Sentinels of the Night

This is my interpretation of the famous four hoodoos in Devil’s Garden. I photographed them during my visit to Grand Staircase-Escalante NM in May.

 

Devil’s Garden is very easily accessible and thus maybe the most photographed part of the Grand Staircase-Escalante NM. With its closeness to the parking lot, it was the perfect place for me to visit after my strenuous night at the “eye of earth” flic.kr/p/W6brbo

 

It was also my first try to shoot nightscapes with my new Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM lens, bridging the gap between my Samyang 24mm and Sigma 35mm primes on one side and my Canon EF 70-200mm lens on the longer end. I therefore took this image at 50mm, right in the middle of my previous gap in focal length.

 

I am pretty impressed with the result. While there are faster 50mm primes on the market, they probably cannot beat the sharpness of this beautiful lens. Even wide open it is tack sharp and shows no coma at all. The f/2.8 aperture is no problem if when using a tracker for the sky.

 

Of course I also captured he four hoodoos with other lenses. So there will be more shots of these funny four guys. Stay tuned…

 

- Astro-modified Canon EOS 6D

- Canon EF 24-70mm f/2.8L II USM

- iOptron SkyTracker

- LowLevelLighting with 3 LED lights

 

Foreground:

- 3 x 50s @ ISO6400 from fixed tripod; stacked in PS

 

Sky:

- 3x 50s @ ISO6400 tracked, stacked with fitswork4

 

Thanks for all your faves and comments.

 

Prints available:

ralf-rohner.pixels.com/

Done