Sun Power

At the Eastern end of the gorge, this stunning vista is a front row seat to the mighty Columbia River as it unfurls and cuts through the Cascade mountains. And for just a few weeks each year, the slopes morph into gold.

Here, the sun's warm light channels down the gorge bouncing off of balsalt cliffs into fields of balsomroot sunflowers.

The final result came from three focus-stacked frames since the first grouping of flowers was 5 inches from my lens and I wanted everything to be tack sharp. The wind was ripping so I needed to manually blend them, which gave me a lot of time in post to appreciate the fine details. Shooting with a fast enough shutter speed to freeze the motion meant driving the ISO up to 1100, which is no problem for modern equipment. What an amazing time to be a photographer.