Tag Archives: arch

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: San Francisco, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Ferry Building and Embarcadero Center Building

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Ferry Building and Embarcadero Center Building
Ferry Building and Embarcadero Center Building

Ferry Building and Embarcadero Center Building. San Francisco, California. July 12, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Embarcadero Center and Ferry Building near the San Francisco waterfront on a foggy morning.

This is another photograph that I’ve been sitting on for a while – first while it languished as a raw file between last July and early this year when I did my annual review of the previous year’s images, and then after post-processing as I posted photographs from Death Valley, the Sierra, and the coast. It has been sitting on my desktop long enough.

The photograph was made from the dock side of the San Francisco Ferry Building, looking back over the building past its iconic tower towards some of the modern buildings in the Financial District. The light was very interesting – there was still, obviously, the usual summer morning overcast where I was. However, behind me and out over the Bay the clouds were breaking up and the light was starting to come in at a low angle from off the bay, providing a glow to features like the windows of the tall background building.

This photo was made while walking streets in San Francisco and shooting mostly “old school” with just a 50mm prime.

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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: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur Coastline

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Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur Coastline
Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur Coastline

Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur Coastline. South of Monterey, California. May 13, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Bluff, cliffs, seastacks, and fog-shrouded coastal hills along the Big Sur coastline of California.

The bridge in the distance beneath the rounded, fog-topped hill is the Rocky Creek Bridge. (It is sometimes mistaken for the famous Bixby Bridge, which is a bit further south along the coast highway.) I’m very familiar with this area, having photographed from here many times. In fact, later on this morning I was up in the hills beyond the hilltop home while investigating a gravel road that heads back up into the mountains here.

I wanted to juxtapose a range of near and far bits of the bluffs above the shoreline cliffs in this scene. While the coastal meadows will turn brown very soon, on this mid-May date and in this relatively wet year they were still green. The coast highway travels along the upper part of the bluffs, often between the cliffs and the hills rising above. Beyond the bridge you can see the roadway rise to pass around another hill before descending toward the next creek to the south.

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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

Natural Arch, Sierra Nevada

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Natural Arch, Yosemite
Natural Arch, Yosemite

Natural Arch, Sierra Nevada, California. July 23, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

One of two known natural arches in this area stands high on a ridge.

Although I have visited this area for decades and know it quite well, this year was the first time I had taken notice of and actually visited this natural arch or bridge, supposedly one of two in this region. (The other is, from what I’ve heard, underwater!) I won’t say too much more about this feature since it seems to be pleasantly unburdened by tremendous waves of tourists at this point… If you know where it is, I urge you to do the same.

(To illustrate how important this is with a fragile feature such as this arch, after I posted this image somewhere else a person followed up with a photograph of some damned fool standing on the arch! This demonstrates a gross disregard for this beautiful feature – there are weaknesses in the rock at the ends of the arch, and taking risks with a feature like this one that took nature thousands of years to construct is the height of irresponsibility.)

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

G Dan Mitchell Photography
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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.

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Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur

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Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur
Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur

Rocky Creek Bridge, Big Sur. Garrapata State Park, California. May 1, 2010. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A natural bridge in front of manmade Rocky Creek Bridge along the Big Sur Coastline, California.

This scene is becoming a sort of personal icon in my photography of the California coastline. I have made a couple black and white photographs of the location that are among my very favorite photographs, but I’ve been meaning to work on a color photograph of this spot. There are at least three general conditions in which this spot gets what I regard as interesting light: fairly early morning when the light slants down toward the ocean from over the coastal Big Sur hills, late afternoon in warm light, and during various types of cloud and fog conditions. This version is from the first of these – photographed relatively early in the day when portions of the scene are backlit but some light hits parts of the scene directly after the sun rises above the tall mountains to the east.

Believe it or not, I still don’t think I’ve fully worked this scene – and I have several other ideas of how I would like to shoot it when the conditions are just right.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

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Technical Data:
Canon EOS 5D Mark II
Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS USM at 360mm
ISO 200, f/11, 1/250 second

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