During a recent trip to Mono Lake, I took a few photographs of a local attraction, the natural limestone “tufa tower” formations. I love landscape abstractions, and monochrome is my favorite medium for that. However, sometimes I also make Abstractions in Color. My original goal in Mono Lake was to take black and white pictures, which I did, but the blue and orange stripes on the lake in sunset and sunrise were too striking to ignore. I surrendered to color.
Many photographers like to take pictures that are different from others’. I, too, make an effort to point the camera at something different from the most obvious composition. When photographing with others, however, sometimes I will find myself right beside a photo peep and we are both capturing the same scene. Some places are limited in what they offer. In some cases, going away from the other photographer(s) for the sake of originality may be impractical. For example, a few feet to the right maybe down a cliff. Furthermore, being realistic, there is hardly a scene that has not been photographed several times before. And this is OK, since I like to think that using in-camera techniques and post-processing, I can make an image that reflects my unique vision.
Location: Mono Lake, CA, USA;
Equipment: Nikon Z50, AF-S NIKKOR 70-200mm F2.8G, tripod, Lee Polarizer, 4×6 Color Graduated Resin Filter (Soft Edge, Cyan), and 6 stop ND filter;
Settings: 175 mm, f/18, 5”, ISO 100;
Tips: The color filter from Lee helped to enhance the blue color of the mountain, better matching the blue stripes of the water. The orange and blue stripes on the lake are natural and result, at least in part, from the angle of the sun on the salty water in sunset.
Edited to add: another crop of this image has been featured by LeeFilter for their June, 2021 selections. Below is the evaluation of the jury:
Good morning!
Congratulations!
Your image has been selected by Harry for our LEE Filters June YourView. Here is what he had to say about your image:
This image is a good example of the true usage of a tint grad filter, both to drastically improve the mid-tones and make the yellows/oranges jump out of the image specifically, whilst not effecting or touching any other colours. The background strikes me most as a real striking contrast between warmth and cold. Strangely I find the rocks a little distracting, and would’ve personally been inclined to shoot another image without them to truly capture the contrast between colours.
All five images selected are being uploaded and will be showcased on our website here. The images will also be shared across our LEE Filters social media channels from Monday 5th – Friday 9th, giving you the exposure you deserve, so do look out for them!
Thanks again for taking the time to enter YourView and continuing to support LEE Filters.
Kind regards,
The LEE Filters Marketing Team
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It is all about the light 
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