Sunrise in the Himalayas, originally uploaded by acastellano.

The photographer: “Annapurna Circuit - Trek Day 17

Each morning dozens of trekkers wake up at 5am to begin the thousand-foot climb from Ghorepani (9,500′) to the summit of Poon Hill (10,531′). They make this pilgrimmage in the dark in order to witness one of the most spectacular scenes in the Himalayas (or the planet for that matter)…sunrise on Poon Hill. From this perch, you can watch as the sun’s first rays light up the entire Annapurna range and then light up the imposing face of Dhaulagiri across the Kali Gandaki valley. It is well worth the climb…and worth the effort to carry your best camera, a tripod and lots of film!

This is a photograph scanned from a film negative. It was not “photoshopped”, other than to adjust the brightness/contrast levels. I used a print from the original negative as my target for the adjustments. I also performed a small amount of noise reduction to eliminate some of the scanner noise, but I had to leave some of the graininess in there, otherwise it looked completely fake!”