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

Man With Ice Cream Bar

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Man With Ice Cream Bar
A man eating an ice cream bar on a Manhattan night

Man With Ice Cream Bar. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A man eating an ice cream bar on a Manhattan night.

As I continue revisiting some old raw file archives from nearly a decade ago, I’ve been going through some photographs from a weeklong visit to New York City. We were there partly for music-related activities, partly for family reasons, and partly to make photographs. A few years’ distance from the immediate experience lets me see the photographs a bit more objectively, I think, and I’ve found several that I think are worth sharing now.

For five or six years I’ve been doing a lot of handheld night street photography, but this photograph comes from before that period —actually from a single evening in Manhattan when I began photographing in twilight and just kept going. There are multiple ways to “read” this photograph. I think that one initial approach may be less than complimentary to the subject, but the more I think about it the more I see other perspectives that are positive. I’ll leave it to viewers to sort that out!

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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Clouds, Sand Storm, Desert Mountains

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Clouds, Sand Storm, Desert Mountains
Clouds from a weather front above sand storm in dessert mountains

Clouds, Sand Storm, Desert Mountains. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Clouds from a weather front above sand storm in dessert mountains.

At times during our early-April visit to Death Valley National Park we had some remarkable atmospheric conditions to work with. That was certainly the case on this evening, when we had a combination of low-angle sunlight (which became quite colorful right at sunset), a building sand storm that was filling the air above the Amargosa Range with thick dust, and a passing weather front that darkened the sky and dropped some light rain.

In this interpretation of the scene I chose to go with a black and white rendition. One reason is that, in some ways, monochrome interpretations actually allow more subjective flexibility with the scene. I think that black and white allows us to comfortably step a bit further away from the objective reality of the scene, since we start with something that is, by its monochromatic nature, emphatically not what we see in the real world. In this photograph I wanted to emphasize the powerful and monumental quality of the storm clouds above the masses of dust and sand covering the mountains.

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

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

Photographs: Nature

Tidy Tips Flowers And Grass

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Tidy Tips Flowers And Grass
Sprng tidy tips flowers in a grassy meadow

Tidy Tips Flowers And Grass. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sprng tidy tips flowers in a grassy meadow.

This post continues my recent adventures with the new macro lens, in which I learn to better understand how to photograph small things at short distances. For someone who often photographs the large things in the world, where sizes are measured in miles rather than millimeters, this requires some adjustments!

This is not the first recent photograph of tidy tips flowers, nor will it be the last. We had plenty of opportunities to photograph this beautiful flower this spring when we traveled to Southern California grasslands and desert areas. In this photograph I endeavored to place one large flower in front of a background that included more of these flowers and the intensely-green spring grasses.

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.

Blog | About | Flickr | Facebook | Email

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

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

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Southern California

Sand Storm, Virga, And Mountains

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Sand Storm, Virga, And Mountains
Sand storm and evening virga over Death Valley mountains

Sand Storm, Virga, And Mountains. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sand storm and evening virga over Death Valley mountains.

Here is( yet another) photograph from an astounding early-April afternoon and evening of wind and sand storms, a passing weather front, desert landscape, and transforming light. We were south of this location in the middle of the day and had heard a forecast for high winds and blowing sand. Sure enough, the wind began to rise, and when I looked far to the north I could see the dust rising. We quickly headed that way.

There was a somewhat unusual conjunction of conditions. (I write “somewhat” because I have been lucky enough to experience it once before.) The high winds were whipping up sand and dust and sending it high into the air and far up into desert mountains to the northeast. At the same time the remnants of a passing weather front were building clouds above the dust and sand, and virga was falling from some of the clouds. Just before sunset I began to photograph this scene, and I kept photographing as the colors and light transitioned to sunset and then dusk.

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.

Blog | About | Flickr | Facebook | Email

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

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

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