Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming ·
Grand Prismatic, Up Close
On a summer journey through America’s national parks, I reached Yellowstone’s most remarkable colors from the boardwalk—and left knowing which view I would seek next.
Exposure for this photograph
- Aperture
- f/16
- Shutter
- 1/80 second
- ISO
- 200
- Focal length
- 38mm
- Technique
- Single exposure
Camera and capture details
- Camera
- Canon EOS R3
- Lens
- EF24–70mm F2.8L II USM
- Support
- Handheld
- Process
- Single exposure
Last summer, I was fortunate enough to take a national park tour that began in the Southwest and continued north to Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks during the summer of 2025.
Of all the landscapes I encountered at Yellowstone, Grand Prismatic Spring was the highlight for me.
The view I had
Seen from above, the spring resembles an enormous multicolored amoeba, with bands of blue, green, yellow, and rust spreading into the surrounding landscape. Paul Reiffer’s aerial photographs show that remarkable shape.
I did not have the time or opportunity to see it from that perspective. My visit kept me on the boardwalk, close to the spring and looking across it rather than down upon it.
This photograph, made on August 21, 2025, captures part of what I could see from there: rust-colored ground, hints of the spring’s rainbow hues, rising steam, a forested hillside, and a beautiful afternoon sky. The boardwalk view did not reveal the spring’s full shape, but it brought me close enough to appreciate its color and texture.
The photographs I missed
I wish I had made more photographs that concentrated on those rainbow hues. They were the feature that interested me most, but I came away without as many frames of them as I would have liked.
That is becoming part of learning photography for me: recognizing afterward what deserved more attention and carrying that realization into the next opportunity.
Next time
If I return to Yellowstone, the Grand Prismatic Overlook will be a priority. Reaching it requires a meaningful hike, but I would gladly make that effort for an elevated view of the entire spring—and another chance to photograph the colors I did not fully capture this time.