Ennis Cave Trip Report
June 3 8, 2009
The second photo shoot in Ennis cave is now behind us. Our goal was to collect additional photos for owner, Randy Rose, to use in a book on Ennis Cave.
Kay and I made the 7 hr trip to Ennis Cave on June 3. Over the next two days Jim Cooley, Pic Walenta, Dave Mead, Mark Lankford, and Maria Lankford joined the crew.
Tim McClain, who knows Ennis better than anyone, led us and helped with the photos on June 5 and 6.
On the 5th we worked on passage shots, the Board Room and a canyon shot between the 40 foot water fall and Column Hall. Tim was very helpful in pointing out long, relatively straight passages for the passage shots. The canyon shot required getting the camera on the high side of a cliff near the 40 Foot Water Fall and the lighting crew in the canyon beyond. Jim and I exited Column Hall and headed for the high camera position near the water fall and Tim led the lighting crew to the lower part of the canyon. We were underground about 7 hr.
On the 6th we carried in 18 slave flash units to light the Breakdown Room. The room is about 200 feet long by 150 feet wide with a 50 foot high ceiling. Rather than use a wide angle lens and try to light the whole room at once, I used a 50 mm f1.4 lens and took multiple overlapping shots. This allowed us to focus our lights on about a quarter of the room at a time. Post processing using Photoshop CS4 photo merge pulled the overlapping shots into one image. Tim directed me to the Balcony for a high vantage point looking south. After the shots from the Balcony I moved to the other end of the room and repeated the process shooting north. After finishing in the Breakdown Room we took a quick look at the Alien and Tims dig. The amount of material removed in the dig is almost unbelievable!
We left about half of the flash units in the Alcove of the Breakdown Room. Mark decided he did not need the crawling Tim was describing for the last half of the trip and headed out on his own. Tim led the rest of us, (Jim, Pic, Dave, Maria, and Rick) on to The Blow Hole with photo stops in the Cairn Room and Lons Lost Passage. The clean translucent formations at the end of Lons Lost Passage are spectacular and quite unique for Ennis since many of Enniss formations are mud or dust covered. I have heard about the Blow Hole for many years but to feel the strong air flow in person is impressive. This will lead to big cave one of these days. A very tired crew climbed the ladder to daylight at 7:00PM adding another 9 hours to the photo project.
On Sunday, June 7th, our guide deserted us and went to town. Jim, Pic, Mark, Dave and I headed in at 11:00 AM, on our own, to photograph the Mined Passage. Pic and Jim also wanted to drop some pits. Marked helped rig The Giants Potty and Pic and Jim dropped in. This gave me a chance to get some photographs of the Potty with light at the bottom. Next it was on to Goose Pit. Pic dropped the pit but we only had 75 feet of rope with us which was enough to get her to the first landing but the rope would not reach the bottom of the pit that may be 65 feet deep. Our last photo stop was the Mined Passage. We were all safely out by 4:00 PM.
Thanks to Randy Rose for his generosity in opening Ennis cave to the caving community. And a special thanks to Tim McClain for guiding the photo trips and helping set up some of the complex shots.
Rick Hines
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Extraordinary video, great work and thanks for posting. This is such an amazing place ! 5 stars.
The shot at 6:57 is excellent. Full of dreams and questions.
One little question : I read you used a 50 1.4 on a D700. I'd like to afford both soon... What do you think of this couple?
chupalol360 1 year ago