 2015  
It's just exquisite!
January 31st, 2015  
Very deserving Junko, big congrats!!
January 31st, 2015  
Well if it didn't land in the TT I would have been very surprised. It's an excellent shot. You placed the tree where you did and it worked! Congrats! :)
January 31st, 2015  
AMAZING!! Congrats!!! Just stunning!
January 31st, 2015  
Congrats on TT Junko - a breathtaking shot!!
January 31st, 2015  
Beautiful capture and deserves to be in the T20
January 31st, 2015  
Wow! Big fav.
February 1st, 2015  
This is an awesome shot, and most definitely should have been in the TT! Well done.
February 1st, 2015  
Gorgeous. Fav
February 1st, 2015  
Congrats on the TT... I knew this was a great shot! :)
February 1st, 2015  
a fav!!!
February 6th, 2015  
This is amazing
February 8th, 2015  
Wow.
Awesome shot.
Great to see how little light pollution there is in the background. And at only 30 seconds I feel like I can try this without the need for a remote timer.
FAV.
February 10th, 2015  
Oh WOW
August 18th, 2015  
Stunning!
January 17th, 2016  
wonderful
April 25th, 2018  
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