Photographs: Nature, Photographs: White Mountains

Inyo Sunrise

Image November 19, 2022 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Looking south from the White Mountains toward the Inyo Range at sunrise.

On my aspen photography trip to the Eastern Sierra during week three of October I took one day off from photographing the autumn leaves and headed east into the White Mountains to visit the Ancient Bristlecone Pine Forest. It had been a few years since my last visit, and it seemed like time. I left the town of Bishop in predawn darkness, planning to be at an overlook of the High Sierra at dawn. Dawn on the Sierra is always impressive, though the photographic challenges on this morning were many. But just at sunrise I looked back to the Southeast, across the Inyo Range and all the way to the peaks of Death Valley, to see an impressive sequence of silhouetted peaks..

From here I continued on to the higher reaches of the White Mountains, an alpine moonscape of round and very high peaks, covered in many places by the remarkable bristlecone pine forest. These trees survive in one of the most challenging environments in California, at high elevations in these dry and barren mountains. At this late-season date there was hardly anyone else there. I saw a couple of cars at the (closed) visitor center, and I was entirely alone for an hour or so at the highest, most-distant grove of trees.

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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question. (Click this post’s title first if you are viewing on the home page.)

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

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Travel, Photographs: Urban/Street

The Urban Wilderness

Image November 18, 2022 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

This photograph comes from a well-known, popular rock outcropping along the shore of The Lake in Manhattan’s Central Park. I made the photograph on an October morning as we killed time before heading to the airport for our flight back to the West Coast. We wandered across the park, down the East Side to the Columbus Day parade, and then back to our hotel. One thing that struck me about this scene was how familiar the appearance of the people climbing the rocks was — I could find a similar scene in the Sierra..

I enjoy the parallels between photography of the urban and natural worlds. There’s no denying that they are rather different, but I think there are similarities,. too, and I’m able to apply my experience photographing the natural world to urban photography. It is possible to see the human presence in the city as almost a kind of wildlife — and photographing people and wild life can be challenging in similar ways. The city also presents a landscape, and the same principles that work in wilderness can work here, too. ( I sometimes think that the particular landscape in this photograph, with those ridiculously tall and slender buildings, may have more I’m common with movie depictions of cities on distant planets!)

COMMENT OR QUESTION? Scroll down to the comment form.

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. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Trunks, Fallen Leaves

Image November 17, 2022 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Fall leaves cover the ground inside a grove of small Eastern Sierra aspen trees.

This stand of aspens was at the edge of a larger and wildly colorful grove that descended to a nearby creek and then a good distance up the slopes on the far side of the canyon. Those other trees are the main attraction here, but as I looked down toward these trees it seemed like they provided an opportunity to enter the grove and photograph close to the trunks. Here many of the leaves had already fallen, which might usually let some much light into the grove that it would be hard to photograph. But evening shadows had reached this point, muting highlights and opening up the shadows.

Photographing this subject presents some challenges. For one, I often start in such places thinking it should be easy to find a composition among such beautiful tree trunks — but then most of the potential compositions seem to include some sort of obstruction. Also, in order to get a lot of the trunks in the frame I must work very close the trees using a very wide angle lens, so small changes of camera position seem to have big effects! Finally there is the matter of the color of the light. If you were there in this grove you would notice white trunks and warm-colored yellow leaves. However, objectively speaking, the light in this shadowed area is quite blue, being illuminated by the sky itself. So I have a decision to make. Is it better to go with that blue, which looks quite a bit different from what I saw at the time? Or should I alter the coloration to reflect my memory. I’ve done both, but in this photograph I went with the latter option.

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question. (Click this post’s title first if you are viewing on the home page.)

Photographs: New York City, Photographs: People, Photographs: Travel, Photographs: Urban/Street

I Choose Culture

Image November 16, 2022 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A man wearing a jacket with the “I Choose Culture” slogan watches the New York Columbus Day Parade.

After five days chasing New England autumn color, we spent a couple of nights in Manhattan. The photograph comes from a morning walk through midtown Manhattan before headed to the airport to fly back to the West Coast. This couple was up against the barricades, watching the “Columbus Day” parade up Fifth Avenue. In addition to the catchy phrase on the man’s jacket, the light was quite special, with reflections coming into the street from almost all directions.

Wandering along the parade route we got a look at a large cross section of the cultures on Manhattan. It is one of the most diverse places I’ve been, in almost every way — ethnically, locals and tourists, rich and poor, you name it. There’s even more political diversity than some would have you believe, with a fair number of rather conservative elements showing up and and in the parade. One surprise — Rudy Giuliani was standing at the front of one of the floats!

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

Scroll down to leave a comment or question. (Click this post’s title first if you are viewing on the home page.)

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Inyo Sunrise

The Urban Wilderness

Aspen Trunks, Fallen Leaves

I Choose Culture

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