Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Lake, Peaks, Morning Light

Image November 13, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Early morning light reflected in the water of an alpine Sierra Nevada backcountry lake.

Yes, I am still mining the vein of photography from that week-long Sierra backcountry trip with a fine group of fellow artists — the “first light gang” and a few other good folks who joined us on this year’s adventure. We spent a week in a beautiful 11,000′ subalpine valley, a place filled with meadows, rocks, and water; and surrounded by high peak and lots of beautiful, rocky lakes. The peak in this photograph dominated the view from our camp, and it figures in much of the work we brought back from the trip.

A relatively short distance above our camp, just up a hill and on the other side of a low saddle, there was a rockbound subalpine lake whose shoreline ran up against the base of this peak. I’m pretty sure that we all made multiple trips up there, often in the very early morning, hoping to work with the first light of the day. On this occasion I arrived before the sunrise light touched the peaks, and I then continued to photograph as it worked its way down the rocky terrain.

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: San Francisco, Photographs: Urban/Street

Mr. Bing’s Cocktail Lounge

Image November 12, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

People walk past Mr. Bing’s Cocktail Lounge, San Francisco.

San Francisco is changing quickly. I’ve lived in the Bay Area long enough to remember when it had a very different and often somewhat more working class character, at least in the many neighborhoods where regular working folks lived. (There has always been a kind of wealthy upper class here, too.) Areas that are now considered quant tourist attractions used to be places where real San Franciscans lived.

So one thing I’m conscious of as I photograph in The City is that many features aren’t likely to stick around much longer. I’ve already seen many disappear. It wasn’t that many years ago that I walked south from into the Mission Bay district and found industrial sites, abandoned lots, old stuff that had been left to decay — but that area is now, a few short years later, filled with a new and wealthier group of San Francisco denizens. A year or two ago I started to see some changes along this section of Columbus — several venerable Italian coffee shops were closed or for sale. I know nothing about Mr. Bing or his cocktail lounge, but I have to wonder how long this establishment will be remain.

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Photographs: Night, Photographs: People, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Travel, Photographs: Urban/Street

Souvenir Shop, Night

Image November 11, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

People in front of a colorful Chinatown souvenir shop at night, San Francisco.

A few years ago I began to photograph in San Francisco’s Chinatown district. At first the visits were simply connected to my street photography visits to The City, as this area happens to be on my route between several other areas I also photograph. As a Bay Area person I have visiting this spot for decades and, frankly, mostly regarded it as a tourist area. (In fact, portions of the “main drag” though the area do have largely that quality.) But eventually several things began to change my sense of the area. The first was deciding to not just walk the main tourist route, but to go a few blocks to either side. Second was to go there at the non-tourist times, for example in the early morning, when a walk along Stockton Street is a very different experience. Third was to photograph at night.

The first time I did the latter in this area was a few years back when some night photography friends suggested that we meet up for dinner there and then spend the evening photographing. I was entranced by the effect of the colorful lighting spilling onto the narrow streets and sidewalks, something that makes night photography a more viable option than on typical wide American urban streets. At about the same time I was introduced to Manhattan’s Chinatown district — a place that is both different from and similar to this San Francisco area — and I began to photograph both of them.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Treeline Landscape

Image November 10, 2019 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Glaciated slabs, meadows, stunted trees and higher peaks near treeline in the Sierra Nevada.

A recent post from Scot Miller, one of the photographers on this backcountry photographic excursion, reminded me that I still had at least one more photograph of my own from this summer 2019 trip into the John Muir Wilderness. This scene was steps from my campsite for a week in this 11,000′ valley, a week during which we had a chance to thoroughly explore and photograph the area.

When I go through my photographs following such a trip there is an almost inevitable cycle to how I work with the photographs. Often I come back with a few specific images that I recall making and looking forward to post-processing… and I typically work these up first. Then I go back through the work and “discover” additional images that I might have paid less attention to but which immediately catch my attention. Eventually I continue to work through the archive and I begin to find more subtle photographs that I like for a range of reasons. This one, to me, has a kind of quiet quality that I like, in part because it suggests the stillness of these locations, but also because it conveys, I think, the contrast between the intimate, such as that nearby tree, and the immense, such as that distant eastern escarpment cliff face.

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