Photo of the Day: Camel Thorn Trees in Namibia

At first glance, this image may seem like a beautiful painting. However, it’s actually a largely uneditted photo of camel thorn trees in Namib-Naukluft Park. In an interview, photographer Frans Lanting describes how he was able to take this amazing photograph.

Here’s a short summary about the making of the photo. It was made at dawn when the warm light of the morning sun was illuminating a huge red sand dune dotted with white grasses while the white floor of the clay pan was still in shade. It looks blue because it reflects the color of the sky above. Because of the contrast between the shady foreground and the sunlit background I used a two-stop graduated filter which reduced the contrast. The perfect moment came when the sun reached all the way down to the bottom of the sand dune just before it reached the desert floor. I used a long telephoto lens and stopped it all the way down to compress the perspective.