Photographing El Capitan in Yosemite National Park

Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View

Welcome to Yosemite!

There are a lot of photographic opportunities in Yosemite National Park. I'm sure that statement is not news to anyone. I visited the park for the first time in September, 2016 for about 3 days and got to see a lot of it. But in 3 days I don't think you can get great photographs of everything unless you're extremely lucky.

After reviewing my photographs, I feel that I really only captured some decent shots of El Capitan. Perhaps because it is the most accessible for someone in my condition (I didn't hike at all, and especially didn't climb up any of its routes!).

El Capitan can be photographed from Tunnel View, the Merced River, El Capitan Meadow, and up close from the El Capitan Trail. I'm sure there are locations at some of the cliff tops along the southern edge of the Yosemite Valley such as the Cathedral Rocks that offer great vantage points too, but I haven't found any photographs posted from such a location.

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Location, Location, Location

Google Map of El Capitan and part of Yosemite Valley

If you've never been to Yosemite National Park, as I hadn't, here's some information about Yosemite Valley, focusing on El Capitan.

Yosemite Valley is located in Yosemite National Park. The valley is surrounded by the famous Half Dome, El Capitan, and Glacier Point formations. The Merced River runs through the valley. The valley is where the main park visitor center is located, along witih 4 campgrounds.

In the capture from Google Maps at right, which shows part of Yosemite Valley, the red marker is on El Capitan. El Capitan is at the west end of Yosemite Valley, on the north side. Across from El Capitan on the south side are the Cathedral Rocks. In the picture at the top of the page, the Cathedral Rocks are the closest 3 domes on the right side of the image. In front of them is Bridal Veil Falls (without much water during September).

The pointy part of El Capitan is called the "nose". As you can see, it points almost due south.

Best Time and Placeto Photograph El Capitan

Morning Time

El Capitan, shot from the
middle of Northside Drive

As you can see from the map, the right side of the El Capitan nose will get the morning light and the left side will get the evening light. In addition to that, the early morning shots will likely be easier due to fewer people out and about. When I visited in early September it seemed like the valley was pretty inactive until about 8:30AM or so. That gave me plenty of time to have a lot of the roads available to myself.

As you can see from the shot at left, I was able to shoot from the middle of Northside Drive (the west bound road that runs along part of the north side of the valley).

For this shot I actually got everything set up on the camera while on the side of the road. When there were no cars I went out to the middle of the road, listening for cars (which works as long as they're not a Prius!), leveled the camera and composed and took the shot.

This was taken at 8:01 AM with my Nikon D610, Nikkor 16-35mm f/4 lens, 1/320s, f/8, ISO 100. It would be much harder to do later in the day when this road is pretty well packed or has constant traffic.

During Mid-Day

El Capitan from El Capitan Meadow
Mid-day lighting at 3:03 PM

Mid-day shots aren't usually very memorable. They don't often have much wow factor. I shot some during the day including the one at left, which was taken at 3:03 PM. It's okay but the light doesn't have a great color and there were no clouds in the sky . 

The lack of clouds led me to not leave much sky in the composition. I liked the meadow but photogenically I'm not as excited by the yellow grass - I'd rather have seen it when it was green. This photograph probably works more as a vacation reminder than anything that someone would hang on a wall.

On the other hand, what I did find interesting during the day, was that there were climbers on El Capitan! I walked along the El Capitan Trail and heard them above me. 

It gave me a good excuse to pop on a telephoto lens. I shot the climbers using my Nikkor 70-200mm when I was close to El Capitan on the trail, and then when I was out in El Capitan Meadow I used my Nikkor 200-500mm and shot some more.

I didn't have the 200-500mm with me when I was on the trail so I didn't shoot that way. I wish I had because due to the increased distance of being out in the meadow, the size of the climbers is about the same between the photographs shot with either lens.

Climbers on El Capitan

The photograph above was taken using my Nikkor 200-500mm f/5.6E, 1/200s, f/11, ISO 100. I shot this from near the fallen tree out in the meadow at 1:52PM. A number of other people were there too, including climbers and photographers, one of which also had the Nikkor 200-500mm.

In the Evening

El Capitan over the Merced River
Morning shot, 7:49 AM

I only shot El Capitan in the evening from Tunnel View. I think it would work to shoot from along the Merced River west of El Capitan to get the golden sunlight hitting the west side of the nose. 

This shot on the left is a morning shot but you can see that the left side of El Capitan should get the sunset light and I think you'd have a nice photograph. 

Note that the Merced River was pretty low. If you are there in spring time these rocks would be covered. Also, the shot might be a bit better if you walked up the river a bit to get more of El Capitan out from behind the trees.

I was at Tunnel View during two evenings and enjoyed the sunsets from there. Here are a couple of different shots at different times.

Yosemite Valley from Tunnel View
4:41 PM

This photograph was taken at 4:41 PM. It's actually an HDR photograph with very subtle HDR processing - except that I don't like the white at the bottom of the sky. It was shot with the Nikkor 16-35mm f/4 at 22mm, f/10, ISO 100 (and multiple shutter speeds).

I did NOT zoom in solely on El Capitan from Tunnel View in any of my shots, although it could be done. But looking at this I think you'd agree it probably wouldn't be that great. I think the better shot is when more of the valley is included. However, different light may change that.

The shot below was taken at 6:56 PM using my Nikkor 70-200mm f/4 lens at 70mm, f/11, 1/100s, ISO 100. It points out an issue with shooting this side of El Capitan at sunset: the cliffs to the west of El Capitan cause shadows to fall across the face as the sun sets.

El Capitan at Sunset

Looking at these last two photographs, taken from near the same location (they were actually shot on different days), you can also see the difference in composition due to the focal lengths. The top is at 22mm, the bottom at 70mm. I chose to put Half Dome about in the center of the bottom image which meant that El Capitan is truncated severely.

UPDATE: And finally, I wanted to include this night shot from El Capitan Meadow - another shot of the climbers. I took this with my Nikkor 20mm f/1.8 at 20mm, f/1.8, 4s, ISO 320.

El Capitan with Lights and Stars

I hope this gives you some ideas about where to shoot El Capitan when you visit Yosemite National Park!