Fireweed Sunset

Ah, springtime in the mountains. Well, at this elevation, having had a heavy snowpack the previous winter, this "springtime" image was taken at the beginning of September. Fireweed is one of my favorite wildflowers, so I was quite thrilled to have found this patch just in time for sunset. I was able to set up looking directly west, toward the setting sun. The sky lit up early and I chose to make my one exposure at the moment the sun was dropping behind the mountains. This kept some saturated backlight on the foreground flowers, and eliminated the harshness of direct light. This only gave me one shot to get it right. You just don't work fast with a large format film camera. Fortunately, it all came together. Not a bad result. And it's always an adventure hiking out of the mountains in the dark!