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: Arizona, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: The Southwest

Rain Squall, Monument Valley

November 14, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Distant mesas and towers of Monument Valley, veiled by a passing rain squall

I have a bit of a surprising confession to make. Utah is not the only state in the American Southwest that I had not previously photographed. Although I have been in the state before, I had never photographed there prior to this year, when we made a quick pass though the upper portion of the state on a drive between Moab and Zion National Park. Several things explain this. First, as I’ve written before, I’ve long been a California landscape bigot – the “local” landscapes of ocean and mountains and deserts and redwoods and more have been, and continue to be, such a focus that I’ve felt little inclination to shoot elsewhere. More recently, as I discovered Utah, I felt a bit of an obligation to avoid Arizona for certain other reasons that I won’t go into right now.

That’s right. I’ve never photographed the Grand Canyon. In fact, I haven’t even seen the Grand Canyon except from the air while flying over the state. And, no, I had not seen Monument Valley either. As we left Moab and headed south, I was excited about seeing this new landscape, but a bit concerned about the potential for photography as a storm – and not just the afternoon monsoon – was moving through. Sure enough, just about the time we got near to Monument Valley the clouds thickened, the wind blew, and it began to rain in earnest. However, I soon caught sight of the towers and mesas of this valley in the distance, familiar from so many photographs I’ve seen, and I quickly realized that the rainy conditions were actually going to provide some very special light and effects. This photograph is a case in point. It was cloudy but not raining at my camera position. Just beyond, a passing squall was dropping rain across the desert terrain and muting and blurring the features, but beyond that the sun was shining on the stupendous distant formations, and beyond them broken clouds were moving.

Text, photographs, and other media are © Copyright G Dan Mitchell (or others when indicated) and are not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Cracked Sandstone

November 13, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Large cracks in layers of sandstone, Zion National Park

On our way to Utah points further east in late October, we passed through Zion National Park and ended up spending the better part of a day photographing along the Mount Carmel Highway route through the park. There are any number of places here to park the car, get out, and walk down into the narrow washes and valleys or climb up to various prominences. On this day the prospect was even more interesting since autumn color had come to the high country – much more than in the more famous Zion Canyon – and the oak and red maple trees were showing brilliant and vivid colors.

At several points we decided to investigate small canyons that passed near the roadway, and several of them included short stretches that were very narrow. There is a lot of tortured looking geology in some of these places, the result of eroding and sculpting power of the sand and water and other processes. Here a large “chunk” of sandstone was leaning away from the creek and was cracking, both along the natural strata in the rock and perpendicular the layers. In these places it is often interesting to see how seemingly solid rock can take on the qualities of a plastic material that has been bent and carved.

Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Fractured Sandstone Detail

November 12, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Details of fractured sandstone rock, Zion National Park

On this day we had driven across a good chunk of Arizona and southern Utah while traveling from Moab towards Springdale and Zion – and it had rained, heavily at times and lightly most of the day. Back in Arizona many of the creeks and rivers had come back to life, and north of where we were it may have been snowing. By the time we reached Zion and headed across the Mount Carmel Highway on our way to Springdale, everything was quite wet.

Rain radically changes the appearance of this portion of the park. (In truth, it changes the appearance of many things, but that is a topic for another post!) There were puddles and rivulets everywhere, and those dry waterfalls that characterize this country were no longer dry. The clouds soften the light and fill in the shadows, and the moisture intensifies the colors, especially the red and pink colors of the sandstone. Shortly after entering the park we pulled over and spent some “quality time” exploring this change near a small valley that held pools and a little temporary creek, and I found this area of fractured sandstone.

Commentary, Equipment, Ideas

“Have you ever shot a Leica or Contax lens on your Canon Body?”

November 11, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 4 Comments

(From time to time I re-post stuff that I wrote elsewhere, including things from various photography forums. This is one of those posts. While I do believe it using good and appropriate photographic equipment, I do not believe in “magical gear,” whether lenses or cameras or whatever. Gear is important, but only insofar as it actually affects your ability to produce the photographs that you are working on. This particular – and lengthy! – comment was a response to a common response to those of us who don’t believe in magical gear, namely to suggest that because we don’t use it we must not understand. Enjoy!)

G Dan – just one question Have you ever shot a Leica or Contax lens on your Canon Body?”

That dismissive come-back doesn’t work, despite the fact that such a reply is often offered as if it should stop discussion in its tracks.

So, no, I have not. There are many things I have not done, however, that I don’t do because facts don’t support the wisdom of doing them, or because facts do support the wisdom of doing something else. Let me give you a photographic example. I have chosen certain specific lenses for my photography. In the process of making those decisions I investigated and considered many other lens options, almost all without actually trying them, and came to logical and intelligent decisions that led me to choose something else.

The argument that people can only have opinions about things they have actually “used” is, on its face, simply nonsense. It also is an absurdly impractical concept. I’d be willing to bet that those who offer up this gem of an argument do not follow it in the rest of your lives. For example, you might be able to offer an opinion about various political systems or countries and whether you would prefer to live in them or not, but you would be a very unusual person if you had actually lived in all of them about which you have an opinion. I’ll bet that when you purchase a car, you do not try all of the options that you dismiss before deciding that you are uninterested in them. You might admit to knowing things about places you have never visited or about which you have not made direct observations yourself. (It is cold in Antarctica. There is no oxygen on the moon. When it is night where you are, it is day on the opposite side of the planet.) Continue reading “Have you ever shot a Leica or Contax lens on your Canon Body?” →

G Dan Mitchell Photography

All posts by G Dan Mitchell

Cracked Sandstone

Fractured Sandstone Detail

“Have you ever shot a Leica or Contax lens on your Canon Body?”

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