« Posts tagged cedar mesa

Big Man Alcove

Big Man Alcove

The Big Man Panel in Grand Gulch is a large pictograph and petroglyph panel located in a very large alcove about 200 feet above the canyon floor. It’s not visible from the bottom, so you need to climb up to it if you want to see it. The focal point of this panel are the two life-sized anthropomorphic figures painted in red that seem to represent a man and woman This photo shows a wide view of the alcove and the pictographs painted within. In the future I will post up some closer photos of these figures for a better look at them. This is an amazing panel to view, and it’s easily seen on a day hike into Grand Gulch.

>> Big Man Panel & Lower Comb Wash

Mule Tower Star Trails

Mule Tower Star Trails

Even though this blog was mainly created so that I could share my rock art photos, I will occasionally share some of my photos of ruins as well. They kind of go hand-in-hand since I am usually out searching for both at the same time.

Here is my first photo of ruins posted on this blog, and it is actually one of my favorite photos taken so far this year. Back in April, my friend Jared and I headed up to the Mule Canyon Towers on Cedar Mesa just before sunset so that we could stick around for some night photography. I had this particular photo in mind when we went up there, so shortly before it was really dark out, I composed this shot on my tripod and waited for it to get a little bit darker out. My goal was to get some nice star trails behind the tower and through the window opening. Once it was dark enough out, I locked my shutter release cable and started the waiting. After about ten minutes a few clouds started to move across the sky and right into my shot! I was a bit upset by this and almost gave up, but fortunately I let my camera keep going. After about thirty minutes I finally decided to end the shot and pack up my gear. I had pretty much written off this shot as a failure at that point.

A few days later when I was back at home and going through all of my photos from the trip, I came across the shots that I took that night. I decided to process them and see how they turned out. To my surprise, I actually liked the way the clouds added some interest to the sky and was glad I did not give up on this shot!

For those of you wondering how the tower was lit, the almost-full moon was rising behind me and provided plenty of nice light on the tower so that I did not have to add any additional light to the scene.

>> Mule Canyon

Circles and Stripes

Circles and Stripes

A unique perspective of a concentric circles petroglyph found in Mule Canyon. While exploring the ruins and rock are in this particular alcove I happened to notice the light was reflecting onto the top portion of the large alcove creating a nice glow and enhancing the dark stripes above. I then framed this petroglyph so that I was able to capture part of the glowing ceiling in the top right portion of the frame. I’m very happy with the result.

>> Mule Canyon