yosemite

Yosemite Firefall: A Photographer’s Guide in 2024

We photographers generally have long lists of projects we want to do and then we have our bucket list items -- those things we can only hope we someday get a chance to shoot. As a nature and landscape photographer, the big three on my bucket list were the Subway at Zion, Fly Geyser, and Yosemite’s Firefall.

Sotheby’s to Auction Off Massive Ansel Adams Collection, Including $1M Print

Sotheby's has announced plans to auction off one of the most impressive collections of Ansel Adams' work in existence. On December 14th, over 100 of the legendary photographer's most iconic photos will be sold, headlined by an early print of Moonrise, Hernandez, New Mexico that is expected to fetch between $700,000 and $1,000,000 by itself.

Photographer Captures Rare Yosemite Falls Rainbow Phenomenon

In 2017, Utah-based landscape photographer Greg Harlow captured a rare and beautiful phenomenon in Yosemite National Park. Standing at Glacier Point, he was able to capture Yosemite Falls "turning into" a rainbow: a phenomenon that only happens at certain times of year and under certain circumstances.

Capturing Rare Yosemite Moonbows in Real-Time Video

As an astrophotographer, I had this dream of seeing the moonbow (AKA the lunar rainbow) one day in Yosemite, my favorite National Park in California. Every year, either water flow or cloud conditions prevented me from catching it. But this year, my dream came true.

My Experience Shooting the Yosemite Horsetail Firefall

My name is Aaron Chen, and I'm a photographer in the San Francisco Bay Area. I was in Yosemite for the 2019 Firefall and would love to share my experience so that others can do it themselves!

A History of the Yosemite Firefall and Tips for Photographing It

Each year from summer of 1872, the owners of Glacier Point hotel started the event of Yosemite Firefall. For seven nights a week, they would spill hot embers from Glacier Point down to the valley 3000 feet below. The event ended in 1968 when the National Park Service ordered it to stop because the overwhelming number of visitors that it attracted overwhelmed the meadows, and because it was not a natural event. NPS wanted to preserve the Valley, returning it to its natural state.

Capturing the Milky Way Over Yosemite National Park

Back in June of 2018, I was fortunate enough to make a 9-day trip to Yosemite National Park, California to capture the Milky Way galaxy over Half Dome. My entire trip revolved around capturing this image since I had captured nearly this same panorama two years prior during my first ever trip to the park in 2016.

Photographer Searching for Couple in His Epic Yosemite Engagement Photo

Michigan freelance photographer Matthew Dippel was in Yosemite National Park in California recently when he spotted a man walk out to the edge of a cliff with his girlfriend and drop to one knee. Dippel captured a breathtaking photo of the proposal from his vantage point, and now he's searching for the mystery couple in his photo.

A Timelapse of the Fastest-Ever Climb of El Capitan in Yosemite

On October 2017, rock climbers Brad Gobright and Jim Reynolds broke the record for speed climbing The Nose on El Capitan in Yosemite by making it to the top in 2 hours, 19 minutes, and 44 seconds. Photographer Tristan Greszko witnessed the climb and made this beautiful 7-minute timelapse showing how it went down.

Capturing the Incredibly Rare Moonlit Firefall at Yosemite

This is the famous and elusive Horsetail "Firefall" in Yosemite National Park, but unlike every other image you may have seen—taken near sunset around February—the fire effect in this image is caused by moonlight. That's the only possible way one could see the firefall and stars at the same time.

Photos of ‘Firefall’, When a Yosemite Waterfall Looks Like Lava

For a short time every February, when conditions are just right, Horsetail Falls in Yosemite gets transformed by a phenomenon known as "firefall." When the sunlight hits the water just right, the waterfall looks like molten lava flowing down the side of El Capitan.

Photographer Sangeeta Dey was there to see and capture the firefall this year, and her above photo has been going viral.

Photographing the Blood Moon in Yosemite

I was in the middle of Yosemite during the "Blood Moon" lunar eclipse on April 4th, 2015. Here's the story of the cool experience I had shooting it.

How an Unknown Photographer Named Carleton E. Watkins Helped Save Yosemite

Did you know that a single unknown photographer helped change the course of history for Yosemite with his photos back in 1861? The video above tells the story of Carleton Watkins, a man whose photos of Yosemite made their way to President Abraham Lincoln and helped influence the decision to turn the area into a National Park.

No Drone for You! National Park Service Bans Camera Drone Usage in Yosemite

Would you like to photograph the Upper Yosemite Falls by drone? Attach a GoPro to your newly-acquired DJI Phantom 2 and just have at it, capturing views that Ansel Adams would envy? Well, you can't, because it turns out "use of unmanned aircraft systems (drones)" is prohibited in Yosemite National Park.

This Glorious Yosemite Time-Lapse Makes Us Want to Head to California Right Now

What exactly makes one landscape, milky way time-lapse stand head and shoulders above the crowd? In a genre so over-saturated that some people have lost faith in it altogether, how do you create a time-lapse worth international attention?

We're not entirely sure, but we do know that the video above fits the bill just right -- it is, in a word, spectacular.

Photog Sets Out to Document US National Parks With Her Pinhole Camera

For most photographers, names like "Yosemite" and "Yellowstone" likely conjure impeccably detailed images in the Ansel Adams tradition. San Francisco photographer Ashley Erin Somers, however, thinks there's something to be said for a more low-fi aesthetic.

She's started a project to photograph some of the biggest attractions in the National Park system with a homemade pinhole camera, with the end goal being to produce a fine-art photography book documenting her work.

Amazing Full Moon Highline Walk Shot from Over a Mile Away

Getting the perfect shot, from the perfect angle, with the perfect perspective, is an obsession of great photographers and videographers. This is because, although there may not be any one perfect angle from which to capture a moment, a few of them are leaps and bounds more impressive than the others.

In this video from NatGeo's "The Man Who Can Fly" -- a short piece on daredevil adventurer Dean Potter -- filmmaker Bryan Smith and shooter Michael Schaefer found one of those angles, and it only took them a mile away from their subject.