Now to get them sleeved and sequenced and boxed.
Here's a little sample. Some of them are scenes never seen before from Shiprock. Others more common. Some right at parking areas and others had a good bit of climbing and walking.
From contact proofs.
The White Tower. 120 Angulon backed into the last corner of a little ledge. I didn't see the overhang in the upper right. The camera was so tight up against the cliff that I couldn't get holders in and out. Polarizer to cut the glare. Looks like the horizon line has dissolved and the shadow is just hanging. This was the further-ist spot for a climb into a place I had never been.
Southwest face. Off the road that crosses the South Dike about mid-morning. Yellow filter. 190 Wide-Field Ektar that I bought for 300 bucks at Kurt's Kamera Corral on Central Avenue in Albuquerque in about 1994. It still has the price tag in one corner of the lens board.
The Salt Cave. 120 Angulon. No filter. Tripod center column was hitting the ground. Had to dig a few pebbles out so it would be clear.
East face detail. 450 Nikkor. Looking at this one. Hard to know where to start and stop. The light on the face was open shadow, but the plains bounce light back up better in other places. Polarizer to cut reflections off the rock. Tough camera position and a little bit of a struggle to get up the talus slope.
Little neck group in evening light. 120 Angulon. Yellow filter. Long slog to get up, with rattlesnake. That's the main rock shadow all the way to the right. Clouds coming and going. We'll see. Might be too much. I was after the biggish neck with it's long shadow streaking out behind it, but would have to come later in the year. The Sun was too far to the Northwest.
Afternoon light from the hill grave site. 120 Angulon and also a 190 version. Have to be careful about shadows jumping ridges and distorting. Yellow filter. I was up here three times: scouting, dawn, dusk. Have to lay them all out together in sequence. I love this image.
Little neck shadow jumping a dike. 190 Wide Field Ektar, Yellow filter or none. Leaving the little shadow on the right side. Needs it. Had to really scramble to get this, then scramble again when I ran out of holders.
East face boulder field. 120 Angulon. One of my favorite rocks at Shiprock. Used to be quite a walk to get over to it, but now folks are driving all over the place and tracks come right up to it.
Little dots. To go with The Dot. I'd never seen these dots before and the camera position is on a loose fractured slope. Sporty to the extreme. 190 Ektar, no filter. May use a little negative retouching to firm up the main dot. And then never print it. From just off the ridge just below the Hermit's cave on the North shoulder. Looks like an easy walk up. It's not.
Shiprock has a sunlit side and a shadow side most times of the day and when the wind is blowing a windward side and a wind shadow. I tend to try and keep all that in mind. This day on the North shoulder there was a howling wind out of the West. Then it died to nothing. I hadn't shot a thing but noticed this wall and the little dots. I got down this loose slope off the ridge when the wind died, but was uncertain about getting back up. The slope only 60-80 yards...then a drop off. Lonesome place.
South dike detail. East side of the South Dike in the afternoon open shade. Polarizer. 450 Nikkor or the 12 inch Ektar. Tough to get good camera position on the talus slope.
East face boulder field. My favorite boulder again. 190 Ektar and a polarizer. This is a little darker than a print would be.
The Meteorite. West dike. 190 Ektar and a polarizer.
South Dike shadow. 450 Nikkor. Yellow filter.
Table Mesa. 450 Nikkor.
Morning light on the West Dike. 450 Nikkor and a blue filter. No wind and a beautiful morning. That dike shadow doesn't last long. I took the shadow photo, (6 from the top), from that dark-topped hill.
Table Mesa. 450 Nikkor during a dust storm. They blew through in sequence about 30 mins apart.
South Dike. 190 Ektar and blue filter.
I had four lenses with me, all fixed lenses. No zooms of course for the 5X7 Deardorff. Some quite old. I used all four. 120mm Super Angulon, 190 Wide Field Ektar, 12 inch Commercial Ektar, 450mm Nikkor. Would have hated to be without any one of them. Used a polarizer, yellow, orange, (once), blue and no filter. Worked out of an old F64 camera pack exclusively. No film holder problems. Gitzo tripod with carbon fiber legs but a big heavy #4 head for stability.
