Carlsbad Caverns National Park (big cave)

In an effort to beat the the Texas heat we drove over to the New Mexico mountains. Stopped by Carlsbad and saw the cave. Was very neat, my first time shooting a cave so it was an adventure and a lot of fun.

All shots with a 50D 11-16mm lens and flash. Did a fair amount of post darkening and coloring the pictures to get them to look more "cave" like.

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Great shots... were you using a tripod as well?

atexasphotog wrote in post #10823987
Great shots... were you using a tripod as well?

Thanks! Unfortunately not. The ranger told us no tripods were allowed (probably because it is so dark inside). So I was limited to handhold and flash.

I'm pretty sure I used a tripod there last year. Had to be very careful not to block the passages. I may be the cause of a new rule.

Anyway, cave shots are fun and you did really well with these. Shots without flash are quite different. Not necessarily better, but different.

excellent set

sparker1 wrote in post #10825090
I'm pretty sure I used a tripod there last year. Had to be very careful not to block the passages. I may be the cause of a new rule.

Anyway, cave shots are fun and you did really well with these. Shots without flash are quite different. Not necessarily better, but different.

Thanks. The ranger was pretty adamant about no tripods so maybe you are the reason, just kidding

I really would like to go again. Shooting with a flash was pretty challenging. It is extremely hard to bounce the flash right. A lot of the time you will completely blow out a rock or a wall close to you so you have to be very careful. Also, the combination of flash and near darkness really zaps the color out of the rocks and makes them appear near white. So a little post work has to be done to make the color more natural.

BKATX wrote in post #10827124
Thanks. The ranger was pretty adamant about no tripods so maybe you are the reason, just kidding

I really would like to go again. Shooting with a flash was pretty challenging. It is extremely hard to bounce the flash right. A lot of the time you will completely blow out a rock or a wall close to you so you have to be very careful. Also, the combination of flash and near darkness really zaps the color out of the rocks and makes them appear near white. So a little post work has to be done to make the color more natural.

Funny I was there last year and it seems like everybody had a tripod except me. Hard to get great pictures down there without one. You did a fine job on yours.

Just for fun, check out my Carlsbad Cavern post from last year.

https://photography-on-the.net …highlight=carls​bad+cavern

sparker1 wrote in post #10831616
Just for fun, check out my Carlsbad Cavern post from last year.

https://photography-on-the.net …highlight=carls​bad+cavern

Thanks for sharing Stan. Nice shots there. Did they have green lights on when you were there? We didn't see any greens, only yellows and reds.

BKATX wrote in post #10833564
Thanks for sharing Stan. Nice shots there. Did they have green lights on when you were there? We didn't see any greens, only yellows and reds.

There was green in several places, as I recall.

Maybe a monopod and high ISO would work?
Number three is very mysterious.