Could a Large Format Redwood Tree Portrait compete with National Geographic's photo?

[NightHeron]

Hello All,

I'm a newbie interested in finding out if it is possible to take full sized redwood tree portraits using large format that are somewhere near the quality of the photo that Michael Nichols achieved for National Geographic. See: http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/redwoods/gatefold-image. Mr. Nichols ran an array of DSLRs along a vertical tramway in front of a tall redwood tree and shot over 80 images to stitch together to form his portrait. I would like to try to photograph an entire 300' -380' tall tree without having to get either me or my camera way up in the air.

I imagine that it might be possible to use a long, large format lens with a large image circle to create a number of distant shots to stitch into a vertical panorama shot without perspective problems. Naturally this would require an unobstructed view of the redwood tree from quite a long distance. This would certainly limit, but I don't think it would eliminate, possible subjects.

Can this type of image be made using large format, and if so how?

[Paul Fitzgerald]

"I'm a newbie interested in finding out if it is possible to take full sized redwood tree portraits using large format that are somewhere near the quality of the photo that Michael Nichols achieved for National Geographic."

they did that a century ago with 'sky-scraper' cameras, should not be too hard to duplicate today.

Front rise introduces diverging verticals, looming, mushroom head
tilting the camera introduce converging verticals, falling, pin-head
using half of each would cancel themselves to parallel verticals.
the only problem is to move far enough back to avoid an enlarged center, cigar shaped.
Move back as far as the tree is tall, farther would be better.

[Brian C. Miller]

Folmer & Schwing Mfg. Co., Sky Scraper Camera, Improved (http://piercevaubel.com/cam/ekc/skyimp.htm)

Looks like the lens on that is a Wollensak 6-1/4 inch (159mm) lens. The "Sky Scraper" had a lot of front rise to it, but I don't see a mention of how much rise. The previous version looks like it had about four inches, using an additional board at the base.

The Wollensak wide angle lens shown there does not have a lot of room for movement. (I have one.)

So there you have it: use a wide-angle lens with a lot of coverage, and you'll need a lot of rise.

(Actually, just about any monorail, and a good number of field cameras, can do this. It's not that special now, not like it was in 1903.)

[dperez]

Sure, you could use the exact same method with the rail tramway, but use a large format camera instead, and then stitch the images together. Check out Jeff Liao's work in Habitat 7 (http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artObjectDetails?artobj=317347), which used multiple 8x10 exposures that were stitched together.

-

[Brian Ellis]

I've photographed quite a bit in the redwoods around Crescent City, CA. I don't see how you could get far enough away from the tree to make that kind of photograph without getting up in the air, which you say you don't want to do. I'm sure I've missed some but the groves I've been in have been pretty dense.

[Jim Galli]

Probably not. However if you could get to the 100 foot level and then use rise you could probably achieve something similar. Or pick a tree that allows you to back up so that an 80 degree lens can capture it. OTOH what they accomplished is a nice scientific document, but it isn't art. Who could stand to look at the mess they made out of the tree trunk off to the right.

[Brian C. Miller]

You'd need something like the Rodenstock Grandagon N 200mm. It has a 495mm image circle, so you'd get nearly four inches of rise from it on 8x10 on the long side. So, yeah, photographing a redwood in one shot is possible, but not arbitrarily just any redwood tree.

[NightHeron]

Thank you all for your replies.

I thought that there would be limited opportunities to make complete portrait photographs of tall redwoods using a large format camera and vertical shifts, but I still have not found any images that I know were made that way. The only full portrait redwood photos I have found were stitches of many DSLR photos by either Michael Nichols or James Balog. I would really like to see some photos made with roughly this approach if anyone knows where these images are lurking.

The specific approach that I imagine is to use a long (360mm - 480mm) large format lens with a very wide image circle on a 5X7 field camera with generous vertical shifts available to make two vertical shots to be stitched together. The tree would need to be quite distant, on the other side of a river, or across a long clearing. Among the many things that I don't know is whether there would be sufficient DOF with such long lenses to to keep both the trunk and the branches sharp.

Those of you that have suggested lens sizes have recommended lenses in the 150mm to 200mm range. Why do lenses in this normal to mildly telephoto range seem like the correct approach to those of you recommending them?

Thanks again.

[John Kasaian]

The Grizzly Giant in Mariposa Grove has been shot full length many times. Also Sequoia NP has opportunities near the General Sherman, which has a steep mountianside staircase allowing you enough elevation to tackle nieghboring redwoods.

[Jim Galli]

If $$$$$ were no object, ie. you had a pac fund to spend wildly from, I'd look into having Richard Ritter build you one of his 8X20's with the vertical back option. That would get you very near the 6.5:20 ratio of the image you've shown. Then I'd buy the Schneider ULF 550mm lens and start doing the math to see exactly how far back and how high you'd need to be to duplicate the image. Once done it would certainly beat the digi version.

[Bill Burk]

A big problem is getting a clear view of the tree in its entirety. After all, most of them are in... well... forests.

Like you said, restricting your choice to a redwood with a clear view limits your subjects. You may end up with heartbreaking portraits of lone redwoods in clear-cuts.

There is no limit to the quality of photos you can make of redwood trees, if you accept partially obscured views. I've noticed a need for better portraits of the great trees and I wish you well if you choose to take on the project.

[Heroique]

Here’s the only top-to-bottom Redwood in my entire 4x5 portfolio.

It’s the tree on the far right – the three center trees are Austrian Black Pines.

Sierra Redwoods (also known as Giant Sequoias) are common in the city of Seattle.

When it comes to Sierra Redwoods, I enjoy close-ups of their beautiful fluted bases.

Tachi 4x5
Schneider XL 110mm/5.6
T-Max 100 (in T-Max rs)
Epson 4990/Epson Scan

[ROL]

Although you'll not find any color, redwoods, both coastal Sequoia Sempervirens and Sierra Sequoia Gigantea, were quite commonly photographed in their vertical entirety in the nineteenth century by "large format" plate photographers. Communicating the wonder of these great trees was quite in vogue, made unfortunately all the easier as their brethren were cut down all around them. I would suggest you check historical records, published books, and photographs in any federal lands visitor center or natural history association, where redwood groves are located (NPS: Kings Canyon – Sequioa, Yosemite, FS: Sierra, Muir Woods, etc.).

[ROL]

When it comes to Sierra Redwoods, I enjoy close-ups of their beautiful fluted bases.


As do I.


Senate Group, Giant Forest
5X7 TXP 320 (200), PMK Pyro, Fujinon 180mm
http://www.rangeoflightphotography.com/albums/Sequoia-Kings%20Canyon/Senate%20Group%2C%20Giant%20Forest.jpg


Establishing the incredible beauty and mass of these trees, doesn't have to be communicated only by photographing them in their entirety, or in color. Light and form, monochrome's métier may also be used to establish their greatness, without their full measure.

[Jeffrey Sipress]

Ain't going to happen, You simply will not be able to achieve enough camera to subject distance without other objects getting in the way and you will not be able to get the camera high enough of the ground without sophisticated apparatus.

Like ROL, I did not feel the need to show the entire tree to be able to imply it's majesty.

http://machinearts.com/fredphotos/bigtrees1.jpg

[Peter York]

Some of the small meadows in Sequoia NP should provide enough distance to capture an entire tree.

[Drew Wiley]

Sure it could be done in LF if it was done digital. But you'd have to rig up something special
and apply for a special permit just like NGS. A balloon or cable system could be used, along
with a gyro and fixed lens wide-angle camera. You'd stitch at the end. Think of it as a
vertical panorama shot. Just shooting the thing would work only if other trees weren't in
the way. Do you want to shoot a specific tree of just any really tall redwood?

[Brian C. Miller]

Danger thought time! :)
What if something like a Cirkut camera were adapted to be used as a strip camera (http://www.sportsshooter.com/news/2043)? As the camera moves up (or down) the scaffolding, the film is passed behind the lens. Thus, no stitching is required.

[NightHeron]

Thank you all for sharing the excellent redwood photos. I certainly agree that it isn't necessary to fit the whole tree in a photo to capture it's essence.

Unfortunately, my project needs to be done on a shoe string budget. Custom cameras and vertical tramways are out of the question, though that Cirkut looks quite tempting. Hopefully Ansel Adams' claim that old Koronas are perfectly adequate is correct.

I don't want to photograph a specific tree, though I prefer tall, big, and old trees with character. I doubt that it would be possible to do a full portrait of any of the tallest, or biggest, Coastal Redwoods. According to the video about Michael Nichols' photograph, it was done from only 50 feet from the tree. Thus the need for a vertical tramway and I am about as likely to get 100 feet up in the air to take photographs as I am to get hired as a Chippendale dancer. The Sequoias in the Sierras are probably spaced far enough apart to allow many distant redwood photos.

I've spent a little time searching on the internet for some of those B&W redwood photos from 100 years ago, but I haven't found anything yet. I seem to recall reading that Humbolt State U. in Arcata CA had an archive of old forest photos, but that is a 5 hour drive away.

[Jim Galli]

Do some searches for Darius and Tabitha Kinsey (http://www.ebay.com/ctg/Kinsey-Photographer-Locomotive-Portraits-Half-Century-Negatives-Darius-and-Tabitha-May-Kinsey-Dave-/707389#). He was out in the forest 100 years ago with an 11X14 and a few with mammoth plate doing spectacular things. The books (http://search.half.ebay.com/Darius-Kinsey_W0QQmZbooksQQ_trksidZp3030Q2em1446Q2el2686) are cheap.

[Len Middleton]

Unfortunately, my project needs to be done on a shoe string budget. Custom cameras and vertical tramways are out of the question, though that Cirkut looks quite tempting. Hopefully Ansel Adams' claim that old Koronas are perfectly adequate is correct.

I don't want to photograph a specific tree, though I prefer tall, big, and old trees with character. I doubt that it would be possible to do a full portrait of any of the tallest, or biggest, Coastal Redwoods.


I find the best way to address a problem is to first define your objectives well. What do you want the photo(s) to say or tell?

If you want to show the magnitude and majesty of these trees (sorry, but I have not seen them), then what are you going to use as a reference to provide a scale to the image. There is a couple of reason a certain individual uses yellow film canisters in his auction; they are his "trademark" / signature, and it provides scale as we all know how big those yellow film canisters are and can thus compare it against the lens being listed. I ran into a similar issue many years ago photographing a large church (St. Joesph's Oratory) in Montreal. It loses it affect when you have to tell everyone that the small dark rectangle in the corner of the structure is a man-door...

If you want to show the character of wood in its battle with the elements, will that really be visible in a frame-filling image of the entire tree?

Are you asking the right questions?

Good luck in your project, as it has the potential to be a real learning experience.

Hope my questions help you to re-examine and re-evaluate your own questions,

Len

[Brian Ellis]

Thank you all for your replies.

I thought that there would be limited opportunities to make complete portrait photographs of tall redwoods using a large format camera and vertical shifts, but I still have not found any images that I know were made that way. The only full portrait redwood photos I have found were stitches of many DSLR photos by either Michael Nichols or James Balog. I would really like to see some photos made with roughly this approach if anyone knows where these images are lurking.

The specific approach that I imagine is to use a long (360mm - 480mm) large format lens with a very wide image circle on a 5X7 field camera with generous vertical shifts available to make two vertical shots to be stitched together. The tree would need to be quite distant, on the other side of a river, or across a long clearing. Among the many things that I don't know is whether there would be sufficient DOF with such long lenses to to keep both the trunk and the branches sharp.

Those of you that have suggested lens sizes have recommended lenses in the 150mm to 200mm range. Why do lenses in this normal to mildly telephoto range seem like the correct approach to those of you recommending them?

Thanks again.

I think you have the right idea but I don't know how practical it is. Since you don't want to get up in the air the main problem will be getting far enough away from the tree. As I said in my original message, the redwoods I've seen when photographing them in the groves around Crescent City, CA have all been packed in dense areas. It would be next to impossible to get far enough away from them to capture their height in a single image or a couple images followed by a stitch).

While you might be able to find one on the other side of a river or clearing as you mention you then have the problem of having a LF lens long enough to more or less isolate a single tree.

I doubt that it's impossible but it might take some searching to find the right tree in the right location (i.e. far enough away to get it all in one or two shots but close enough for your longest lens to more or less isolate it). The one thing you have going for you with LF is the ability to crop a lot and still get a decent image (or as an alternative, aim the camera up in the air and then correct the perspective in Photoshop). Other than that a digital or 35mm camera might be the better tool because of their longer effective focal lengths.

[NightHeron]

Hello Len,

I would like to covey the immense height, size, and complexity of old growth redwood trees. This is something that I think that Michael Nichols did very well with his array of cameras on a vertical tramway, but this is an extraordinarily expensive and time consuming single photograph. I would like to be able to capture similar trees with roughly similar resolution economically enough that I can photograph many trees in many different lighting conditions. To show the scale, I would expect follow the example of many others who have photographed redwood trees with people in red or yellow jackets next to them. I'm not certain that I intend to do a frame filling photo of a single tree. I suspect that the quality of the image that I can manage will dictate the images that I attempt to capture.

Hello Brian,
I am also concerned about how practical what I want to do is. I have yet to try doing a vertical panorama with a DSLR and correcting the perspective errors with Photoshop. Perhaps this will yield better results than a stitch of two LF photos with a vertical shift, but I suspect that neither Mike Nichols or James Balog were satisfied with this digital stitch with perspective correction approach. They must have at least tried it before they started hoisting themselves or their camera arrays up into the stratosphere. Whatever the end results an old Korona is on one of those little brown trucks headed my way.

Hello Jim,
Thank you for the heads up about the Kinsey books. I will take a look.

[rdenney]

Any time you include something big in a relatively small photograph, the result will lose scale and what seems big in person will not on the photo. Even the photos of the tree trunks do not convey the scale unless there is something else in the photo of known size. One of our members (I don't remember who--maybe Vaughn) made a photo of a redwood stump--the tree had been felled many decades ago--surrounded by secondary trees that were obviously mature but dwarfed by the ca.-20-foot-wide stump. That conveyed the scale of the giant redwood in ways I've not seen in other photos that didn't include things like cars or people.

I saw the stitched image to which you referred. The stitched image has a feature that cannot be achieved from ground level except at a great distance: the point of view is always "eye level". One is looking at the horizontal branches end-on throughout the height of the tree.

When you stand on the ground and look up, vertical lines converge to a vanishing point where they all meet. By keeping the back of the camera vertical, you can spread out the top part of the picture to keep those vertical lines from converging. The top of the tree will therefore maintain its proportional width with respect to the bottom of the tree. This is called "perspective correction", but it's really an induced distortion. Our eyes and brain naturally interpret those converging vertical lines as being parallel, but in photographs, they are out of context and appear unnatural. So, we induce a distortion in the photo to perform some of the processing needed to restore context.

But despite the fact that keeping the film plane vertical keeps vertical scene lines parallel, the photo will still be viewing the upper branches from their underside, not end-on. It will still look as though you are at ground level.

The greater the distance you are from the tree, the less pronounced this effect will be, because the angle from the camera to those tree tops will be shallower. Of course, more distance means you need more space. And that distance has the effect of eliminating the sense of height of the tree, and it will look like a picture of a normal tree unless you include something of known scale in the view. Given the scalability of nature--from a distance a 1-foot tall bush with tiny leaves could be a 10-foot tall bush with big leaves--that item of known scale almost always has to be a known animal, human, or something man-made.

Probably the shortest and widest-field lens for 8x10 on the market right now is the Schneider Super Symmar XL 150mm, with an image circle of 386mm and an angle of view of 105mm. My sense is that with 8x10 film, you'll get enough shift to keep the back vertical using that lens with about 1/3 of the scene below the horizon. If the 2/3 of the scene is above the horizon and 400 feet tall, the field of view will be 600 feet. With that lens, you'll be maybe 250 feet away if I've done my sums correctly. From that distance, you'll be looking quite sharply upwards at the top of the tree, even though there will be no convergence of the parallel verticals. If you restrict the format to 4x10, you can get a bit more rise within the coverage of the lens and you'll thus be able to move a bit closer and include a little less of the foreground.

With longer lenses, coverage is greater and the required shift is lesser, but you'll have to be much further away from the tree.

On 4x5, the lens of choice would be the 72mm Schneider Super Angulon XL. It will work about the same as the Super Symmar XL on 8x10, but it has a bit wider angle of coverage so you'll be able to move a big closer.

You'll need a camera optimized for short lenses and large movements if you go with lenses this short. That's a separate conversation if you're still hanging in there.

Rick "wondering if this is the easiest large-format starting point" Denney

[Bill Burk]

If you want to show the magnitude and majesty of these trees (sorry, but I have not seen them), then what are you going to use as a reference to provide a scale to the image. There is a couple of reason a certain individual uses yellow film canisters in his auction; they are his "trademark" / signature, and it provides scale as we all know how big those yellow film canisters are and can thus compare it against the lens being listed. I ran into a similar issue many years ago photographing a large church (St. Joesph's Oratory) in Montreal. It loses it affect when you have to tell everyone that the small dark rectangle in the corner of the structure is a man-door...

I agree, though an occasional human scale element will help illustrate the size, I find it trite when done all the time. It may help your appreciation for the trees if you can learn techniques to estimate the size and magnitude of the trees you photograph (using surveying tools). Then you could include size information in the subtitle of the photograph or in footnotes of an info sheet.

[Vaughn]

I have taken the exact photo you are looking for. It took me several years to find the tree in the right place at the right time. It is a beautiful tree, too, up in the 300' range. It is deep in the virgin forest -- no clear-cutting, etc. I photographed it with a 150mm lens and two sheets of 4x5 film (vertical). The camera is set up on a ridge top (and on a trail, too) which gets the camera about 1/3 up the height of the tree...so the camera is pointed slightly down for the bottom half and quite a bit up for the upper half.

I printed it as two 7"x19" prints (actually 7x19 for the bottom and 7x17 for the top), matted with two windows in a 48" board with an inch of space between windows. Printing it long and narrow gets rid of the perspective problems of pointing the camera up and down.

I took a friend out with me to fire the shutter and I am standing at the base of the tree. I am so small in the image that I am not at all obvious. In fact when I tell people that I am in the photo it can take them 10 to 30 seconds to find me, even though I am right out in the open at the base of the tree...one's sense of scale is that thrown off by the size of the tree. While I agree with Bill that it can be over-done, having me in the image makes people step back when the size of the tree finally hits them...very effective. Since I have photographed it, there is a branch that has grown that blocks a small amount of the trunk.

Vaughn

[John Kasaian]

The Grizzley Giant iIRC lost its top, but is certainly imposing enough (the main off shoot is the diameter of a Volkswagen I heard one ranger say) and not too crowded in by other trees.
Just sayin'

[QT Luong]

I don't think so. The main point is if you take the photo from the ground, the perspective on the crown won't be as good. By the way, the Geographic claims that it's a first time such an image was created, but I think James Balog did it many years ago (see http://www.amazon.com/Tree-New-Vision-American-Forest/dp/1402767161/?tag=alargeformatphot).

[Vaughn]

We had a copy of the Nat. Geo image up on one of our buildings (Humboldt State Uni.) for several weeks -- it was a little over two stories tall. Impressive at that size. Not quite life size, of course!

I have photographed the tree I mentioned above several times. The first time was with a Rollieflex (it took 3 negs to cover it base to the very tip), then with 4x5 three different times. The Redwood National Park used my first set of 4x5 negatives to have an eight foot copy made for display at our local airport -- they had about 6 different B&W images enlarged for a display at the baggage area. Eventually they went with color images and I always wondered what happened to the prints. Then when my boys were in 5th grade they went on an over-night stay at the park's educational center and I was happily surprised that my print was displayed in the main meeting room/cafeteria. I signed it for them with a sharpie.

(Un)fortunately the park damaged one of the negatives, so I re-shot it, doing a better job of it and this time wearing a lighter shirt so I would be easier to see at the base of the tree.

Vaughn

Thanks to this thread, I am now thinking of taking the 11x14 camera out to the tree (with the help of my three boys) and re-taking it again as part of my My-three-boys-in-the-environment series. I want to modify a darkslide so I can take two 5.5x14 images on a single sheet of 11x14 film. I'd do it two images again and have my boys standing at the base and would probably make platinum prints -- mounted similar to the original I did.

I have a selection of lenses I can use...perhaps the 19" RD Artar, but if that is too much coverage, perhaps the 26" RD Artar. It would not be an easy image to make with the old beast of an 11x14 with limited movements available -- perhaps I should do it with the 8x10 (two 4x10 negs) instead.

[NightHeron]

Hello Vaughn,

I'm happy to hear that you managed to take the photo that I would like to attempt, but it is discouraging that you only found one tree with years of searching. I hope that you will be happy with the new results that you get with your boys. I looked for your photo on the Redwoods National Park website and didn't find it.

I too have been searching a bit for a clear view of an old growth redwood without much luck thus far. There doesn't appear to be a clear view in Armstrong Grove (Guerneville, CA), The Grove of Old Trees (Occidental, CA), or in Montgomery Grove (Ukiah, CA). Hendy Woods State Park has some interesting possibilities, but only if the rangers would allow volunteers to remove some of the young hardwood trees obstructing the view from a trail about 150' above the main redwood grove. Hendy Woods is on the list of State Parks to be closed by July, so perhaps they might be interested in facilitating photographs that could increase interest in the park. And if this idea doesn't pass muster from an ecological standpoint, they are sure to forbid it.

Hello QT Luong,

I agree that when taking the photo from the ground, the perspective on the crown will not be as good as from an elevated platform, but I'm not expecting to kick Michael Nichol's and National Geographic's butts with an old Korona. Taking the photos from a varying elevated viewpoints can come with even more disturbing problems if there isn't a relatively uniform background of trees behind the main subject. In James Balog's book, "Tree A New Vision of The American Forest" he photographed several trees with the horizon in the background from varying elevated viewpoints. In these shots many of the individual photos from the stitch have the horizon in the background, but the horizon is at a different elevations for virtually every individual shot. This may conform to Mr. Balog's personal aesthetic, or just be a byproduct of his approach, but I find the images disconcerting. He managed to capture the main subject admirably, but the background is really screwy.

Hello John Kasaian,
Thank you for the recommendation. I suspect that it would be easier to find a clear distant view of several of the Giant Sequoias than the Coastal Redwoods.

Hello Bill Burk,
I agree that using people as a scale element does get a bit redundant, but I don't think that a note specifying the height at the diameter of one of these trees really succeeds in communicating the immensity of these things as well as a scale element. Both Michael Nichols and James Balog place a number of people in bright jackets both beside and up in their trees to act as scale elements and without them I don't think I could grasp size of those trees. Mr. Nichols also has a few people in the tree that are not in bright clothing, so it adds interest to try to make sure that you have found everyone in the tree.

Hello Rick Denny,

Thank you for your response. This is probably not the easiest large format starting point, but I think that I have a greater probability of success than if I were attempting female nude photos.

[Vaughn]

The image has never been digitally copied, and I am afraid that when the Park had the negs enlarged, it was long before the web and websites! LOL!

If I have the time, I'll try to scan the negs tonight or later in the week --or scan the contacts of the latest set of negs I made (1986) if I can find them (I have not been able to find the actual negs from that shoot for years) -- and post them here. Actually, I have a set from that last shoot that I can find easily enough -- I used a female model and I have the negs of her in the nude, but have always wanted to print the neg of her with her clothes still on. Her breasts were ample, but the top of her breasts reflected light as bad as a bald man's head way down there at the base of the tree -- visually not very appealing.

The tree is in Prairie Creek Redwoods State Park -- way north of the areas you have searched.

Vaughn

[NightHeron]

Hello All,

I have reviewed Darius and Tabitha Kinsey's "This Was Logging," and their "Kinsey Photographer Volumes I & II." These folks managed some amazingly fine photographs of the early logging days, but I have yet to find a full tree portrait in their material. The focus of the photography seems to be the loggers and their equipment with the big trees as a background. Is there some other published work by them that might contain a full tree portrait? I note that they did stereo photos as well as large format, so perhaps there are some stereo photographs floating around with full tree photos in them.

A more thorough search of Hendy Woods SP has yet to yield an old growth redwood that can be viewed clearly from a distance, and the park ranger isn't returning my calls.

I now have an old Korona 5X7 that needs needs some reviving and a Turner Reich 8X10 Series II convertible lens on order, so perhaps I'll have a chance to photograph my thumb in a few more months.

[Redwood_Forest]

Hello All,

I'm a newbie interested in finding out if it is possible to take full sized redwood tree portraits using large format that are somewhere near the quality of the photo that Michael Nichols achieved for National Geographic.

Within reason, I don't see why not, at least to a certain size print or enlargement. You may even be able to take a higher quality photo in some respects, eliminating artifacts from stitching. You would almost need to find an elevated position looking straight across to mid-height on a redwood trunk. I believe that would be better than tilt-shift due to the way shadows appear, that I don't think TS will cover as adequately as a single frame. Trails to hunt include James Irvine trail and Brown Creek trail in Prairie Creek. Possibly walking off trail upslope from Prairie Creek trail. Nichols had climbers hide and hold lights in the canopy and you will not have that luxury.

Recently, I made a 60 inch frame of a lower trunk with digital 5DS, a 50 megapixel camera. There we enough detail to see individual needles I know I can take a single full height redwood image with it if I go up a hill. If I can do it, they you can certainly do it with large format. Enjoy the work !!

Can't share related examples yet since I just registered today. But if you search mdvaden + redwoods + discovery ... you will find my stuff. The redwoods is where I photograph most often.

[Bill Burk]

Welcome Redwood_Forest!

One place to see some interesting redwood photographs is James Balog's "Tree". He shot some trees in 4x5, and others using the digital stitching and roping technique that started this thread.

I used to live near the Alonzo Stagg tree, and I know that tree has no clear view of the whole thing... I once climbed a small tree near it and shot straight across at just a small section of bark. I know how it feels to view a great redwood from partway up. So I was stunned and impressed that Balog photographed the same tree from bottom to top.

A friend in the forest where I lived, Mike Law, wrote a book "To Find the Biggest Tree" which is a great reference for trees to look for.

Hope you get a chance to chat with Vaughn, who also spends a lot of time in the redwoods...

[Leszek Vogt]

If you want to do it just so you can say that you've done it, that's silly. Not sure what is your reason. Can it be done ? Yes, but there will be cost....rent a cherry picker and it needs to be tied with lines, so it does not move during exposure.

John's suggestion is what I followed (before even reading it :>) at Sequoia NP....and got a vertical pano of Gen. Grant (I believe). I used my DSLR handheld, using longer lens (105mm)....and stitch it all without issues. Sure, you get some branches in the way, but overall the tree was clearly visible. There were some folks at the bottom - adding to the scale of this huge tree.

Les

[Redwood_Forest]

Welcome Redwood_Forest!

One place to see some interesting redwood photographs is James Balog's "Tree". He shot some trees in 4x5, and others using the digital stitching and roping technique that started this thread.

I used to live near the Alonzo Stagg tree, and I know that tree has no clear view of the whole thing... I once climbed a small tree near it and shot straight across at just a small section of bark. I know how it feels to view a great redwood from partway up. So I was stunned and impressed that Balog photographed the same tree from bottom to top.

A friend in the forest where I lived, Mike Law, wrote a book "To Find the Biggest Tree" which is a great reference for trees to look for.

Hope you get a chance to chat with Vaughn, who also spends a lot of time in the redwoods...

The thread poster may not even be following anymore, but the subject is interesting. Here's a composition from years ago, within hours of a Tsunami hitting the redwood coast from Japan's earthquake. I was in Prairie Creek Redwoods which I mentioned in the last post. This photo was from a "point and shoot" Canon SX10 IS. The view is almost looking eye level straight across to the upper part of a 300 ft. (+) coast redwood. About 170 feet of trunk is exposed, If the lower tree wasn't present, a full redwood image could have been taken. But I've seen other redwoods in the same park like one called "Hairpin" where the entire tree is visible, with tripod placement available looking mid-trunk area.

This image file will max-out around the 20" x 30" print size for reproduction from digital.

http://photos.imageevent.com/mdvaden/redwoods/huge/Geisha_Two_Sample.jpg

[Jim Noel]

I have a similar image made with a 159 mm super WA on 7x17, turned vertically. Ferns at the bottom, tip of the tree touches the top. No stitching or other digicrap, juts a straight print.

[Jim Fitzgerald]

I have a similar image made with a 159 mm super WA on 7x17, turned vertically. Ferns at the bottom, tip of the tree touches the top. No stitching or other digicrap, juts a straight print.

That's what I'm talking' about. Bravo Jim.

[stawastawa]

I wonder if NightHeron ever did make some images...

[Redwood_Forest]

I have a similar image made with a 159 mm super WA on 7x17, turned vertically. Ferns at the bottom, tip of the tree touches the top. No stitching or other digicrap, juts a straight print.


Approximately how far away were you from the tree? Redwood? Curious about the relation between focal length and distance for that kind of camera.