““Your most important gear is your eye, heart, and soul””
Valle de La Luna…Atacama Desert…Chile. Valle de la Luna is known for its landscape of dunes, mountains, and rock formations, formed after eons of flood and wind. It is the driest nonpolar desert on earth. I was travelling on my first photo trip with three distinguished professional photographers: Art Wolfe, Ignacio Palacios, and Kevin Raber. On this trip I had a Nikon V2—small and easy to carry. We were here early to catch the sunrise, or rather the changing light of the valley as the sun rose. It was tough walking…and tricky to get a steady perch amongst the steep and rocky terrain. The valley, the dunes and the mountains were breathtaking. However, it was to be the first of many times this trip that I would be frustrated about my Nikon V2’s limitations in very low light ... which is exactly what I had here. So, I waited. I noticed there were various stone outcrops emerging from the valley floor. I waited. I waited some more. I waited for the sun to hit one of these stone monuments. And it finally did.
This was the result of patience and visualizing the shot that I was looking for. And hoping it would happen. I was fortunate that the sun lit up something that was interesting and that this glimmer of morning sun provided exactly what I need for capturing the essence of the morning. Using the 30-110mm lens, I still could not get close enough to frame the picture as tight as I wanted it. Therefore, this image is cropped from the original. However, this process also began my journey into digital photo processing at a level that I had not realized was possible. All this learned from our pro photographers on this trip. I have many images taken from this trip that, despite the lack of semi-professional equipment, I am very proud of. And this confirms my belief that it is not the equipment at all that makes the photo—it is the artist behind it.