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.

Let me interrupt - I know that my blogs are being read - I would really like to hear your thoughts or comments, good or bad. You should be able to leave comments below without having to log in. Please let me know what you think of what I have to say!

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! 

Yosemite National Park Day 2 - The Valley

At 4:50AM on Tuesday, September 6, 2016, I woke up in Yosemite National Park at site #410 in Crane Flat Campground. Or, it could have been heaven. I wasn't sure at first. At least not until I started getting moving and had to deal with the bear container. And, I think I had been grinning all night.

It was 51 degrees Fahrenheit with clear skies. The sky was light but the sun wasn't in sight - it was the perfect time to get going!

I got dressed, brushed my teeth, and left the campground as stealthily as I could. I went to the Crane Flat Store and filled up with fuel. That's a good time to take care of that - there was only one other person fueling at that time of day. The other times I'd pulled through the store it was busy as heck. There wasn't any other fuel for maybe 50 miles so the Crane Flat Store always had a waiting line - for fuel as well as the store itself, the pay phone, and the restrooms.

Half Dome from near Curry Village

I left the store and headed east on Big Oak Flat Road towards the valley for my first time. I thought I'd hit Glacier Point but after merging on to El Portal Road and the Southside Drive, and then getting to the fork in the road with Wawona Road, I decided to go get my Half Dome shots instead and didn't take the turn.

I drove to the end of the valley, driving through Curry Village and both Pines Campgrounds and discovered there weren't any great shots of Half Dome from there. I went back to the meadow where Curry Village Drive intersects with Happy Isle Loop Road and parked the Explorer. I got a few shots from there of Half Dome and the meadow. I really planned to go back there sometime to walk around the meadow or hopefully even the Mirror Lake Trail but never did make it. I guess that'll be for another visit.

Looking North at the valley near Curry Village

When you look at Half Dome from that meadow it's hard to tell the scale. The meadow (well, Curry Village) is at about 4,000 feet elevation. The top of Half Dome is at 8,839 feet, approaching 5,000 feet or just shy of a mile higher than the valley and almost straight up from the valley floor. Impressive!

This shot of Half Dome isn't great. The sky was clear with the sun behind the mountain. I tried editing it to get some blue to come out but no luck. And, the granite has a blue cast. I'll have to work on it...

I didn't think that the sunrise was going to much good from that location; the sun was going to rise behind Half Dome. I decided to head back to El Capitan to see what I could get there.

North Dome (I believe - the peak on the left)
and Half Dome

El Capitan is at the south-west end of the Yosemite Valley. For those of you who don't know, which I didn't until I started looking into Yosemite, the Yosemite Valley area is the main tourist attraction part of Yosemite National Park. Yosemite National Park is about 45 miles high by 35 miles wide, encompassing about 1,200 square miles. It is roughly the size of the state of Rhode Island and was visited by about 4.3 million people in 2015.

The Yosemite Valley, which is where the Yosemite Village including the Ansel Adams Gallery, views of Half Dome, El Capitan, and Yosemite Falls, is about 7 miles long and 1 mile wide. The Merced river falls into the valley from Vernal Falls and meanders through the valley from east to west. The Yosemite Valley is probably the most famous part of the park but it is not the entire park.

One of the valley's permanent residents

There was some road construction going on during my visit so I got to detour around the Yosemite Village area. As I was getting out of the built up portion of the valley I encountered a deer in the road. He basically paid me no mind after he convinced himself I wasn't going to run him over, taking his time to get out of the road and continue grazing along the sidewalk. I'm guessing that he's probably encountered a human before.

I continued on towards El Capitan along Norhtside Drive, passing by the Yosemite Falls Trail entrance. It's quite a noticeable structure, leading to the tallest waterfall in the United States at 2,435 feet high (a bit less than 1/2 of a mile). However, I had found the Yosemite Conservancy's Yosemite Falls webcam and knew that there was no water coming over the falls. It was bone dry and I thought I might walk up the trail but never did make it. In fact I didn't even get a picture of the entrance.

El Capitan peeking through some pine trees

I started glimpsing El Capitan through the trees. What an imposing bit of rock! It sits closer to the road than Half Dome and has about a 3,000 foot face. I actually like how it seems to be revealed to you slowly as you approach from the Village end of the valley, building up the excitement. I have watched a few YouTube videos about people climbing El Capitan and I have seen the same gradual view of the mountain. Now I was seeing it in person!

The traffic at this time was still pretty good, by the way. It was still about 7:00 AM and the rest of the tourists were probably still in bed or just getting their breakfast. I hadn't eaten yet, saving that task for a bit later, after I tried to get a sunrise shot or two. I was only going to have a few mornings in the park, and probably only one in the valley, and I didn't want to waste it eating.

The sun greets El Capitan

I pulled off the side of the road a bit west of El Capitan on one of the turnouts and set up to get some shots as the sun came up and hit the face. What a lovely site! I would end up spending most of my time in the valley shooting El Capitan instead of Half Dome or anything else. The Merced had water but not a lot. The waterfalls were not of interest in the limited time I had. The village itself isn't really that photogenic and once the other tourists started arriving it wasn't that fun to negotiate around them (especially with the road construction).

I shot a good number of photographs with my DSLR and then headed back to the village after the sun was basically fully up over El Capitan. I did stop and take a few shots from the Merced.

I had to climb over a good number of boulders to get to the location where I shot the Merced / El Capitan shots from and I have to say, I enjoyed the heck out of it. There was another guy there also shooting, one stop up from mine. I ended up walking around him so I could be in front of him, ruining his shot instead of the other way around.

El Capitan from the Merced River

He wasn't getting his feet wet though and I was. I really wanted to be over the water but never did find a truly great spot. I tried a few places but with the water so low I wasn't going to get any kind of reflection. For the photogs, I found my Nikkor 20mm f/1.8G was not wide enough. I had to switch to my 16-35mm f/4 in order to fit this shot.

It struck me how lucky I was to have the selection of lenses I needed. I actually had them laid out in the back of the Explorer. When I got to this location I tried the 50mm to see if it was okay, which it wasn't. By the time I'd tried the 20mm and realized I needed an even wider lens, I was not only grinning about being in Yosemite Valley but I was also grinning about my photo gear.

I had my lenses laid out like a smorgasbord of nice glass and was using them (well, I hadn't used the telephotos much - yet).

And, I thought I was making good choices. If I wasn't carrying my gear bag I did a quick look through a lens to see if it would work. If not I'd switch it with the one that would work. And I had a lens for most needs.

What I didn't have, though, was a neutral density for the 16-35 that would let me slow down the exposure to get the silky water in front of El Capitan. I was a bit bummed, especially since I'd made half of an attempt to get one from Tempe Camera before leaving but they didn't have one (for the Cokin system). However, once I got to the water and saw there wasn't anything to slow down anyway my grins came back.

Phone booth and shuttle outside Degnan's Deli

I continued on to the Yosemite Village area where I walked around a bit. I got a wonderful breakfast burrito and dark, strong, hot coffee from Degnan's Deli. The burrito is NOT on the menu. I had visited the main Yosemite Store, looking for hot coffee. I picked up souvenirs but they didn't like like they'd be good for breakfast so I put them in my Explorer and kept walking.

I had met a young couple on a sidewalk and the woman had a coffee. I asked where she got it and they told me Degnan's so I promptly asked about a breakfast burrito and the man said he'd had a huge one there. I was on my way!

I sat outside to eat it, observed constantly by squirrels, and watched the shuttle come and go. Afterwards I called my wife (I wasn't sure that anyone else's wife would answer my phone call) using the pay phone. No cell phone reception for me.

I walked through the Ansel Adams Gallery where they had an original print of "Muir Pass, the Black Giant" priced at only $84,900. I was at least $100 short so I didn't get it.

I strolled through the visitors center with a lot of information about the park. I got to see a life size bronze statue of John Muir. I sat outside of the theater deciding if I wanted to wait for the next show and took a shot of the mountain above the village.

Ansel Adams Gallery

Bronze statue of John Muir

The view from the theater

My wife had put in an order for a stainless steel souvenir ring so I stopped in the store again to get that. I have to say that I have kind of changed my souvenir purchasing. I like getting something from the places I visit but I don't need useless things.

In the past I've tended to buy T-shirts and I'd wear them. But I've got so many of them (including concert and sporting event shirts) that I gave away a good number that I'd never worn at Christmas last year to a family we sponsored at work. I have been avoiding buying them the last couple of years and instead I've been getting ball caps.

I wear ball caps when I'm camping and not getting a shower in order to hide my (barely) less than perfect coiffure. But the caps that were available were just not to my liking. They had a lot of calligraphy type fonts which looked like gangster styles to me and I just didn't care for them.

Heading to El Capitan along Northside Drive

What I started last year was getting stainless steel rings and I kind of like them. I got my first one from the gift store at Cape Foulweather on the Oregon coast on my way to my 40th high school reunion last year. Then I picked one up from the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. I added one from Yosemite. Then it was off for some time in front of El Capitan.

I passed by Camp 4 and was tempted to drive through it. That is where the people stay that plan to climb El Capitan and the other rocks like Half Dome. But I kept going...

Getting full of myself, I wanted to try to get to the base of El Capitan. I first pulled in to the El Capitan picnic area thinking I might be able to get to it from there. Since there was no one else around I decided it would be a good place to remove my long underwear in the outhouse. Since there was no one around but me it must have seemed like a good place for about 5 other cars to pull in to while I was changing my clothes, and for the occupants of those cars to see if the bathroom was available.

El Capitan's first line of defense

After getting out of the bathroom, I grabbed some gear and walked down the trail towards El Capitan but soon realized (after it came in to view) that I was quite a ways from it. I got back in my Exploder to drive a bit closer.

I got to the next pull off where there's a trail head. I didn't notice the trail head at first so started trying to just make my way through the pines, boulders, and underbrush up to the base of the cliff. I didn't make it too far. I climbed up a good number of boulders, wiggled through some stickery shrubs, but it became too much for me to navigate while holding my tripod.

I headed back to the car and that's when I saw the nice, wide, manicured trail with a number of other folk on it so I headed down it.

I got a ways down and started talking with a pretty young slender gal (aren't they all?) about the face. She said the trail went right up to the face - something I never found out because I started shooting from right there and just didn't finish the trek. Another thing I'll have to do on my next visit.

The reason I got distracted was because there were climbers on the mountain. I started shooting photographs of them. I had my Nikkor 70-200mm telephoto zoom and put it on. Other folks were passing by and a family of 4 got very interested in the shots and wanted to see them on the back panel. You could see some details about the climbers, their gear, and the cliff face itself. Then a group of about 5 young men who were also photographing stopped and took some shots and we talked for a while. It was a photographic geek and appreciation fest for maybe 45 minutes or so! Man I was enjoying my visit!

El Capitan Meadow, looking southish

I decided to head back to my Explorer, then drove to the El Capitan Meadow which is across the Northside Drive from El Capitan. There is a good bit of parking on the meadow side of the road and I took advantage of it and then walked out in to the meadow near a fallen tree that was also in shade.

The meadow has wonderful, long grass even though it was more brown than green in early September. But it's the type of meadow you don't see a lot of in Arizona. I'd seen another meadow the year before at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon and also enjoyed it. I hadn't wanted to leave it either.

This time I took my Nikkor 200-500mm f/5.6 with me into the meadow. I set up near the fallen tree where there was no one else.I got my 200-500mm lens on and started taking some shots. Within about 10 minutes I had a number of other folks either talking to me or congregating at the fallen tree, wondering why I was there. I think there were about a dozen people there. That was okay until the photography expert decided to join us.

Climbers on El Capitan

I shot some photographs of the climbers using the 200-500mm lens. The photography expert was asking how the lens was doing to which I replied it looks pretty good so he went to get his copy along with 2 tripods and 2 cameras. I didn't mind until he almost stepped on my bag with my other 4 lenses in it. I guess the shot was so good where I was in the open field that he couldn't set up 5 feet away in order to avoid stepping on my equipment.

I got up and left and went to take shots of other things in the meadow.

I shot some follow up pics from the meadow and decided to cap off my valley day by visiting Tunnel View.

Tunnel View is a favorite viewpoint east of the long tunnel on Wawona Road, looking into Yosemite Valley. There's a good chance you've seen photographs from the view point. A recent (I believe September 2016) issue of National Geographic had a nice shot from there (actually, from up on the hill above the parking lot).

I went up there to see what I could see of the sunset. There were a decent group of tourists assembled, and a few DSLR folks too. I couldn't help myself - I had to join them!

Tunnel View Viewpoint with El Capitan on the left,
Cathedral Rocks on the right,
and Half Dome distant in the middle

I took some shots there and they were okay - you have to take a photograph there if you visit Yosemite. It wasn't until later that I realized the iconic shots from that location include Bridal Veil Falls, to the right of Cathedral Rocks.

Since there was such little water flowing over it I didn't even notice that it was there, or more precisely, I didn't notice it was missing.

Afterward I headed back to camp, stopping to take a few shots along the way from some viewpoints along the Big Oak Flat Road which I hadn't stopped for in the morning. It was getting to be about 5:00 PM and I wanted to get back to camp before it was completely dark in order to make another helping of ramen and sausage and Ritz crackers! I needed fuel to keep the grin alive!

Looking south from Big Oak Flat Road

Counting down to Yosemite

With about a week to go before I hit the road for my Yosemite trip, I find I can't think of much else. My wife probably wishes I'd give some consideration to our anniversary but that is is a struggle!

I'm excited to see Yosemite for the first time, but I know my experience is not going to include the best the park has to offer. Spring time is the best time for viewing the waterfalls. When I look at the live webcam of Yosemite Falls, I'm a bit underwhelmed. There appears to be zero water coming over the falls. I'm guessing the rest of the falls are similar. I can't tell how the Merced river is, but I'm guessing that it too will be less spectacular than other times.

I've known that would likely be the case when I made these reservations but I still had to go. I had wanted to go earlier in the year but due to surgeries and other health issues I was unable to. I decided I still had to get out somewhere this year and Yosemite grabbed my attention even with the diminished waterfalls.

I figured that if nothing else, I'd be able to do some scouting as well as see the granite and Tuolumne Meadows. Plus, I'm going to visit Sequoia and King's Canyon National Parks, and I may add a night at Joshua Tree National Park.

I'm just excited to get out and visit somewhere new. The crowds should be thinned out a bit now that a lot of schools have resumed. Who knows, with the waterfalls dried up there may be an opportunity for photographs that only become available at this time of year!

And, I'm already trying to figure out a plan to re-visit the North Rim of the Grand Canyon before the end of the year. Plus my brother Rick and I are talking about something in Colorado where he lives (Rocky Mountain National Park or Mesa Verde National Park). I sure hope that this trajectory continues and I get to experience more of our nation's parks on their 100th Birthday - Centenial Year!