I rouse early Saturday morning and drove about an hour to get to this location to capture this image at dawn.
I've always wanted to shoot the sunrise from this location and thanks to Fred's assignment this week it gave me a good reason to drag myself out of bed long before the early light of dawn.
Thanks for looking and good luck to all this week!
Dawn over the Blue Ridge mountains.
Edit: I updated this image with a new blending technique for the 5 bracket shots.
I'm not sure whether you achieved the impressionistic look in post or in the camera - and, frankly, couldn't care less. Great depth, nice narrative and composition, and a shot that, I suspect, conceals quite a bit of technical complexity - a little like how a Neil Young song can seem awfully easy until you pick up a guitar and try to duplicate the chord progressions. Thanks for sharing this.
Thank you very much Ipanematom and Bill for the complements!
The "impressionistic look" that you see was in fact captured in the sooc images. I shot over 200 images with various compositions that morning and most of them had much more blue and reds in the sky as the sun peaked over the far mountains. As the sun reach the height shown in this image the sky had exploded into this wonderful soft golden color just before the fog shortly came rolling in. I chose this image because I really liked the moss in the foreground and the way it helps lead the viewers eye into the scene. The golden glow on the grass and moss from the back-lighting was a huge bonus that I was happy to capture.
As for any technical complexity involved, I wouldn't say there is other than blending 5 bracketed images. Because of the dynamic range involved I had to blend 5 bracketed shots together using a new to me software (LREnfuse) that helped keep the image looking natural. My original software I used always gives my images a strange HDR effect that I have grown to dislike.
