All posts by G Dan Mitchell

G Dan Mitchell, photographer and visual opportunist focusing on the Pacific coast, the Sierra Nevada, redwood forests, California oak/grasslands, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography and more. Posting daily photographs since 2005, along with articles, reviews, news, and ideas.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Basalt Columns, Lichen, Autumn Plants

February 26, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Since this photograph is in the 2016 Yosemite Renaissance 31 exhibit that opens this evening, I am reprising it for today’s post.

Basalt Columns, Lichen, Autumn Plants — Autumn plants and lichen lend color to basalt columns, Devils Postpile National Monument

Autumn plants and lichen lend color to basalt columns, Devils Postpile National Monument

Quite honestly, this photograph was at least partially the product of laziness! We were recently in the eastern Sierra Nevada for a few (more) days of autumn color photography. We had driven up late the previous day, and by the time we got settled in to our lodgings the idea of getting up again at “oh-dark-thirty” to head out and make dawn photographs was not appealing. Rather than overtly cop out, we sort of agreed to maybe not set alarms and instead just sort of see when we might wake up. Needless to say, on the morning after a very long drive that ended late at night… we did not get up at the crack of dawn! In fact, we wandered out for breakfast at perhaps 7:30 or so, and only then returned to our room to get ready for photography.

With no prior planning at all, we made a more or less spontaneous decision to visit Devils Postpile National Monument, which was to our lodgings at Mammoth Lakes. I’ve been in that area many times, but always in conjunction with backpacking trips, and most of those simply headed out from Agnew Meadow. We finally got down there in the middle of the morning. It turns out that this is actually a very good time to photograph this geological structure, as the sun is behind it, producing beautiful soft shaded light on the details of the basalt columns. To make a series of photographs from which this image comes, I used a very long lens, which allowed me to isolate and compose photographs out of small areas of the much larger wall of basalt columns. (Update — December 2015: Patty Emerson Mitchell reminds me that I almost left my camera in the car on this morning, claiming that I was really just there to let her see this location!)

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Commentary, Shows

Yosemite Renaissance 31

February 25, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The 31st annual Yosemite Renaissance Exhibit opens this weekend in Yosemite Valley. Come on by if you are in the park! The free opening Artists Reception is on Friday, February 26 at 5:30-7:30pm in the Visitor Center Gallery. The show then runs from Saturday, February 27 though May 1.

Yosemite Renaissance features artists who work in and around Yosemite and the Sierra. It includes a range of media — photographs, painting, ceramics, sculpture, and more.

I’m honored that one of my photographs was again included in the exhibit — for the fourth year in a row. This time it is a photograph I made at Devil’s Postpile National Monument last year: “Basalt Columns, Lichen, Autumn Plants”

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Wildlife

Western Meadowlark

February 25, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Western Meadowlark perched in San Joaquin Valley branches

I’m going to indulge my bird photograph collection interest and share what is really just a photograph of another little bird! This beautiful little bird was a side attraction I found during a recent visit to the California Central Valley to mainly photograph geese and cranes, plus the odd heron and egret.

Photographing the larger birds is an experience that often vacillates between moments of wildly photographing as birds fly above, or as huge flocks take to the sky, and then long periods of not doing much at all — waiting for birds, trying to figure out where the birds are, moving to another location to find birds, and so forth. But I’ve found that when I keep my eyes open I find interesting things that aren’t what I was initially looking for. That was the case with this yellow western meadowlark, which was standing in some brush alongside a perimeter road at a wildlife refuge and which I just happened to spot while passing by.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Wildlife

Bald Eagle

February 24, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A bald eagle perches in a tree.

I rarely see bald eagles in my home territory in the San Francisco Bay Area, so seeing them when I travel is a special treat. This area of the Klamath Basin that I visited in mid-February is known for them — in fact there is one refuge in the area that is off-limits to humans, specifically so that these magnificent birds can flourish without being disturbed. As I was out in a refuge on afternoon and driving along a levee I spotted a group of people stopped ahead. I slowed down and approached slowly, not wanting to disturb whatever they say, and I soon saw the very big eagles nest up in one of the trees. Soon I saw that there were two eagles in the tree, and I made some initial photographs.

I returned to the area again the next evening, this time with a better organized plan. Sure enough, both eagles were again out and about in the are of their nest, alternating between perching in the nest and heading out to hunt. At one point this eagle returned from a hunt, but instead of going to the nest and sharing its prize, the bird perched on a branch a few hundred feet from where its partner was in the next and it proceeded to feast on something it had caught. This provided an excellent opportunity to get a relatively close (with a long telephoto) and unobstructed view of the bird. After eating, the eagle tore some trigs and small branches from the tree and flew off to carry them back to the nest — as if to say, “Sorry, no food. But I did bring something nice for the house.”

G Dan Mitchell Photography

All posts by G Dan Mitchell

Basalt Columns, Lichen, Autumn Plants

Yosemite Renaissance 31

Western Meadowlark

Bald Eagle

Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.