Alignment Over Bear Butte

For this image, I had been watching the path of the full moon and planning where I needed to position myself to photograph it rising behind Bear Butte. With a longer lens compressing the distance between me, the mountain and the moon, the goal was to make that enormous moonrise feel as commanding in the photograph as it did standing there watching it happen.

As daylight disappeared, I waited for the first edge of the moon to break above the horizon. Slowly, it climbed into view behind the unmistakable silhouette of Bear Butte, glowing against the deepening evening sky and briefly creating the alignment I had envisioned.