Photographing the Petroglyphs of Northern New Mexico

Photographing petroglyphs can be a horrible challenge. It's too bright, the lighting angle is wrong, the light is too soft or too harsh, etc. Waiting for just the right lighting or trying to modify with filters just never quite does it. Nope, the best results are had using strobes. In this example, three Canon 580exII strobes are used to light the petroglyphs at an angle that makes them stand out, and at the same time reduce the key of the overall photo just a touch.

Without strobes:

You can play with the brightness and contrast in Photoshop, but you'll never get the petroglyphs to show much better. The glare from the natural sunlight is too much. A polarizer helps, but not really to the extent desired.

Adding two 580EXIIs camera left (handheld) to light the petroglyphs of the large boulder and one 580EXII behind the large boulder to light the large spiral on the rear boulder (strobes triggered by PocketWizards and ratio controlled by AC3 Zone Controller) provides a better result.
EF 24-70 f/2.8L USM at 25mm, Canon 5D Mk II, ISO 100, 1/100th, and f22

With strobes:


Specifics:

It just goes to show, you can never have too much gear in the field! (But you do need a strong back and legs to get it there!)