CraigBILL

I have visited New Mexico’s Three Rivers Petroglyph Site several times throughout my travels, but never was able to take the time or be in the presence of great weather to capture any nice images.

This time it was going to be different. In fact, I planned to stay all night so as not to be rushed. And I'm glad I did. The weather was a bit cold, but pleasant skies for photography. So I started out late afternoon to find a nicely positioned petroglyph that faced the sunset direction.

For this project, I wanted to do a still time-lapse to capture an image that I had been wanting to try. First, after scouting and finding this lizard impression facing West, I setup my camera with a wide angle lens and waited for the light to cool off. Next, I setup two flashlights for light painting the petroglyphs as they were darkening as the sun lowered. Then I waited for the sun to peek around the rocks for the first exposures. I only had a few minutes as a sun this low moves super fast. And finally, I played with the flashlights patiently until the rocks were properly lit for the last captures. These two fused images gave me the still time-lapse photograph called “Origin”.