A lot of my photography is opportunistic. I’m out on an adventure and a cool image presents itself. This one I worked at.
I have been over Mt. Whitney at dawn a couple of time and I have some nice images from those flights (You can scroll to the bottom of my home page and search “Whitney” for various flights and images).
However something was lacking. Depth. It is difficult to have much depth in an aerial photo since you are typically pretty far away. So I decided to try a shot from behind the White Mountains, a 14,000 foot range just to the east of the Sierra. I was visiting Death Valley so I tried to time the flight to take off at first light (I had to have a little bit of light to see the unlit runway) and get to the White Mountains at sunrise.
It worked. I arrived a little early so I flew along the spine of the White Mountains, did a few 360s, and then the sun peeked out. In many photos it actually difficult to tell that it’s the tallest thing around – but in this image it is pretty clear who is king.
West Coast Flying Adventures 
Awesome pics. I’ve tried to snap photos of Whitney flying up or down the Owens Valley (?) before, but either the turbulence was too tough or the lighting didn’t make MtW stand out enough to be very flattering. Going early in the AM probably solved both. Beautiful.
Yeah, the best flights for both light and turbulence have been very early. Like sunrise early. Thanks!