Photographing drip sand castles in the desert at Cathedral Gorge, Nevada

Located in northern Nevada, Cathedral Gorge is a secluded, 1,800 acre state park. It serves as a quiet, more intimate alternative to the bustling Valley of Fire (which I photographed the week prior). The geology here is also entirely different, featuring walls of melted bentonite clay. These formations resemble delicate drip sand castles, or maybe even Gaudi's Sagrada Familia in Barcelona, if you let your imagination to run wild.

At first, I felt frustrated. The eroded spires were cool to see, but their color was uniformly beige, making separation and depth problematic. Light wasn't on my side either, for similar to Valley of Fire, the gorge was often dim and in-shadow during peak light hours at sunrise and sunset. Regardless, I persisted, and eventually things started to click.

When the light was bad during midday, I hiked and scouted for subjects. Surprisingly, during my three days there, I never saw another person doing the same. Then later during peak light hours, I returned to areas of interest and looked for compositions. This often meant shooting in light that was still hard, but as good as it would possibly be before the sun dropped behind the hillsides and cast shadows across the gorge.

For example, I chose the spire in the image below because it was low enough to capture in its entirety rather than towering overhead. I positioned myself at an angle to the sun to create layers of light and shadow, using a polarizer to help retain warm color in the highlights. What surprised me most, however, was the ground. I was fascinated by the lines radiating from the base. Had the ground been flat and textureless, the image wouldn't be the same.

I liked the idea of focusing more on the ground and low spires, so I looked around for more. That's when I came across this spire (below), with its fantastic downward slope that feels like it's slowly melting into the floor. The sun was quickly setting, so I took a number of rapid images hoping to catch just the right amount of light on spires (not too bright or too dark).

On my last night at Cathedral Gorge, I felt tired and unmotivated, but forced myself to venture out in case something caught my eye. I searched the area without seeing anything new. As the sun set, I assumed I had taken my last photo. While hiking back to camp, I came across a shadowy interior space with multiple small spires, each neatly interspersed (image below). I found a higher vantage point to get a better view and tried to place the camera and tripod in a position that left enough space around each spire so they would not visually clump together. I was working in very dim light with a 20-second shutter speed, but I think I managed to coax something worthwhile out of the scene.

Overall, my experience at Cathedral Gorge turned out better than expected, despite my initial concerns about color and light. Like most things, it simply took time for me to figure out how to work with the environment and find images within it.

For more, check out my new video below from Cathedral Gorge, where I discuss the challenges of doing landscape photography in valleys, canyons, and gorges, and what we can do to work around their limitations.