Panoramic view of the iconic Colorado River at it gooseneck curves through the majestic landscape of southern Utah west of Moab. I'm actually in this shot, standing atop one of the white rock capped plateaus (Gooseneck Viewpoint) to the far right of the frame. This is a 9 shot (5 exposures each) 45 images in all panorama composite image shot with the DJI Mavic 2 Pro drone (just outside of Canyonlands Nat'l Park boundries). The road to get here (Shafer Canyon Road) is accessed from Island in the Sky Road which is in the park and was quite a trip, offering amazing views - right on the edge of cliffs in some sections dropping hundreds of feet to the canyon floor. No texting and driving while negotiating those curves.
I was born and raised in Arizona - and this was my first visit to the North Rim of the Gran Canyon ... pretty stupid right? Being an avid astro-photographer, I have known for some time that this part of Arizona is the absolute darkest part of the state in terms of light pollution in the atmosphere. Which means it is an excellent area to photograph the stars! Fortunately, I had enough clear sky to capture that awesome Milky Way as it crossed once again over the Grand Canyon just before it started raining. This image was composited from multiple photos from this position close to the North Rim Visitor's Center. Multiple exposures of the stars (about 8 I think) were aligned and merged together in a process called median blend photo stacking that reduces almost all sensor noise from the resulting digital image. Then, multiple long exposures (4 or 5 6 min. exposures) of the canyon were also merged in the same process. The distant lights are at the Grand Canyon South Rim area 10.3 miles away and include lights from hikers descending (or ascending) along the Bright Angel Trail. The orange glow is from the lights of Flagstaff some 72 miles distant.
We were fortunate to catch an awesome Grand Canyon Sunset with picturesque light showers scattered across the view from the North Rim. May, 2019
