Sunrise and Sunset Shots (and Golden and Blue Hours)
Sunrise seen from Watchman Overlook, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Review your Crater Lake park map while you travel to each rim overlook. This will help you determine the best compositions for those Golden Hour sunrise and sunset shots. Do your recon work prior to your photography session so you aren’t wasting precious minutes driving from one overlook to the other in search of the best vista.
What’s the Golden Hour? It’s that period of time before and during sunset, and during and after sunrise, when the light is soft and golden upon the landscape, creating depth and shadows to the scenery while adding saturated color to any clouds above. And, close along the heels of the Golden Hour is the Blue Hour. That's the period of time preceding sunrise or follwing sunset, when the landscape is bathed in shades of purple and blue. That's why it's such a good idea to arrive at your photo spot an hour prior to sunrise or sunset, because there are so many images you can capture in between.
Waiting for the sun to rise at Watchman Overlook, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Waiting for sunrise at the Sinnott Memorial Overlook, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Sunrise viewed from the Sinnott Memorial Overlook, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Figure out the times for sunrise and sunset *before* you get into the park, because you can’t expect much in the way of working cell service except at some of the higher elevations. Wi-Fi is nonexistent except at Crater Lake Lodge. During my stay, I knew the sun would rise at about 5:51 a.m. and set at about 8:49 p.m. This means I needed my camera gear set up at least 30 minutes prior to these times in order to capture compositions of the sun, not only after it had risen or set, but also as it made its way up or down the horizon line. The angle of the sun as it moves creates different colors and lighting conditions to provide a series of gorgeous before-during-after imagery.
A midday view from Palisade Point, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Sunset from Palisade Point, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Sunset's afterglow at Palisade Point, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
As the sun moves above or below the crater rim, everything above the rim’s horizon is much brighter than the landscape below. A graduated neutral density filter (grad ND) comes in handy for minimizing sunlit brilliance in order to expose for the scenery below the rim without blowing out (overexposing) the sun and sky. The image below is a grad ND “blooper” but I’m including it for you to see the difference in contrast when using this particular filter.
A grad ND "blooper" at Palisade Point, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
You can photograph sunrise and sunset handholding your camera, but a tripod helps avoid camera shake blur. If your camera has a 2-second timer, use that, too, or a corded or remote shutter release to mitigate the vibration caused when your finger pushes down that shutter button.
Hey, while you're at it, don't forget to capture some video of sunrise or sunset. Below are a couple of short video captures of sunset's afterglow at Palisade Point along the East Rim Drive and sunrise as seen from the Sinnott Memorial Overlook, just off the Rim Trail near Crater Lake Lodge.
Photographing the Stars and Comet Neowise
Neowise's first appearance in the sky that night, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Stars and Neowise Comet over Palisade Point, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
A bucket list item for this trip was to try and capture a shot of the comet Neowise over Crater Lake. This national park is a great venue for star photography, with little or no light pollution, especially on a moonless night. The added icing on the cake for me was the appearance of the comet Neowise. I wanted to photograph it over as much of the lake as I could, so I chose an overlook I’d visited earlier that day. Standing there in the chill breeze with several other photographers all socially distanced, I watched and waited. The Milky Way popped up behind me while the afterglow of the sunset in front of me kept the stars from showing up. Then, around 10:00 p.m., I detected the very faint glow of the comet’s tail. I’d read online that it’s difficult to look straight at the comet and see it clearly, and one must look to the side of the comet for a peripheral view. The writer was correct! I could see the comet outline much better by not looking at it directly.
A tripod is an absolute requirement for night shots, since ISOs will run anywhere between 2000 and 3200+ with shutter speeds of 20+ seconds and the widest lens aperture setting available (f1.4 to f2.8 or f/4 max) to make those stars really pop. No tripod = big camera blur.
Manual focus is also necessary because it will be too dark for your camera’s auto focus to work. Note that while focusing on infinity to get a wide-angle star shot, not all lenses focus on the same portion of that infinity mark (the sideways figure 8). That’s why it’s a good idea to capture a smartphone pic of your lens auto focused on infinity during daylight hours in order to refer to that photo when using manual focus at night.
Where the focus ring mark falls on infinity on one of my Canon lenses / Rebecca Latson
Where the focus ring mark falls on infinity on one of my Nikon lenses / Rebecca Latson
Now, mirrorless cameras are a different kettle of fish. My Sony Alpha camera has no focus markings on the lens. Instead, focus is achieved via a live view of the scene. Point-and-shoot cameras and some smartphones have Night settings, but I don’t know how well they work. However you work with your focus, do some practice first prior to your actual photo event. That old saying "practice makes perfect" rings true.
Neowise appearing just after sunset, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Neowise over Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
As you look at these images above, you’ll probably be wondering to yourself why it’s not lighter and you can’t see more of the crater rim and trees. Many of the beautiful star images you see on Instagram, Facebook and Flickr are composites. A shot (with camera on tripod) is captured of the area during an earlier part of the day, then it’s blended into a shot of the same location captured beneath the night sky. Yes, those are gorgeous images, but I’m a bit of a purist. What you see here is what I saw: dark on the bottom and lit up on the top, with a little bit of starlight reflecting off the water.
Once you get your star images home, you’ll need to tease out the stars (and maybe a comet) with some judicious editing. The main concern with high-ISO night photos is the “noise.” Noise is a term for those pink, yellow, and blue grains you see in your photo. Some cameras are great at minimizing the grain, while others, not so much. My DSLR cameras have quite an issue with noise, but my mirrorless cameras don’t produce as much of that grain. Regardless what camera used, night photos generally require the application of noise reduction software. There are all sorts of brands out there such as Imagenomic’s Noiseware, Topaz Denoise, and a host of others found via your search engine. Some or all of these are both stand-alone programs as well as plug-ins to Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom.
Wildflowers
It's easy to think of nothing but the "Big Picture" when viewing Crater Lake. But, you should still take the time to observe your surroundings. Don’t forget to photograph the little things you see, as they help flesh out your Crater Lake story. For instance, during the summer, there are so many wildflowers in bloom, from Anderson’s lupine to cliff penstamon to spreading phlox to silver raillardella. It’s an interesting contrast between barren, dusty, exposed pumice ground dotted here and there with small, low-growing patches of brightly-colored flowers. You can use a macro lens for your SLR or the macro setting on your point-and-shoot to photograph the flowers. Smartphones do a nice job of flower closeups, too, as do telephoto lenses on SLRs. The majority of flower shots you see here were captured either with a 100-400mm telephoto lens, or a 24-105mm lens at the 105mm focal length.
Anderson's lupine, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Pumice paintbrush, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Pussy paws, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Silver raillardella, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Western pasqueflower, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Fritillary on the flower, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Phlox, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Woolly sunflower, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Wildflowers, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
The Trip and Arrival
While not my first trip for 2020, my July visit to Crater Lake National Park sure felt like it, after staying at home since early March because of the coronavirus pandemic. If you read my previous article, you’ll know how I prepared for my visit to this park during the pandemic, and what you might expect for *your* own visit. For this article, I want to tell you what I saw and photographed (and how I photographed it) at this unique national park located in southern Oregon.
Crater Lake National Park map / National Park Service
There are two entrances to Crater Lake. I arrived via the North Entrance station, where I drove across an area of the park known as Pumice Desert. It’s a desolate dry meadow designated as a Research Natural Area, dotted here and there with trees and patches of low-growing wildflowers. Stop at the pullout to the right and take in that broad expanse of pumice and dust. To read more about Pumice Desert, click here.
Driving across Pumice Desert, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
The broad expanse of Pumice Desert, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Nine miles south of the North Entrance is the very first scenic overlook of Crater Lake I encountered. I saw crowds of people standing close together and the parking lot looked full, so I opted to bypass that first vista and continue my circumnavigation of the crater via East Rim Drive. Along the route, I stopped to photograph the view looking back toward Pumice Desert.
Looking back down to Pumice Desert, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
According to the NPS, Crater Lake has 30 rim overlooks around the 33-mile Rim Drive. Only the most popular overlooks are named on the park map: The Watchman, Cloudcap, and Phantom Ship. During the summer, if you arrive around midday (like I did) anytime between 10:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m., the light will be harsh and flat (actually, a summer haze develops any time after 9:00 a.m.). Of course, you still want to photograph what you see.
That first view of the lake, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
I’m an SLR user, so the two things that helped me mitigate that haze were a circular polarizer (CPL) and the Dehaze slider in Adobe Lightroom. For smartphone users, there are all sorts of editing apps that simulate a CPL, enhance the structure of the landscape, and eliminate some of that haze. Higher-end point-and-shoot cameras have threads on the front of their lenses onto which you can attach a CPL. Less expensive point-and-shoot cameras don’t have that option, although they will probably provide you with a number of different exposure modes, from shooting in bright light, to shade, to night.
You can also add interest and depth to the scene by including such things as flowers in your foreground, utilizing trees as natural frames, and focusing on a familiar landmark, like Wizard Island. If you are lucky, the lake water will be still enough for great reflections. FYI, from my own personal experience while there, early mornings and late evenings do not guarantee mirror-smooth lake water.
Blue water, blue sky, and natural frames, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
A lake view, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Crater Lake
We all want to get a shot of the entirety of Crater Lake, from one side to the other. An ultra-wide-angle lens (11-24mm or 12-24mm) on an SLR can capture just about all that circumference, as will the widest-angle setting on your smartphone. Multiple shots “stitched” together with your photo editing software for a panoramic composition are another option for capturing the width and breadth of the lake. In truth, any wide-angle lens will do a good job of getting *most* of Crater Lake in a single shot. Many of the overlooks around the rim only show a portion of the lake, anyway, so by including something familiar, like Phantom Ship or Wizard Island, your viewers won’t need to see the entire lake to know they are looking at Crater Lake.
Crater Lake vista, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Wherever you are within the park, make note of the shadows during different parts of the day. When I hiked up to Watchman Peak summit in late afternoon, I realized my own shadow got in the way of many of my ultra-wide-angle compositions. I tried some creative positioning of myself, but still ended up with shadows. I recommend a morning rather than afternoon hike up to the summit to prevent those intrusive selfie shadows.
An unintended selfie shadow at Watchman Peak summit, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Beyond the Crater Rim
While the actual lake and caldera rim are the stars of the show at Crater Lake National Park, there is more to see and photograph. Turn away from the rim to view Mounts Thielsen and Bailey as well as ancient tree-carpeted cinder cones. Mornings might provide interesting low-hanging clouds or fog in the valleys.
The view on the other side of the crater rim, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
A twisted wood sculpture, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
I spy with my little eye: a marmot! Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Zero in on interesting geological textures, colors and patterns such as those around Pumice Castle.
The scenery around Pumice Castle, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
Capture leading line shots of the trails you hike, like Sun Notch Trail.
Hiking along the Sun Notch Trail, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
While visiting Cloudcap Overlook, take time to inspect the twisted, bent whitebark pines, hardy survivors of a harsh environment.
The trail through the whitebark pines at Cloudcap, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
If you’ve taken the time to hike the .5-mile trail to the summit of Watchman Peak, then capture images of things you see at the summit in addition to Crater Lake. You’ll marvel at how tiny the cars appear at Watchman Overlook, where you started your hike.
A view from Watchman Peak summit, Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
A Little Extra Advice
In my previous article, I listed the lenses and other camera gear I brought along. Here, though, are some helpful non-camera tips from my own experience for traveling to Crater Lake during the summer:
- Take insect repellent. A breeze usually keeps the mosquitoes at bay, but shady spots and/or no wind mean hordes of bloodsuckers descending upon the unprepared. I sprayed on an insect repellent with 20% picaridin prior to heading out in the mornings and evenings, when mosquitoes are the most bothersome. Anything with DEET works just as well.
- If you are hiking the trails, think about wearing clothing that’s been sprayed with permethrin prior to your trip to ward off ticks. You can spray it on tents, too.
- Pack along Benadryl or other allergy meds. It was bone-dry during my July visit. Hikers and vehicles kicked up volcanic dirt and dust, creating an allergy Red Alert. Thankfully, I’d brought Benadryl and Sudafed with me to alleviate an otherwise miserable day I might have spent in allergy hell.
- It goes without saying, bring plenty of water and salty snacks. Why on earth would you bring salty snacks with you? Summer at Crater Lake means you’ll be sweating out your body’s salt. If you drink too much water on top of that, you further dilute the sodium remaining in your blood which causes all sorts of problems. If you’ve ever read Andrea Lankford’s “Ranger Confidential,” then you’ll understand what I’m saying here (btw, definitely read this book).
- Don’t forget the sunscreen. The higher the elevation, the less there is of the earth’s atmosphere to help block UV rays.
- Wear sturdy shoes, preferably hiking boots or hiking shoes. I can’t tell you the number of people I saw wearing flipflops or sandals. I even passed one woman starting out on the Watchman summit trail, wearing what could only be described as shower sandals. It’s one thing if all you plan on doing is getting out of the car long enough to snap a shot of the scene at each crater rim overlook, but it’s another to be hiking along one of the trails around there, particularly a dry, dusty, often uneven trail.
- Pack out what you pack in. I brought along my own trash bags for my refuse as well as stuff I picked up along the trail. There’s a new kind of trash out there nowadays: discarded face masks.
- Speaking of face masks, bring one or two along if for no other reason than you won’t be able to enter park buildings without one. Besides, you’ll be protecting yourself and others by wearing a face mask at a crowded overlook or along a narrow trail where social distancing is not possible.
- Keep your vehicle gassed up. There is only one place to get gasoline within the park and that’s at the 2 self-serve pumps in Mazama Village, 7 miles south of Rim Village. Sometimes, they run out – like they did during my stay - and it might be a day before the empty pumps are filled.
In addition to knowing what to expect and how to safely prepare yourself while helping others stay safe, you now know what you might see and how to capture those sights to impress your viewers and remind you of the wonderful time you spent during your Great Outdoors stay at Crater Lake National Park.
Early morning at Crater Lake National Park / Rebecca Latson
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Comments
Magnificent work- she has really captured the essence. Great writing as well. Well done
Excellent! Especially liked the shots of Neowise over the lake and Wizard Island framed through by trees. Bookmarking this article to help plan a future trip. Thanks for all of the great shots and tips!
Nice shot of Neowise over the lake. Since we live in Eugene, Oregon, our family visits Crater Lake every summer. We visited the park this year in the third week of June and camped for a couple of nights at Mazama Campground. The rim road was not yet open including the section out to the Cleawox trail down to the lake itself. While I am sympathetic to the financial issues facing the Park Service, the rim road should be opened sooner rather than waiting for so long. On the south side of the lake, the road could have been opened because there was no snow on the road. There was so little area open in the park that it forces people into the same small area rather than spreading out the crowds by having more space available.
Thanks for these marvelous photos and your awesome insights!
Crater Lake has always been one of my favorite Parks!
Did you get a chance to eat some pie at Beckie's??
Hi Ranger R - thanks for the kind words. I just didn't feel good about eating out anywhere - even if it was eating outside - and thus brought all my own food with me. That consisted mainly of stuff with which to make sandwiches (Spam, Vienna sausage, Deviled Chicken), Maruchan Cup of Noodles, and freeze-dried food I could reconstitute with boiling water. Until this pandemic is well in hand, that's how all my travel eating will be: from my own stash.
You are a most talented photographer. Your advice was an excellent combination of artistic and technical info. Sitting in cold NJ it was a pleasure to "escape". Thanks again.
As I begin my research for a trip to Crater Lake ,with the goal of photographing the Milky Way, I ran across your excellent article and high quality images . Thanks too for the practical advice.