Putting the viewer of our photograph next to us when we took the photograph is just part of the journey. We also need them to feel the heartbeat of that moment that made us stop in the first place. Adding to this is bringing a visual depth to our landscape photograph so the viewer can walk through it over and over again. In this pursuit, lots of small subtleties add up to big drama. Case in point, looking down the Hardy Creek canyon, MT. The foreground darkness brings up mystery while the soft clouds’ brightness pull the eye through. There is layer upon layer, each one a tad lighter until one comes to the God beam that then, brings the eye back to the foreground to enjoy the journey all over again. The drama comes from a bunch of simple elements.

Tint can and does play havoc with B&W, especially in certain situations. Those are when there is a preponderance of red or green. In Monument Valley, there is plenty of red. So if your B&W appears “flat,” you might have a tint issue and didn’t even know it. Simply go into ACR and lower the tint and watch your image. You will quickly see for yourself tint in B&W.

The telephoto, in this case 600mm, is not your typical lens for a landscape. With not clean white and barely a touch of black, it’s not your typical successful black and white. What provides the foundation of possible photographic success is all the layers, all the shades of gray. These help the mind’s eye travel through the photograph, each time a little more appears, and more shades of gray appear. It’s then that the clouds in the middle of the frame break up the layers, and the surprise intrigues the traveler. All that wraps up the image into a simple click, the camera doing all the lifting. It’s the power of the layers of shades of gray.

I’m a sucker for great clouds, and this afternoon, the thunderhead was performing! It grew and grew, and for the Z 6III’s Dark Monotone, it was a simple click. But the rest, well, just wasn’t working. I walked almost a half mile trying to find a foreground to go with the ok middle ground and killer sky. But nothin. The foreground you see isn’t very nice, had to use the Yellow slide in B&W mode in ACR to make somethin happen there. Hate when the heart and camera don’t get together, just couldn’t swing it!

The Missoula Valley runs basically east and west. The Bitteroot Valley runs basically north and south. One carved by the Clark Fork and the other by the Bitterroot. Where the two rivers meet creates a perfect T of the two valleys. Looking south from runway 29, you can see the Bitteroot Valley fade in the distance, and the pending storm fills the void beautifully. This is a simple click using Monochrome to dramatize the stacking of the clouds and the downhill slope. I enjoyed the meeting at the T.