Grafton is a ghost town, just south of Zion National Park in Washington County, Utah, United States. Said to be the most photographed ghost town in the West, it has been featured as a location in several films, including 1929’s In Old Arizona—the first talkie filmed outdoors—and the classic Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. The nearest inhabited town is Rockville.
To get to Grafton, you cross the Rockville bridge built for the National Park Service in 1924 to provide a link between Zion National Park and the North Rim area of Grand Canyon National Park.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
The Milky Way is indeed visible from this location at the front of the Wheaton and Hollis Hotel. Once again you need an extreme wide angle lens to get the shot.
The second image is cropped, standing further back. I was also standing further to the right.
In September, the Milky Way is nearly vertical. In early Spring, the Milky Way forms a low arch and in July it is on a strong diagonal.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
Lighting in the mill is difficult. Windows and lights blow out highlights. Shadows easily go black. The shots inside the mine are High Dynamic Range (HDR) blends.
Lightroom usually does a poor job at this but it did handle the feature image, which I further modified. Here are a couple more images from the inside of the mill.
That’s what a gold processing mill looked like in the 1920’s.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
The Morgue was one of my favorite buildings. I like the pastel colors on the coffins. This shot absolutely requires an extreme wide angle lens. It was not possible to stand back. My back was to the wall.
The morgue is so narrow that only one person was allowed in the building at a time. We were given two minutes.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
Feature Image Details
I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 20mm, F4.5, ISO 6400 for 61 seconds. Stars will streak beyond about 20 seconds so I shot them separately with a star tracker then merged the images.
The formula for determining when stars will stop looking like points if governed by the formula e = 400/FL.
E is the exposure time in seconds. 400 is a constant from experience and FL is the focal length of the lens in mm.
The result of this image would be 20 seconds. My exposure was 60 seconds.
Barbershop Interior
Boarding House
We did not have access to that building. I took the above shots through a window.
They were taken with a Canon 16-35MM F4 L Lens at 16mm and 19mm continuing the streak of very wide angle images.
The first two articles discuss the importance of very wide angle lenses and tilt-shift lenses for photographing Bodie and the interiors of buildings in general.
MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.
This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.
There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
Feature Image Details
I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 19mm, F16, ISO 500 for 1.3 seconds. The saloon is fascinating. Here are some additional images.
Additional Bodie Images – Wide Angle and Tilt-Shift Discussion
The first two articles discuss the importance of very wide angle lenses and tilt-shift lenses for photographing Bodie and the interiors of buildings in general.
Wide angle lenses were used again in this set. The first 4 images in this set were between focal lengths of 11mm and 19mm.
The roulette wheel was taken at 80mm and the poker table at 24mm.
MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.
This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.
There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.
Those articles discuss the importance of very wide angle lenses and tilt-shift lenses for photographing Bodie and the interiors of buildings in general.
MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.
This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.
There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day. We went with Jeff Sulivan. Michael Frye also does tours at Bodie.
I was not that interested in instruction. Rather, I paid for access. If you need help, and many did, the instructors are there.
Jeff Sulivan did help me light paint an image at night that I may not have gotten correct on my own accord.
These tours are worth it, especially if you need tips and guidance.
11MM is ultra-wide. I am just inches away from that billiards table. My camera is level. Either the floor or the billiards table isn’t. I suspect the latter. The front windows are square.
Depth of field is incredible with this lens at 11mm but it does not extend from a few inches to infinity. I took many photographs and blended them manually so everything is sharp.
The inside light and that outside light are vastly different. I had to take many exposures and blend them. I had Lightroom do this for a starting point but the results were not good. I then blended in portions of other exposures in Photoshop, again manually.
This shot is heavily backlit. The sun is shining in causing flare. I edited out the flare in Lightroom. The backlighting also required editing care so the light falloff on the walls from the wall looks natural.
Sometimes when I refer to my images, I say things like “this is an easy shot, just be there”. This is not one of those times.
Meals at All Hours
You can’t get that kind of service today.
That is another complicated image. It was also taken at 11mm and blended as described above. Let’s hone in on some details.
That’s “The Smith Premium Typewriter” left behind gathering dust.
Now let’s check out the state of the art communications system.
Bodie Hotel Communications
That image may look straight-forward, but it’s not. I used a perspective-control Canon TS-E 24mm f/3.5 L Tilt-Shift Lens: blending various exposures. Exposure blending was necessary due to severe light falloff from the windows.
I used a tilt-shift lens to avoid bending the vertical lines. I wanted the walls of the room square from that placement.
Finest Rooms
That is what a guest room at the hotel looked like. Once again the 11-24 mm lens came into play at 11 mm.
Kitchen
The above three images were taken at 15mm, 14mm, and 11mm respectively. I am just inches away from the scales and other interesting items in the shot immediately above.
Photography Notes
For the interiors, you need wide angle lenses. The wider the better. The above images show why.
MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.
This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.
There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.
Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.
Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.
Access
Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )
In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.
The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.
The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day. We went with Jeff Sulivan. Michael Frye also does tours at Bodie.
I was not that interested in instruction. Rather, I paid for access. If you need help, and many did, the instructors are there.
Jeff Sulivan did help me light paint an image at night that I may not have gotten correct on my own accord.
These tours are worth it, especially if you need tips and guidance.
It’s not easy to explain precisely how a tilt-shift lens works unless you have seen the movements of an old large-format camera that could tilt or shift the focal plane while keeping the camera fixed.
It’s easier to describe the effect. When you point a camera up to take a picture of a tall object, the edges point in. The tops of trees and tall buildings appear to bend to the center of the image. The shift function provides a range of correction to prevent this undesired artifact.
We got lucky. There were good clouds at sunset. Then in the evening, for night photography, there were no clouds at all.
There were about a dozen on this tour with a couple of instructors. I was off on my own for this shot. I am certain I am the only one who captured this opportunity, but I do not know what I missed elsewhere. Light like this seldom lasts long.
Photography Notes
For the interiors, you need wide angle lenses. The wider the better.
The Chemong Mine, founded in 1909, is located near the ghost town of Masonic, CA. It was torn down and rebuilt three times. The structures were eventually abandoned in 1939. By the 1950s the nearby town of Masonic was abandoned also, leaving Chemung to fade quietly into the dust.
If you are visiting the Mono Lake area and the ghost town of Bodie, this ghost town is right in the area and worth a visit. Unlike Bodie, there are no hour restrictions. At your own risk, you can enter the buildings.
Bodie is far better preserved and there are many more buildings. But the hours at Bodie are restricted and you can only enter the buildings on a private tour.
Starburst Tips
To produce a nice starburst effect, position the sun so that it is just peeking out the edge of an object. The light bends around objects as well as the diaphragm blades in the lens.
Tree branches work well and are my typical object. In this case, I use the beam of a ghost town building.
The Canon 11-24 mm lens produces an exceptional starburst. The number of rays is lens-dependent, more specifically, diaphragm dependent. An even number of diaphragm blades in the lens will produce that many rays. An odd number of diaphragm blades will produce double the number of blades.
Both of the above starburst images were taken with my Canon 11-24 mm lens which has 9 diaphragm blades, thus 18 rays in the resultant image, some obscured by clouds.
The Chemong Mine, founded in 1909, is located near the ghost town of Masonic, CA. It was torn down and rebuilt three times. The structures were eventually abandoned in 1939. By the 1950s the nearby town of Masonic was abandoned also, leaving Chemung to fade quietly into the dust.
Feature Image Details
I used Canon EOS 5D Mark IV camera coupled with a Canon 16-35MM F4 L Lens at 16mm. It’s a composite image. The Milky Way was taken separately but this is the correct position of the stars.
I use an iOptron start tracker to take long exposures without the stars blurring. The camera slowly rotates with the stars. I have a second EOS 5D Mark IV Canon body with Canon’s low-pass filter removed, invalidating my warranty, but granting me an extra stop of light. With the iOptron star tracker, I can easily take 2-minute exposures without the stars blurring. The end result is milky way images with far more stars than the naked eye can see.
But if you are tracking the stars, the land is blurry because it isn’t moving. One needs to blend images if using a star tracker.
These images were taken on September 12.
In late August and September, the Milky Way is nearly vertical. The core of the Milky Way is visible only for a short time after sunset this time of year.
In April, the Milky Way takes on a rounded appearance and is visible only very early in the morning (think 3AM or so). In summer the Milky Way is diagonal.
The core of the Milky Way is not visible from October through February.
Additional Chemung Mine Images
If you are visiting the Mono Lake area and the ghost town of Bodie, this ghost town is right in the area and worth a visit. Unlike Bodie, there are no hour restrictions. At your own risk, you can enter the buildings.
Bodie is far better preserved and there are many more buildings. But the hours at Bodie are restricted and you can only enter the buildings on a private tour.
