Category Archives: Photographs: Northern California

Photographs from Northern California

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Night, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Wooden Building and Stairs in Moonlight

April 18, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The light of the full moon illuminates the facade of a wooden building, and outside stairway, and passing overhead fog clouds at Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

Since I was out doing night photography this weekend, I’m going to use this as an excuse to insert a night image into the recent stream of Death Valley photographs. (There are more of those, but a bit of variety can’t hurt.) I got an email from Tim Baskerville, the guiding light (guiding dark?) of The Nocturnes, the San Francisco Bay Area night photography group. Tim has introduced and guided many new night photographers over the past few decades, and The Nocturnes group is a sort of loose collective linking together lots of night photographers and providing instruction, online resources, and shows of night photography work. As this is the 20th year for the group, lots of special activities are taking place and this little spontaneous get-together at Mare Island was one of them.

A small story from this weekend’s shoot may illustrate the widespread effect of Tim’s work with night photography in general and with the Mare Island location specifically. Those of us who were to meet Tim at Mare Island arrived to find other photographers already assembled at the indicated meeting place – but we didn’t really recognize most of the group. It turns out that another night photography group (loosely organized, as I understand it, by Thomas Hawk and Ivan Makarov) was going to be there as well. We spoke with them a bit and then they departed for the far end of the island. (They returned later and we worked side by side.) But then, a few minutes later, more vehicles began to show up and we thought that they might be the rest of our group, especially when someone asked “Are you the Nocturnes?” But no, this was a third night photography group, this one out of Sacramento!

In any case, as the light diminished and night came on we started shooting. We had a nearly full moon, which can be a wonderful asset, not so much as a subject (it is very difficult to include the full moon in night shots) but for the beautiful light is sheds on other subjects that might otherwise be very dark. On top of that, we had a combination of some high clouds (which are relatively stationary) and low fog (which creates a nice luminous glow as it quickly passes). I decided to begin the evening’s work by photographing this wooden-sided building and its outside staircase, illuminated by the moonlight, and with a bit of the cloudy sky and faint star trails.

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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: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Shoreline Trees and Pond

April 3, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trees ring a shoreline pond along the edge of a lake, Yosemite National Park.

This little scene is in a not-too-hard-to-find location in the Yosemite high country along Tioga Pass Road. I have another black and white photograph made in nearly the same location that is one of my favorite photographs from last year – in fact, it might be my favorite. I had sort of written off the idea of doing a color version of the same location, but now I’m rethinking that decision.

There are things I like quite a bit about this scene, though there is also one aspect that I’m not completely happy with. I’ll keep the specifics to myself, but one reason for posting this is to remind myself of how I want to re-shoot the subject this coming summer when I think I’ll be able to find very similar conditions once again.

There are a couple of tricky things about this location and this shot. For one, it is hard to find a clear view of the major elements of the scene that is compositionally interesting and does not include distracting elements. (That is something that I now think I may have a solution to…) For another the thing that makes the light so interesting – it is early morning and the trees are backlit – is also the source of a challenge with very wide dynamic range between the shaded portions of the trees and some bright spots of direct and reflected sun on the rocks.

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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: Architecture, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Reflections in Curved Window

April 2, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A curved window on the Portside Building reflects a street scene near the San Francisco waterfront.

And now for something quite different from recently posted photographs…

I made this photograph while walking in San Francisco last summer. I’m intrigued by reflections and by scenes holding multiple layers or even multiple layered sub-scenes, so when I found this curved window I had to try to shoot it. For me the first thing I see is the cross-shaped pattern of the metallic bars separating the panes of glass. Looking more closely at what first seems to be just shiny and silver, I see quite a few colors and patterns, especially in the horizontal bars. On the other side of the window is a bit of the interior of the building – a white wall with its own curved shape, the end of a curved cushioned seat, and a dark area opening further into the interior on the right, within which a few shining lights are visible. Then there is the world in the reflections in the glass. (I mostly managed to exclude myself from the reflections, though you might be able to find a bit of me if you look very carefully! ) A person is framed in the lower right quarter of the frame against a background of a warped and curving street and sidewalk. The upper right section features some clearing fog over the Bay and a bit of an overhang in front of the building. The reflections at lower left are faint, though a cross walk can be seen. At upper left is a typical city scene with a traffic signal, wires, and the front of an urban building.

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

Whalers Knoll, Point Lobos

March 31, 2011 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

View of foggy Pacific Ocean from Whalers Knoll, Point Lobos State Reserve, California.

Whalers Knoll is yet another feature of Point Lobos named after “whalers” – Whalers Cove is another. Sometimes when I hike the trails along the north shore of the park I detour up a trail to the top of the knoll, from which there is a view of a larger expanse of landscape and seascape. But still, given the rough and rugged landscape of Point Lobos, there is no clear and unobstructed view – instead you can see the ocean between ridges and peaks and then only by looking for a spot where the Monterey Cypress trees are not as thick.

Although Point Lobos is a very popular park, it is usually possible to find some solitude by walking away from the most popular shoreline areas and hiking a bit. Since this trail is a bit out of the way and involves a climb, it isn’t unusual to be alone on at this lookout, especially on a foggy day when many visitors find the view from their cars to be sufficient!

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