Nikon D810, 38mm, ISO 200, 0.4 sec, f/13
Mather Point, located at the Grand Canyon Visitor Center, was the first stop of my weekend. After flying into Phoenix and driving 3.5 hours, I arrived at Mather Point shortly before sunset. This is a very crowded place for sunrise and sunset.
Afterwards, I drove to my hotel in the town of Tusayan. Because this was a last-minute business trip, I did not have the required lead time to make reservations for lodging inside the park. Driving to and from my hotel added about 30 minutes to my day compared to staying in the park. This made for slightly longer days when photographing sunrises and sunsets.
While processing this image, I learned about Lightroom’s Dehaze slider. The Dehaze slider is designed to cut through haze and boost contrast and color. It works well on skies and clouds, and images like this where there is little detail on the rocks. The Dehaze slider does increase saturation, so sometimes you have to reduce the Saturation or Vibrance sliders. Click here for an excellent video that explains the Clarity, Texture, and Dehaze sliders.
Mather Point: 36.062016°, -112.107690°
Grand Canyon Weekend Photography Locations (click to enlarge)
The map above shows the locations where I spent time during my Grand Canyon weekend. By the way, a single weekend is not enough time to photograph the Grand Canyon properly. Unfortunately, I was limited by my work schedule to a late Friday to early Sunday visit. I would have liked more sunrises and sunsets to photograph from different locations.
During summer hours, you must ride shuttles to many of these locations, especially to the west of the main visitors center. No worries tho, the shuttles run early enough to catch sunrise anywhere in the park.
I planned my days around sunrise and sunset so there are lots of pictures taken at several of the points. I started on a Friday at the Grand Canyon Visitor center for sunset at Mather Point. Sunrise Saturday was at Yaki Point, sunset Saturday at Yavapai Point, and finished with Sunday sunrise at Moran Point as I was leaving the park. Each number on the map represents the number of images taken at each point.
Photographing sunrise and sunset, combined with the drive back to Tusayan every night, made for one sleep-deprived photographer.
From left to right, using the numbers as a guide, here are the areas I visited during the weekend.
- 9 – Mohave Point
- 20 – Hopi Point
- 33 – Village Area
- 19 – Verkamp’s Visitor Center
- 136 – Yavapai Point
- 23 – Grand Canyon Visitor Center
- 51 – Yaki Point
- 26 – Moran Point
- 4 – Lipan Point
- 41 – Desert View Watchtower
