Before me there must have been at least other admirers who must have seen this tree, standing at the corner where the road turns into a relatively flat run, after about two thousand feet climb in the last five miles or so. But I have done it many times and even filmed a timelapse sequence at this location many years ago.
It was early in the year, the ground was several inches below a blanket of hardened and yet spongy snow that had accumulated over months. The afternoon sun was low to the horizon and the light reflecting off the snow in the background shone through the branches of the tree hurting my eyes. It was a weekend day but we were far out of reach from the ugly west beyond the mountains. I stood there in absolute silence gazing at the silhouette of the tree and thought about how I could meter this scene right. I had Kodak Tri-X in my Leica M-A: a bare-bones camera that I love the most of all my shooting tools and an orange filter to cut through the blue sky.
It was a bright day: Sunny 16 rule tells me I should set 1/400 sec shutter speed to f/16 aperture, less two stops to compensate the orange filter. But it would have underexposed the tree, the details in the bark. I took a spot meter reading on the main trunk dead center and it read 1/60 seconds at f/16 aperture. Applying zone system math to it, I decided to put the 1/60th sec reading at Zone IV(average dark foliage) and fired the shutter set to 1/125 seconds.
Kodak Tri-X 400, Leica M-A, Voigtlander 50 Nokton f/1, Tiffen Orange 21 filter