Tag Archives: bishop

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Owens Valley, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Mount Tom, Late Afternoon Light in Round Valley

December 8, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 4 Comments

Mount Tom rises above Round Valley as afternoon autumn light falls on trees and pastures.

I drive past this spot every time I pass through the Bishop area in the eastern Sierra. Descending toward Bishop, Highway 395 passes through Round Valley, and I am always intrigued by the rangeland in this area, the trees that grow in the pastures, and the steep eastern slopes of the Sierra beyond. I have an image of these trees with fall colors backed by the lower slopes of the mountains… but that is a photograph that so far only exists in my mind! At some point I want to find time to really photograph this spot, but in the meantime I often stop and occasionally explore here a bit as I pass through.

My early October visit was a bit too early for real fall color in Round Valley, though a few trees were starting to turn here and there. As I drove north from the Bishop area I wasn’t expecting really spectacular color, but as I started up the grade that leaves this valley I caught a glimpse of warm light on these trees as the sun was about to drop behind the ridge. I didn’t quite have time to pull over and turn around so I continued up the road a distance and finally located a turn-around, reversed direction, and headed back down to the spot where I had seen this light. It was almost gone when I arrived, even though it had only been a few minutes. Using the lens that was already on the camera I quickly set up my tripod and managed a few exposures as the light left the groves of trees in the foreground.

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.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Owens Valley, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Basin Mountain, Afternoon Light and Haze

December 6, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Basin Mountain and the Sierra Nevada crest rise above Round Valley on a hazy afternoon.

There is a certain kind of afternoon light in the eastern Sierra that is hard to photograph – looking up at the range from Owens Valley into the afternoon sun the haze can be bluish and decrease detail and the light can be very bright. But it is a part of the experience of the “east side” that we all know, I think. I can’t say that I’ve tried to photograph it very often, but I stopped just off of highway 395 in the Round Valley area on this early October afternoon when I saw the rugged foothills rising above the sagebrush towards the Buttermilks and Basin Mountain and the Sierra crest around Mount Humphreys beyond.

For me, this is one sort of classic eastern Sierra view. Imagine a very warm or even hot afternoon. You are driving through high desert sagebrush country – which often surprises people who are headed to the Sierra and are thinking about high mountains and cool temperatures. The mountains to the west rise precipitously from the floor of Owens Valley, with peaks that can be nearly 10,000 feet higher than the lowlands in some places. You see snow on the peaks and sometimes on the slopes of the mountains. You know that there are places up there where you can park a car and walk out in cool mountain air and head up a trail through meadows and forests and cross a ridge into the alpine world – but the terrain gives little hint of this from below. The light gleaming on snow fields and rock projected into the sky reminds you of this other world high above.

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.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Creek Dogwood, Sierra Nevada

November 23, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 6 Comments

Dense growth of creek dogwood with white flowers and fall color red leaves along Bishop, Sierra Nevada.

This is a plant I’ve been intrigued by in the past – literally the very same plant in the precise same location along Bishop Creek in the eastern Sierra. I think it is called “creek dogwood,” but here again I have to admit to my poor ability to offer proper identifications for many plants. (I’ve mentioned before that I often “know” the plants quite well – where they grow, when they come up in the spring, when they flower, and when the go dormant… but I often fail to register their names!) This plant acquires brilliant red leaves in the fall, and with some green leaves and round white “berries,” it has a striking appearance.

This is the next in the series of photographs of very dense vegetation. While it may be hard to make sense out of the photographs when presented as small web images, there is a lot of very interesting (to me, anyway!) detail in a print of this subject. It is even possible, I think, to make some sort of compositional sense out of all of this complexity as well – or at least I want to think so!

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.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Textures

Aspen Color – Wall of Leaves

November 21, 2010 G Dan Mitchell 5 Comments

A nearly solid wall of brilliant fall aspen leaf color in the eastern Sierra Nevada.

This is going to be the first in a short series of “frame filled with foliage” photographs that I’ll post. Although I think they work best as prints – and fairly large ones at that – I’d like to share these since they are something a bit different that I’ve been working on.

Sometimes I’m just so impressed by the sheer density and complexity of the foliage that I’m tempted to just point that camera at them and click. It might look like that is what is going on here, but I am also trying (remember, “trying!”) to find some sort of pattern and form in these very complex textures. This photograph was made in a small aspen grove that was essentially at the color peak – only a very small number of partly green leaves remained, yet most of the transformed leaves were still on the tree. If you have chased aspen color, you know how difficult it can be to find the leaves at just this point!

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.

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