Sunrise in the Dolomites

The Dolomites

The Dolomites might be the most beautiful mountain range we’ve ever been to. The rocky cliffs, high-altitude valleys, and meadows full of quaint little mountain towns are gorgeous. Our sabbatical leg here started with some great weather (clear skies, slightly cool fall air), so we were lucky to experience some incredible Rosengarten views from our hotel near Tiers.

One of the best sightings of the Rosengarten we got was in the mornings, just after sunrise. Since the mountains are to our east, the sun rises behind them and starts to peek out from between the peaks a couple of hours after sunrise. Luckily I noticed some sun rays one morning and grabbed my camera, and managed to get this.

There was a 10-30second window when you could get the sunrays actually streaming out behind the mountain, and I’m really glad I got em! The rocky cliffs plus the way the light hits the pines and lights up the green grass of the meadows makes this possibly my favorite daytime mountain shot.

On the editing side, the raw image came out a bit cold surprisingly. The sun was a bright white, and the overall lighting the camera picked up was blue/white rather than a warm sunrise yellow. As a result, I adjusted the white balance near the sun only, to make the rays more golden, the way they looked in person. I did bump up saturation a bit too to give the image some more punch. Not too much editing here, but what I did made the image look a lot warmer and more scenic.

This was not the only Dolomites photography I did, to see some astro (overdue for years!) go here.