Mesa Arch

Mesa Arch is a favorite of professional photographers and especially preferred at sunrise.  Since it fits my routine to appear at that hour, I made the five-minute walk from the road, expecting to find a few pros from whom I might learn.  I was running late, but stopped on the way for the above shot of a flaming sunrise.

When I came over the hill and looked down on Mesa Arch, there they were, and more than a few, set up with tripods and already clicking.  I quickly mingled among them, shooting from where they shot, commenting on the red spectacle before us.  But I was soon to learn the rules.  There is no sign with printed rules, but the pros know them and enforce them.  I was reprimanded and put in line. 

Rule 1: No talking!  Questions are forbidden and conversation is outlawed.

Rule 2: Never step in the field of someone’s picture.

Rule 3: Anyone with a small hand-held camera like mine is forbidden from taking a place in front.  Amateurs like me must stay back and sneak a shot between the pros as we can.

So I moved behind them like a mouse, aiming where they aimed, holding my camera over their heads.  When one of them left his tripod for a moment, I stepped in and snapped.  But mostly I shot from places away from their turf. 

Mesa Arch is perched on the edge of a mesa, so when looking through it, we see a sweeping vista out across the desert.  Washer-Woman Arch stands in the left foreground; Monster Tower is the pinnacle to its right; and the butte behind them is Airport Tower.  

Looking through Mesa Arch at sunrise is truly memorable.  But if I were a professional photographer, I would try to find unusual and unknown subjects, things that people don’t expect and that are not photographed by twenty other pros every morning.