This image contains three contrasting areas of light. The foreground is in deep shadow, containing softly glowing red and brown grasses. The middleground contains the thermal hot springs that line the river – they send up clouds of steam that catch the pinkish light in their plumes as they contrast to the dark hill behind them. The background of this image is the crest of that hill, lined with the stark remnants of the wildfires that ravaged Yellowstone in 1988. The dead trees are thrown into stark relief by the pinkish yellow light of rising sun behind them.