Trajectory

I have been talking about the composition of this image in an earlier post, and today I want to tell the story behind the scene...

It was the 2nd October 2013, we will not be visiting Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park if the US government wasn't shutdown. Instead, we were planning to be in the Zion National Park, although we still had the chance to pass by Mt. Carmel Highway of the Zion National Park. This is how we end our day in Coral Pink Sand Dunes State Park.

After a day long of walking, we wanted to try something new, something exciting but without involve extra walk. We wanted to rent an ATV, and we thought that ATV can bring us to the site where we are not able to reach by foot, and get some nice sunset shots. However, we can only do this if we are the only people on the ATV tour at the particular time slot, I don't think we will be free to stop at any place we want and scouting around for photography sweat spot, if there are other people in the tour. Ok, we decided that if there is no one else on the ATV tour at 5pm, we will be in. Eventually, there were a group of people joined the ATV tour, so we gave up. Let's go back to the sand dunes, keep walking to find a sweat spot for golden hour shot.

The golden hour is approaching, I was standing on a higher elevation dune with my camera and tripod ready. To the east, it is the nice abstract patterns form by different elevation of sand dunes. I was hoping that, when the sun is getting low, I was able to get a nice and simple abstract shot with vibrant color. Suddenly, an ATV was just hurtling across the piece of land within my frame, creating the trajectories all over the place. With no time to think further, I intuitively pressed the shutter. This is an unexpected moment, but in a good way! When I view the image on the computer screen, I really love how the final image looks! Moreover, if you zoom in the image or view in a larger print, you will see a man riding the ATV with a dog at the back!

If the government wasn't shutdown, if the ATV tour wasn't fill up, if the ATV (with the driver and his dog) didn't invade into my frame, this image will never exist! What's an amazing coincident! Is this what the meaning of Alexander Graham Bell's quote "When one door closes, another door opens"? In this case, three door close and one open!

Happy Friday and have a great weekend ahead!