Colter's Hell

Figure 1. Colter's Hell.

Yellowstone is a hotspot for not just geology, but also tourism. Over 3 million tourists visit this park every year. Winter offers a special treatment to see how the hot and cold co-exist. In fact, John Colter, first recorded white man to visit here, spent his first time in winter. Most people didn't believe what he saw and gave this place the name Colter's Hell.

While many places can claim its world-class scenery, Yellowstone features the hell-like or alien planet kind. After you have visited here in person, you won't blame why those people didn't believe John Colter, especially visiting here in winter.

I stayed in Old Faithful Snow Lodge some days during Christmas in 2011. One of my goal is to catch a Yellowstone-like winter scene. I got up early and headed out on Christmas Eve. The temperature is above 0.0 F, which is warm by Yellowstone standard. The sun was not up yet. I just walked in Geyser Hill and saw if I can find a place to get a special shot.

Basically, I need both thermal features and snow to show off Yellowstone's winter. This seems simple, but it is not easy to find a good lighting with a strong composition at the same time. After I walked a while and arrived around Giant Geyser, I saw the anticipating potentials and determined to stay put here. Here I had lots of snow on the ground and trees. The right hand side trees looked eerie and left hand side trees with mist gave some sense of the depth of the scene. I also had steams rising up to show the thermal feature of the park. The sun was peeking through the mist every now and then. Mostly it was blocked but sometimes found a hole to show up. I also liked the soft lighting condition for the cold feelings of the winter. he scene was dynamic and so I have to take lots of shots. Whenever the sun peeked through, I took some shots. Figure 1 is one shot during about 30 minutes staying alone here.

In term of good lighting and strong composition, this is the shot I tried to achieve. It is also special as you won't see similar kinds of photos often. For this shot, however, it still looks good without the steams. I wish the effects of the thermal feature can be stronger. This is a successful shot, but it does not entirely meet my expectation.

Well, this is about photography. To wait for all conditions right is extremely difficult. Most of the time, one can only try to get the most and hope for the best.