Photo Rumors — A Cautionary Tale (Morning Musings 102/14)

October 2, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Rumors are so much fun! Whether you are interested in cars, computer, smartphones, movies, books, or photography gear, there is a good chance that certain hints and rumors may grab your attention and perhaps get you thinking about “what if.” However — and this shouldn’t be news to anyone! — rumors are not news, at least not in most cases, a fact that can get lost as they get picked up, repeated, commented upon, and so forth until they acquire a veneer of believability that may be inappropriate.

If you are interested in the fascinating sub-species of photography equipment rumors, you might enjoy a recent article (“News! 46MP Megapixel Canon 1DsX DSLR About to Be Announced!!! Or the Anatomy of a Rumor”) that unravels the process by which a very (very!) dubious “report” got amplified and repeated until it was regarded as a likely fact.

(For those who don’t follow links, a short version of the conclusion: The “rumor” appears to have been entirely in the mind of one “imaginative” person until it was spread by people who perhaps should have known better.)

Morning Musings are somewhat irregular posts in which I write about whatever is on my mind at the moment — connections to photography may be tenuous at times!

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

Last Light, Yosemite Backcountry

October 2, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Final evening light on the face of a granite dome in the Yosemite National Park backcountry

As I have mentioned previously while sharing this set of photographs from my early September Yosemite backcountry photography, the particular ridge from which I made this photograph drew me back repeatedly. I climbed it to photograph in the early morning and late in the evening, and in conditions ranging from clear to hazy to scattered clouds. While the larger scene might be regarded as “typical Sierra,” it was possible to juxtapose and pick out all sorts of interesting elements, and the changing light transformed this landscape in surprisingly striking ways.

This was a particularly beautiful evening, and the light and landscape offered up many possibilities over the time I was there — from very late afternoon right on past the sunset. This was one of my final exposures of the evening, and the very last beams of red sunset light were coming up the canyon from the west after passing through a lot of low-level atmospheric haze in order to softly illuminate the edges of the granite slopes along the top of the near ridge as the rest of the scene was already falling into “blue hour” light.

Morning Musings

Important Yosemite Anniversary (Morning Musings 10/1/14)

October 1, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

G Dan and Richard Mitchell in Yosemite, date unknown — Richard Mitchell (left) and G Dan Mitchell (right) in Yosemite, date unknown

October 1, 2014 marks the 124 year anniversary of the creation of Yosemite National Park on this day in 1890. To quote from a park web page:

“In 1889, John Muir, America’s most famous and influential naturalist and conservationist, and Robert Underwood Johnson, editor of Century Magazine, had growing concerns about the devastating effects of sheep grazing in the high country. They launched a successful campaign to persuade Congress to set aside this area as a national park in 1890. On October 1, 1890, the U.S. Congress set aside more than 1,500 square miles of reserved forest lands, soon to be known as Yosemite National Park.”

(The first federal protections came earlier, on June 30, 1864 when President Abraham Lincoln signed a congressional act that established the “Yosemite Grant” in the Sierra Nevada — the first instance of the US government setting aside land specifically for preservation and public use, though not yet technically a “national park.”)

On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the “Yosemite Grant” signing, I wrote a post about my own experience in the park, which includes a bit of my photographic history in the place, including a childhood photograph of me and my brother Richard Mitchell at a park trailhead many years ago, the earliest Yosemite photograph of mine, and a few later shots from the park. Enjoy!

Morning Musings are somewhat irregular posts in which I write about whatever is on my mind at the moment — and the subjects may not always concern photography.

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

Trees and Peninsula, Morning Light

October 1, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning light shines on trees growing on a rocky lakeshore peninsula

On many mornings during our photography expedition into the northern Yosemite backcountry, various of us found ourselves photographing this lovely little rock peninsula, with its well-shaped trees. In fact, at times I found myself looking to photograph here… only to find that one of my friends was on the rocks and photographing these elements close up — and who could blame them. In fact, of the three exposures of the island I made within a few minutes on this morning before heading off around the lake, I think that there are other photographers in two of them! Fortunately, this one seemed to have the right combination of light and form.

The peninsula and its trees are only part of the story here. There are reflections, of course, though I composed the image to minimize them to some extent. And there is the beautiful backlight fringing the needs of the trees, an element that I find hard to resist. I’m also interested in the more distant and higher granite slopes in the far background, on which sparse and thinning trees ascend toward an unseen ridge. The same light that backlights the near trees, also backlights the trees on the granite slopes, and it also lights the atmospheric haze enough to soften the features of this mountain.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Photo Rumors — A Cautionary Tale (Morning Musings 102/14)

Last Light, Yosemite Backcountry

Important Yosemite Anniversary (Morning Musings 10/1/14)

Trees and Peninsula, Morning Light

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