What Is Bryce Canyon And Where Is It?
Bryce Canyon is a small national park in southern Utah. It is located near Bryce Canyon City. The low part of the park sits at an elevation of about 7,664 and tops out at just over 9,100 feet. This is much higher than the other four national parks in Utah. The entrance to the east side of Zion National Park is about 72 miles away. Bryce Canyon is filled with red and orange colored hoodoos. There are numerous hiking trails that go through the hoodoo amphitheater, a road that offers access to numerous overlooks and a visitor center and a couple campgrounds for those who would like to stay in the park.
Winter is a magical and frigid time to visit. The higher elevation means the winter temperatures at Bryce Canyon can drop well below zero. The park can experience significant winter snowfall. The roads in and around the park can become treacherous and a portion of the park road often closes during adverse winter weather.
What Is It Like To Travel To Bryce Canyon In The Winter At Sunrise?
COLD! It’s REALLY COLD! If you are heading to Bryce Canyon from across the country, chances are you’ll fly into the Las Vegas Airport, the St, George Utah Airport of the Salt Lake City Airport. From any one of those or any other airport you’ll need to get a rental car to get to Bryce Canyon National Park.
Once you’ve got your transportation lined up you’ll want to figure out some lodging. In the Bryce Canyon area there are numerous campgrounds, hotels and other lodging establishments. Choice Hotels has a couple properties not too far away. There are may other independent lodging options much closer and in sometimes just outside the park. There are a couple campgrounds in Bryce Canyon National Park as well as some private campgrounds outside the park. If you’d like to explore and camp in another park nearby, check out Kodachrome Basin State Park about 22 miles away.
If you are going in the winter you’ll need to be pretty hardy to camp in the winter. In the summer, it is a great place to camp out for a night or a week. If you are going for sunrise photos, the closer you can stay to the park entrance they better off you will be. There are tons of pullouts along the park road and there are some sunrise spots around the edge of the canyon you’ll need to hike to.
If you will be heading to Bryce Canyon National Park in the winter, you’ll want to check the weather and road conditions the night before you plan to head up. Sunny to partly cloudy mornings with no precipitation in the forecast make the best times to go in the winter. Be sure to check the temperature and dress for the weather. If the forecast is for really cold temps and wind be sure to prepare. It can be brutally cold at Bryce at sunrise in the winter!
What Does It Take To Get A Wall Art Quality Winter Sunrise Photo Ar Bryce Canyon National Park?
If you want to get great wall art quality sunrise photos at Bryce Canyon National park in the winter you’ve got to be willing to brave severe winter weather. There is a decent chance you’ll encounter snow and ice covered roads on the way there. As mentioned earlier, the morning temperatures can be brutal. Dress in layers, pack a warm winter jacket, gloves and a hat. Yak Traks or some other traction device for your shoes is a good idea even if you’ll just be walking around the edge of the canyon.
Most any overlook or pullout can make for a great place to photograph sunrise. You’ll probably want to shoot from somewhere along the rim of the canyon and not venture down into the canyon. The red and orange hoodoos look really awesome with at least some snow covering the landscape.
If you are shooting at sunrise, it’s probably best not to shoot directly into the sun. Many times this will create lens flare. If you don’t mind bright sun spots in your photos this might not be an issue but I prefer photos without the sunspots from lens flare. If your lens is at all dirty, it will be more noticeable if the sun is shining right into the lens.
One way you can sort of shoot directly into the sun is if you can position the camera such that the sun is partly obscured by the horizon, a tree or some other solid object. This will often have the effect of getting the sunlight to splinter and create a sun star of sorts. If you can achieve this it often looks pretty cool. That is the effect seen in the photo highlighted in this article. If the sun is partially obscured by clouds that can make it easier to get a good shot without spots of lens flare in the photo.
When the sun is low on the horizon, the light tends to be softer. Mountains and things like the hoodoos at Bryce Canyon National Park tend to take on a nice morning glow shortly after the sun rises above the horizon. If you can face the same way the sun is shining or at least not shoot directly into the sun you can capture the glow of the hoodoos in the morning.
The landscape at Bryce Canyon National Park is large enough and wide enough for panoramic photos. If they will be stitched panoramic shots it may be a little challenging to stitch them if shooting toward the sun and the sun is present in more than one of the frames that makes up the panorama.
What Is The Best Gear For Photographing A Winter Sunrise At Bryce Canyon National Park?
If you are headed to Bryce Canyon National Park to photograph winter sunrises, you’ll first want to make sure you’ve got the proper clothing. It is often MUCH colder at Bryce than other lower elevation parks like Zion. Some gloves you can use while shooting and some traction devices for your shoes will come in handy.
If you are looking for wall art quality photos and want to have the option to make large prints then you’ll probably want a decent DSLR or mirrorless camera. The lens(es) you take with you will depend on the kind of photos you want to come home with. Will you be shooting wide landscapes? Do you want to photograph specific features or formations within the canyon? The answers to those questions will determine your lens selection.
If you want wide angle landscapes that will capture as much of the canyon as possible then you’ll want to go with lenses as wide as 16mm. If you only have or can afford on all around lens then something like the Canon 24-105 zoom lens will probably be your all around most versatile and practical lens to take to Bryce.
If you will be photographing Bryce at sunrise or sunset when there will likely be low light conditions you’ll probably want to have a decent tripod and tripod head. A solid tripod setup will help you frame up the exact shot you want to get and help keep the camera stead or sharper photos that will make better prints, especially large ones.
Since Bryce Canyon is or can be photographed as a really wide landscape, it i is worth it to take a panoramic setup with you if you prefer to get really wide photos of the landscape and potentially get better wide angle files than are generally possible with a zoom lens wide open.
What Is The Story Behind This Bryce Canyon Sunrise Print?
2012 was the third of about 10 years I spent on the road photographing and experiencing the US and Canadian National Parks and other interesting things in between. During the winter of 2012 I was wandering around southern Utah for much of the winter and decided to spend some time at Bryce. There was a fair amount of snow in and around Bryce Canyon National Park by December and the temperatures were absolutely frigid.
My travel budget didn’t include the funds to spend the night in any of the open lodging establishments just outside or near Bryce Canyon. Sometimes on purpose and sometimes due to bad luck or bad weather I’d gotten used to spending the night sleeping in the car in random places no matter how cold it was. I don’t remember how cold it was on Christmas eve but it had to be in the teens or single digits
This photo was taken on Christmas morning in 2012. Most prior holidays were spent with the family but after falling in love with the national parks, I spent a fair number of holiday seasons on my own sleeping in the car or campgrounds by myself or sharing bunk rooms with strangers in hostels.
On December 24, 2012 I found a spot just outside to park and crash for the night in the car. There weren’t many people around and there was nobody to bother me even if where I parked for the night wasn’t a legit place to stay. It was outside the park.
After mooching an open wifi network from some nearby hotel, I crawled into a zero bag, turned on the car engine and cranked up the heat. The heat ran on high for about 30 minutes until it was nice and toasty in the car. At the 30 minute mark I shut off the car, pulled the sleeping bag hood over my head and drifted off to sleep sometime around midnight. I was still fully clothed for some extra warmth.
The next morning the cel phone alarm went off really early. It was well before sunset. The windows of the car were of course, frosted over on the inside from my warm breath throughout the night. The morning was frigid and my body was firmly against getting out of the sleeping bag or even moving to crack the seal of the bag around me. It was so cold I had to sleep with the phone in the sleeping bag to prevent the battery from dying overnight. My eyelids were heavy. I REALLY didn’t want to venture out in the freezing cold.
Getting sunrise shots, especially when sleeping in the drivers seat of the car often requires a mind over body approach. Sometimes one part of the mind has to convince the other part that well, we drove all the way out to Utah from Philly. We came here to see the most amazing sights in the US. Those sights are often at sunrise. We didn’t come all the way here to sleep. Get the f*ck up and get going. Despite the resistance the two sides of the brain finally agree, proceed to convince the body and things get moving.
That was the case this Christmas morning. Soon the engine was on and the heat cranked up. Body and mind were quickly warming up to the idea of getting out on the rim of the canyon for sunrise photos. The first real step was to get out of the car and find a place to pee. Once the bowels were relieved, all systems were go. The car was in drive and I was headed past the gate and off to “Sunrise Point” for a frigid winter sunrise.
It was Christmas morning so everyone else was probably at home or in their hotel beds getting ready to open presents. My present was going to be the winter sunrise view on the edge of Bryce Canyon. The sense of awe watching the sun rise, the hoodoo amphitheater bask in a golden glow and the fresh white snow glisten as the first rays of sun bounced off the frozen surface. I’ll take that over most any physical Christmas present any day. Experiences over stuff!
Nobody else was in the parking lot that morning. I pulled into a rock star parking spot, put on the Yak Trax for some extra traction and gathered the camera gear scattered around the car. There was just enough cloud cover to mute the bright sun a bit, create some color and add some texture to the sky. With the camera setup on the tripod waiting for the magic moment, I started snapping photos at that magic moment when just part of the sun had risen over the horizon. It is at that moment that getting a bit of a sunburst without sun flare in the photo is usually possible. That was the case on this glorious morning.
At Sunrise Point at Bryce Canon there are not that many different perspectives. It’s the overlook where that one funky small tree is standing on about 18 inches of exposed roots. Its as if the tree sprouted on a bowling ball, grew roots around the ball to reach the soil and the bowling ball rolled away. At sunrise, the light is constantly changing even of the physical landscape is not.
It was quite difficult to operate the camera with the ski gloves I had. Soon they were in my pocket and my fingers started to freeze as I operated the controls on the camera. I hung around for about a half hour before getting back in the car, firing up the engine and thawing out a little bit. In that half hour I snapped a fair number of photos and even a few selfies. Throughout the years on the road, the focus has always been on the stunning landscapes and wildlife and not me.
After warming up in the car for a bit, the rising sun warmed up the outside air a little bit. The bright sun helped make being outside a bit more tolerable. I took a few more photos at Sunrise Point, explored some of the other overlooks that were accessible and went back to the car to snooze for a little while before exploring more at Bryce Canyon and the surrounding area.
In What Formats Is This Bryce Canyon Winter Sunrise Wall Art Print Available?
This winter Bryce Canyon sunrise photos is available on paper, canvas, wood, metal and acrylic in sizes up to 40×60 inches. If it will be hung in an area with diffused lighting, then any finish on any material will look great. Matte prints will look a bit more subdued while the more reflective prints like metal and acrylic or paper and canvas with glossy finishes will look significantly brighter. If you’ll be hanging it in an area with more direct natural or artificial light then a matte print that does not reflect as much light or the surrounding area would likely make a better choice.
This view is available on high quality shower curtains and can be paired with matching bath towels. If you’d like something of a similar size but would rather be able to cozy up to it, then a Sherpa fleece blanket might be an excellent choice for the living room or bedroom.
If you’d like something that would come in handy on a day to day basis, you can get this image on a heavy duty canvas tote bag that makes a great reusable shopping bag. You can order it on a nice photo case or even get it printed on a variety of apparel to lounge around in.
Finally it you’d prefer a brain teaser, this image can be ordered on a 500 or 1,000 piece jigsaw puzzle that comes in a nice box with the image printed on the box.
Leave a Reply