Afternoon Shadows, El Capitan Meadow. Yosemite National Park, California. November 3, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell

This was not a shot I planned to take. I was in the Valley and on my way to another place where I planned to shoot in the early evening when I drove past this spot and saw the boundary between light and shadow falling across these trees. I quickly pulled over, grabbed my gear, set up the tripod and made a few exposures before the light disappeared.

Half Dome and Oak Branches, Autumn. Yosemite National Park, California. November 4, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell

A bit of a postcard shot, but sometimes one cannot resist… :-)

Yosemite Valley, Early Evening. Yosemite National Park, California. Novemer 3, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.

This is a late afternoon / early evening photograph of a grove of trees beyond a recently-burned meadow, with low-angle light from the far end of the Valley illuminating the trees. Although the colors of the scene were quite interesting (intense greens and some fall foliage, with the saturated late light) I like the more classic quality of the black and white version.

Ahwahnee Meadow Oaks, Autumn. Yosemite National Park, California. November 11, 2007. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell.

I had a few free hours on this afternoon – between shooting morning subject and my intended evening subject – so I wandered on over towards the Ahwahnee, passing this nice grove of oak trees on the way. I had previously photographed the small grove in the distance, but I liked this view with the more distant trees framed by the trunks of the nearby grove.