The Camel Procession

I should say from the start that this photograph was staged. The chance of meeting a camel procession at dawn or sunset, in the right dunes, with the right costumes and the right number of animals, would have been almost impossible.

So we treated it almost like a film scene. We found the camel owner, explained what we hoped to photograph, studied the dunes, decided where the procession should pass, and waited for the one element we could not control: the weather.

“Planning makes the photograph possible; the weather decides whether it happens.”

There had been a sandstorm the day before, and we were worried the wind would continue. That night I kept hoping for clear weather. By morning, the sandstorm had stopped and the conditions were better than we dared expect.

We arrived at the entrance before the gates had opened. Our local guide woke the gatekeeper, and after a short walk through the desert we reached the site. The camel owner was already on his way.

While we waited for the light, I studied the terrain and discussed the route with him. The photograph was made after sunrise, from an angle just above the horizontal, with the dunes throwing long shadows across the sand.

Everything came together. The team was delighted, the camel owners were happy, and perhaps the only unhappy person was the gatekeeper, whose sleep had been interrupted by a group of photographers chasing the morning light.

Location: Kumtag Desert, Xinjiang, China.