Tag Archives: atmosphere

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Desert Mountains, Clouds

April 26, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Clouds from a passing weather front and the beginning of a dust storm above desert mountains and valley

The light and atmospheric effects in the desert can be quite varied, though we are perhaps most familiar with the least interesting conditions, the heat and clarity of midday. (Even that has an appeal, but for me it often isn’t photographic.) But go there often enough and at different times of year, and you will witness an astonishing diversity of conditions. I’ve been at this location in extreme heat, gale force winds, snow, light rain, quite evening light, and more. The conditions on this morning were not unprecedented in my experience, but the combination was marvelous.

We arrived at this ridgeline location just before sunrise and, as is often the case, there were clouds above the ridges far to the east that would block the light of the rising sun. Such clouds can be a photographic blessing (when the light up the right way) or a curse (when they simply block the light and leave everything gray). After a very brief bit of color along the distant horizon it looked like this was going to be a gray morning. Fortunately, we stuck around! Since the light on the grand landscape was “challenging,” we turned out attention to closer and smaller things, and while we were thus distracted the landscape and sky were transformed. A weather front was passing by, and beautiful clouds began to stack up above us and to the east. A milky haze across the valley gave the first hints of a monumental dust storm that would arrive by the afternoon. The light everywhere was a luminescent blue and it illuminated the stark forms of the dry wash running up into the desert mountains beneath us.

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Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Desert Mountains, Morning Haze

April 13, 2016 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

This is another “take” on roughly the same scene I shared in another recent photograph, also in black and white. When I made the photograph I was already thinking of it as a black and white image, and it obviously has ended up that way, more or less as planned. I was already familiar with the rugged foreground mountains from previous visits, but the light and atmospheric conditions on this visit were unique. The sky was fairly cloudy, though the ceiling was breaking up a bit, allowing light beams to break through. The atmosphere was extremely hazy. The positive aspect of this is that the light shining through it almost glowed. (In fact, that was probably what first attracted me to the scene.) The somewhat negative aspect is that the haze was the harbinger of a tremendous dust storm that would arrive later in the day.

The black and white rendition represents the result of a sort of pre-visualization. To my way of thinking, “pre-visualization” can mean a range of things. At one end of the spectrum it could mean almost literally “seeing” the finished photograph before making the exposure. In this case I knew I wanted the hazy light beams to glow, that I wanted to retain the dark mass of the foreground mountains, and that the final result would be black and white. But I don’t want to imply more certainty than I actually had. Despite my decent idea of where I was going, I did not know for sure what the exact best outcome would be and, in fact, I made some varied compositions and exposures. On a side note, although we didn’t quite realize it just yet, the haze that made the light so beautiful came from the first dust from dust storms that were building all around the area.

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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: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature

Death Valley, Morning Clouds

April 7, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning sun shines through atmospheric haze and clouds above Death Valley

Death Valley is a very big place, and getting to locations sometimes requires a lot of driving. Photographing there often requires a very early wakeup call, and I’m often on my way to some location in the park well before first light. Leaving during darkness, often for a place very different from where I’m staying, means I have to make some educated (and not so educated) guesses about what conditions might be like many miles away and at sometimes very different elevations. As result, I often do not know precisely what conditions I’ll find when I arrive at an early morning location.

Such was the case on this morning. The destination was more than 6000′ feet higher than where we were staying and many miles away. In the past I’ve arrived at this spot to find very strong winds and very cold temperature. This time the temperature wasn’t so bad but we did have winds. Just before arrival at the final destination the sky lit up briefly, so we halted and photographed from that location before continuing on… and watching the light die as the sun rose. We consoled ourselves — we had caught a brief bit of good light and it was a beautiful spot to be in, photographs or not. Since we were there we went ahead and made a few photographs, and as we did so the conditions began to improve in somewhat dramatic fashion. The earliest hint of the afternoon’s upcoming dust storm appeared in the distant milky haze through which beams of light passed. Higher clouds began to collect, and dramatic light cut across the face of the arid mountains below us.

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

Aspens, Sagebrush Hills

October 21, 2015 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Backlit autumn aspen trees against a background of layered sagebrush-covered ridges

This is a different view of the Sierra Nevada — rather than the high peaks, forests, meadows, rivers, and lakes we have high desert sagebrush country, but with a few aspens as well. When I think of aspens, they first bring to mind high elevation areas of the Sierra, often near rivers or other water sources, but also in some fairly rugged high areas. I don’t, at least not at first, thing of dry and austere landscapes like this one.

These aspens grow in a transitional east slope area. The elevation is high, a bit over 8000′ in this case, but the climate is dry and more closely related to the lower east side semi-desert areas. As a matter of fact, surrounding this grove is a landscape of mostly rolling sagebrush-covered hills. As the hills lead higher toward the crest, the trees become more dense and eventually intermixed with conifers. The light on the further ridges is also an interesting story. it obviously appears when the sun is at a low angle, which on the east side most likely means in the evening, and that is when I made this photograph. There is a short interval as the sun drops in the late afternoon when it is low enough to outline the edges of ridges, but before it abruptly drops behind the highest peaks of the Sierra. I made this photograph within moments of the shadow of the high peaks arriving — in fact, during the time it took me to set up a follow-up shot the beautiful light highlighting those ridges disappeared.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: atmosphere

Desert Mountains, Clouds

Desert Mountains, Morning Haze

Death Valley, Morning Clouds

Aspens, Sagebrush Hills

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