Mojave Desert, one of the hottest and driest places on the planet, stretches from Western Arizona and Southwestern Nevada all the way to Los Angeles County. Graced with sights ranging from magnificent forests of Joshua Trees to burned out shells and parts of cars and hundreds of ghost towns, it also features some of the clearest views of night skies despite the incredible amounts of light pollution from Los Angeles, Las Vegas and surrounding towns.
At the north end of the desert lies Death Valley, the hottest and driest place on Earth. With just 2.36 inches annual average of rain, and summer temperatures that average between 110-120 degrees, only the most resilient plants and animals are capable of surviving this environment.
However, every ten to twenty years comes a winter of heavy rainfall, usually associated with El Niño (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/El_Ni%C3%B1o). These vicious storms drown the valley, and when they reach above eight to nine inches of rainfall, a rare desert miracle occurs. Laying dormant below the harsh high desert landscape are seeds of numerous wildflowers waiting to be awakened by these rare years of rainfall, and the spectacular display that follows has been dubbed: superbloom.
To many, the most spectacular of these wildflowers are Geraea canescens, the Desert Gold, which blanket the lower elevations along the Badwater road.
This video, which premiered on BBC Earth, was filmed as part of SKYGLOW, an ongoing crowdfunded quest to explore the effects and dangers of urban light pollution in contrast with some of the most incredible Dark Sky Preserves in North America. This project is being produced in collaboration with International Dark-Sky Association. You can support SKYGLOW by visiting WWW.SKYGLOWPROJECT.COM
http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160323-when-d
The film was shot and edited by Harun Mehmedinović on Canon 5DIII & 6D Cameras aided by Alpine Labs' Michron, powered by Paul C. Buff Vagabond Mini. LRTimelapse was used to process some of the shots.
High resolution stills can be found here: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/24210546/JPEG/SKYGLOW-AMARGOSA-SUPERBLOOM-STILLS.zip
This video is Part 2 of the Mojave Desert trilogy.
Part 1: MOJAVE BLUES - A journey through a thunderstorm and night sky over Route 66 https://vimeo.com/153992994
Part 2: AMARGOSA SUPERBLOOM - Winter of storms brings about a rare superbloom in Death Valley https://vimeo.com/162027135
Part 3: COMING SOON
Credits:
Producer/Editor/Shooter: Harun Mehmedinovic
Music: Chris Blackwell
Special Thanks:
Gavin Heffernan & Ryan Christiansen
Semezdin & Sanja Mehmedinovic
Matt Walker & Pierangelo Pirak
Kevin Noble & Paul C. Buff Inc.
Greg Horvath & Alpine Labs
International Dark-Sky Association
Northern Arizona University
State Of California
Locations:
Death Valley & Amargosa Valley, CA/NV