Ken Papaleo: X Marks the Shot: Colorado National Monument, Fruita, Colorado.

"X Shot" information.

Camera - Canon EOS 5D Mark II

ISO - 100

Shutter 1/125 sec.

F/stop - 16

Lens - 24/70 zoom

LOCATION.

1. Colorado National Monument is located south of Fruita and on Rimrock Drive.

2. It is about a four hour drive from Denver.

3. It has canyons cut deep into red sandstone

4. Wildlife in area, birds and bighorn sheep.

CHALLENGE.

I heard that this monument has good light for photography, in the morning and in the evening. I would shoot at both times to see which I liked better.

SOLUTION.

Sunrise was around 7:00 am and when it hit these east facing red rocks, they exploded in color. The best shooting for this time of day, lasted only about an hour, after that the color flattened out some. There were still nice pictures to take, but the intensity was gone. Sunset would come early, with the monument facing east, so I started shooting around 2:00 pm. The winter light was nice and only got better, as the afternoon moved on. As it turned out, sunset was around 4:300 pm, giving me 2 and a half hours of real nice light for shooting. I personally liked the evening shooting the best, just because you had good light longer and it got better, right to the end.

OTHER PHOTOS FROM THIS SHOOT.