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: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Museum Windows, Shadows

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Museum Windows, Shadows
Silhouetted figures, windows, and beams of light, Metropolitan Museum

Museum Windows, Shadows. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Silhouetted figures, windows, and beams of light, Metropolitan Museum

This is a second “take” on a location I photographed between Christmas and New Year’s Day last year, when we spent a week in New York. It was an exceptionally cold week, and on a few days we decided that we really needed to find indoor activities. (On other days we defied the cold and wind and walked all over Manhattan anyway.) One of the reliable options is a visit to a museum, so we headed to the Metropolitan, where we wanted to see the David Hockney show. You can’t see it in this photograph, but the museum was packed with other visitors who were also looking for a warm, indoor option.

We passed through this room twice, on our way to and from a section of the museum with relatively modern art that we wanted to view. This space is really essentially a very wide walkway, though I suspect that it could also be used for exhibits at times. The row of tall windows along the southern wall opened to Central Park and, further away, the Manhattan skyline. Lots of people took advantage of the wide window sills as a place to sit. The resulting effects of light were intriguing — backlit people in a variety of poses, the faint image of the park and city outside, and the alternative effects of shadows and reflections from the bright light streaming through the windows.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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Events, Ideas, News

Heading Home

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For the past week I have been the grateful beneficiary of a Yosemite Renaissance “artist-in-residence” (artist-in-renaissance?) gig in Yosemite National Park. Here are a few brief, or so I hope, thoughts before I pack my vehicle, lock the cabin door, and head back to what passes for civilization.

I am grateful to  Yosemite Renaissance and its director, Jon Bock, for giving me this opportunity. I appreciate your generosity, your belief in my work, and the chance to work uninterrupted and at my own pace for a week in the park.

I made a lot of photographs, though I almost never say too much about the results until I have a chance to work with the images over the next weeks and months. That said, the timing of this visit turned out to be fortuitous — in a season of too-warm temperatures and too-little precipitation, this week has been very cold and snowy! Yosemite in winter conditions are special — mist and flurries among peaks and spires, new snow on forest trees, colors and shapes muted by storms, all sorts of effects of light.

This morning I took a short walk near the cabin where I’ve been staying, and I thought a bit about what I got from this residency. I have come to Yosemite for decades. (My earliest memory is when I was perhaps five or six years old, and I was impressed by the boulders and rushing torrent of the Merced River behind our little El Portal motel — now long gone.) While I’ve spent lengthy periods in the backcountry, I don’t believe I have ever spent more than two or three successive days in the Valley. With this weeklong visit, the time pressure was off — I could investigate hunches, revisit locations several times, and work slowly and thoughtfully.

This led to another realization this morning. The week produced more than just one week’s worth of photography, and it connects previous experiences to future work. It fills gaps in my experience with the place and lays the groundwork for work to come.

This morning’s hike was an example. I carried camera equipment but made no photographs — the light wasn’t right. But I got to know a new area and spotted a few subjects for future photography, going so far as to consider how I might compose images there and what time of day and season might be ideal. I’ll be back.

Since I started by describing this as a “brief” note, and I’m already pushing the boundaries of “brief,” I’ll stop here, and conclude (for now!) by again expressing my thanks to Yosemite Renaissance.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Coastal Cliffs, Mist And Shadows

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Coastal Cliffs, Mist And Shadows
Morning light illuminates ocean mist between cliffs descending to the Pacific Ocean

Coastal Cliffs, Mist And Shadows. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Morning light illuminates ocean mist between cliffs descending to the Pacific Ocean

While spending a February morning and early afternoon photographing along the Big Sur coastline I passed by a rather famous and often crowded spot. Having visiting and photographed there many times, I wasn’t all that interested in stopping this time. However, I did look as I passed by, and I thought I saw some interesting light and spray down at the base of these cliffs.

By the time I saw it, there was no time to stop, so I continued on a bit, found a turnout, reversed direction and came back to look more closely. At this morning hour the western-facing cliffs are usually still in shadow, but the sun begins to rise high enough to send beams of light between them, lighting the mist and spray from surf and intensifying the color or the near-shore waters.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
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Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Strolling Couple

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Strolling Couple
A couple walks past a white-painted brick wall

Strolling Couple. © Copyright 2017 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A couple walks past a white-painted brick wall

This photograph is a bit more “in your face” than most of my street photography. I’m generally not one of those “stick the camera in someone’s face” sort of photographers, preferring to be a bit less invasive of people’s space. (However, I can’t deny that photographing people who did not go out into the urban environment intending to be my subjects is, almost by definition, always at least a little bit invasive and aggressive.)

I’m hard pressed now to recall even making the photograph, which means it was most likely made very quickly and probably while I was walking. I could not have predicted the woman’s remarkable yawn — or perhaps she is singing? ;-)

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | LinkedIn | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.