Zabriskie Point
Location: Five miles southeast of Furnace Creek on Route 190.
Best Time: Sunrise
   Next to the sand dunes, Zabriskie Point is the place to go for dawn. Arrive well before sunrise to stake out your location among the crowd of other photographers. The best location is right at the parking area. The sun rises behind you and the first place it shines on is manly Beacon, turning it a deep orange color. As the sun rises, more of the landscape is turned into a golden hue mixed with earth browns. Then the light becomes too flat for photography. consider using both a wide angle and telephoto lens here. The wide angle for the classic scene of manly Beacon with the Panamint Mountains behind it and a telephoto to pick out interesting patterns as the sun strikes the various rock formations.

Dante's View
Location: 26 miles southeast of Furnace Creek (22 miles beyond Zabriskie Point). Take Route 190 southeast to the Dante View turnoff and continue for another five miles.
Best Time: Early morning is best. Sunset if there are some clouds (rare).
   Even if you don't take any photos, this is a wonderful view. From the vantage point of 5,475 feet you can see most of Death Valley. Below you is Badwater, a pool of water set in barren salt flats. Across the valley are the Panamint Mountains and, on a clear day, you can see to the snow-capped Sierra Nevada. Early in the morning there will be less haze to obscure the view and the sun will be behind you.

Golden Canyon
Location: Three miles south of Furnace Creek on Badwater Road.
Best Time: Late afternoon to near sunset.
   A short spur road east of Badwater Road takes you to the parking area. Follow the main canyon 0.75-miles to the end and then go left to the Red Cathedral. This canyon is a favorite with black & white photographers, although there is plenty of color (gold and red)  for the color photographer. The canyon glows a beautiful golden color when the sun is near setting.

Mushroom Rock
Location: Seven miles south of Furnace Creek on Badwater Road at the end of Artist Palette Drive.
   This is a chunk of basalt that has been eroded into the shape of a mushroom. You can walk around it and photograph it from various angles so you can take advantage of different light condition during the day.

Artist's Drive/Artist's Palette
Location: It starts 12 miles south of Furnace Creek. The road through this area is one-way heading north and you might want to drive through as you are heading north from point south. The drive is an eight-mile loop along a narrow paved road.
Best Time: Late afternoon. Best color saturation on a rare overcast day.
Artist Drive takes you through foothills of colorful volcanic rock. The best stop is the Artist's Palette (about five miles along the drive) where the rocks look as though someone splashed red, yellow, green, pink, orange and black paint all over them. Colors change as the sun sinks in the sky so plan to spend a little time here.

Salt Ponds/Devil's Golf Course
Location: 12 miles south of Furnace Creek on Badwater Road. Take graded dirt spur road to the west.
Best Time: Any time but late in the day is more interesting.
   Wear sturdy shoes and bring something to kneel on, a wide angle lens (even a fisheye might be interesting) and a close focusing system. This is a vast area of pillars of salt crystals. The ones near the parking area are warn down because people have walked all over them. You are going to want to walk further to where the crystals haven't been damaged. These crystals are sharp so you will need those sturdy shoes. A picture of the whole area looks like another world. Close ups of the crystals themselves look like miniature castles. Get very close with your close-up system, or better yet your wide angle lens. A lowering sun can create a truly out-of-this world image

Natural Bridge
Location: 15 miles south of Furnace Creek. Take the two-mile dirt road to the east to a parking area. A quarter-mile trail takes you to the formation.
   Natural Bridge is not a terrific photo subject beyond its novelty, but you can work with it for some interesting framing views of some of the nearby rocks.

Badwater
Location: 20 miles south of Furnace Creek.
Best Time: Sunrise and early morning.
   At 280 feet below sea level Badwater is almost the lowest point in North America. (The actual lowest is a nondescript area a few miles west that beats Badwater by two feet.) Early morning is an interesting time to photograph here. There are usually no people about and the pool of water is highly reflective. Low angle photographs of the pool showing the vastness of the valley are often the best shots.

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