Tag Archives: barren

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

Morning Light, Badlands Terrain

April 29, 2014 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Early morning light on tortured badlands formations, Death Valley National Park

I made this photograph at a truly iconic location (arguably the iconic location) at Death Valley National Park back in early April. While I don’t always photograph icons, and I make a point of looking for other things when photographing in well-known areas, I’m not anti-icon. My relationship with them is complex, but when I’m with someone who has not seen them before or when I visit a new place for the first time or when unusual and spectacular conditions arise… I’ll be there with everyone else. (Though sometimes I’ll be there without everyone else, since sometimes I go to these places in less likely conditions or an unusual times.)

All of this is my introduction to saying that I made this photograph at the famous Zabriskie Point area of Death Valley. I have photographed here quite a few times over the years, and while I don’t always revisit the spot, when I do I always find something interesting to photograph. It could be special conditions (clouds, full moon, haze, etc.), but more often I like to seek out smaller component elements of this famous landscape and see if I can make photographs of them. This terrain certainly provides plenty of opportunities! It is a rugged place where gully-riddled ridges are stacked one above the other, and at the right times of the day the light can glance across these elements in beautiful ways. The light in this photograph came well after dawn, when the sun had risen enough to begin to light the features more thoroughly, but on a morning when its intensity was diminished just enough by high, thin clouds.

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: New York City, Photographs: Urban/Street

Winter Trees, Statue, Central Park

March 22, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Barren winter trees and statue in Central Park, New York City

At the end of 2013 we spent a week in New York City, devoting our time to a combination of family visits and exploring the city and surroundings. We staying in Manhattan and did a lot of walking and subway riding there, but we also got up to the north as far as The Cloisters museum and also spent quite a bit of time in Brooklyn.

We managed to miss the worst of the tough winter weather in New York. We had some rain on one day, and there was the tiniest flurry of snow on another near the end of the trip. For Californians from the San Francisco Bay Area, it seemed cold, but not nearly like it would be starting a few days after we left, when cold conditions and very heavy snow arrived. All of this was great for us since we wanted to walk and photograph a lot. On one day we decided to wander around in Central Park. It was a beautiful winter day, with mostly blue skies and clear air. The park was crowded with plenty of other people who were taking advantage of the opportunity to get out. As we wandered around I carried my small rangefinder-style camera and mostly shot quickly and spontaneously, focusing on whatever happened to catch my attention—a group of trees, tall building surrounding the park, people, and so on. Here I tried to fill the frame with the stark, twisted forms of these barren winter trees against the clear sky… with a small surprise in the lower left corner.

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

Titus Canyon Road

February 6, 2014 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Titus Canyon Road descents into upper Titanothere Canyon before climbing to Red Pass

Early December is a fine time to be in Death Valley National Park, and I managed to spend five days there this past December. The weather is cooler this time of year – in fact, temperatures dropped into the upper twenties in the Valley during my visit and well down into the teens in some of the upper elevations that I visited during the pre-dawn hours. Although seasoned Death Valley visitors prefer to visit during the cooler months, things seem much quieter than a few months later in the spring. In fact, I almost had the entire Stovepipe Wells campground to myself on my first night!

The relative solitude extended to this day, on which I drove over the Amargosa Range via Titus Canyon Road, the rough back-country one-way route between the Amargosa Valley and Death Valley itself. I know this route fairly well, having been over it a number of times. I always start in the morning, and this trip was no exception – I was well out on to the route when the sun came up. Often I just take a few hours for the trip, stopping at a few key locations. But recently I have thought more about how I might photograph some of these places that I used to simply drive through, and on this visit I slowed way down and devoted almost the entire day to this area. The location in this photograph is an example of the sort of area that I might have just passed through in the past. Here the road traverses the upper reaches of a very large canyon that eventually spills out into Death Valley far below. The location from which I made the photograph marks the high point on the route, and I always stop there – but on some previous visits I have just regarded the terrain as being empty. It isn’t, and I’m learning to see it more clearly. Here the gravel road drops down from the previous ridge, winding through the rough and dry landscape to the bottom of the canyon and its dry stream bed before climbing steeply up to my camera position.

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

Desert Mountains and Valley

January 14, 2014 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

Receding desert mountains about the Amargosa Valley, Death Valley National Park

At first look, the general scene here might not have appeared to offer too many photographic opportunities. Although it was still somewhat early in the morning, it was well past the “first light” phase that can make almost any subject look beautiful. There was a great deal of atmospheric haze, and it almost obscured the far mountain ranges. And, as seen in the lower portion of this photograph, while the location is in high and rugged mountains, it is an extremely spare landscape with few plants and only the subtlest of colors from the high desert sage and similar plants.

But, for me, several things were going on here. First, I like haze! Second, a few years ago, after many years of photographing in the Death Valley landscape, I began to look beyond the familiar and more obvious beauties of sunrise and sunset light in dramatic locations in the Valley, and to try to figure out how to photograph more subtle and complex beauties that I encountered at other times and in other locations. I had found myself most often driving through locations like this one, on my way to other places that I presumed would be more interesting. Yet, even though I wasn’t photographing this sort of place, I was having pleasant experiences in them and developing an affinity for them. On one trip it hit me that if I liked being here, there must be some what to make photographs that somehow expressed what it was in these apparently barren places that made me like them. So I stopped here for some time, in a place that might seem like many other places along this route, and I looked around.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: barren

Morning Light, Badlands Terrain

Winter Trees, Statue, Central Park

Titus Canyon Road

Desert Mountains and Valley

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