El Capitan Meadow, Yosemite Valley, Yosemite National Park, CA, 10/28/2008
My goal with this photograph was to capture the look of El Capitan Meadow beneath its towering namesake just as the meadow became bathed in morning sunlight. Freshly arrived sunshine on grass and trees has a delicate quality that is short lived and completely lacking in harsh mid-morning light. Here direct illumination has arrived over most of this Yosemite Valley scene, while the lower right corner is still momentarily shaded. Autumn in Yosemite is a beautiful time, and although the colors are more subtle than in the American northeast, I enjoy the shades of yellow, gold, and russet that can be found here - including the brown meadow grass! El Capitan is the largest exposed granite face in the world and rises 3,600 feet above the valley floor. The formation was named by the Mariposa Battalion when it explored Yosemite in 1851. El Capitan ("the captain" or "the chief") is a loose Spanish translation of the local Native American name for the cliff. Along with most of the other rock formations in Yosemite Valley, El Capitan was carved by glaciers.
