Tag Archives: bloom

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Dogwood Branch, Whirlpool

May 16, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A gentle whirlpool on the surface of the Merced River behind a hanging dogwood branch with spring blossoms

I have photographed dogwood blossoms quite a few times before, but I had never quite gotten around to trying my hand at the “dogwood over water” photographs that are so popular and which can be so beautiful. However, on this early May 2013 visit to Yosemite Valley I made that one of my loose goals during a single day of shooting. Fortunately for me, this was a great year for dogwood blossoms and I managed to arrive at what must have been just about the perfect time. Too early, and the flowers can be sparse and perhaps a bit green; arrive too late and they can be quite worn our, with brown spots and holes. But during my brief visit I think I saw them growing more thickly on the Valley trees than I remember from past visits, and many of them were still in great shape.

I found a steep section of river bank not far from a bridge – and the bridge provided some shade and softer light on the water. This branch was hanging right down over the edge of the water, with a bit of bridge and tree shadow darkening the smooth water in this section of the Merced River. The main challenge with this subject is, perhaps surprisingly, the combination of the need for somewhat long exposures and the difficulty of getting perfectly breeze-free conditions right above the water. Even on a relatively still day, over the river the air is likely to be moving, and it doesn’t take much movement to blur exposures of a quarter second or longer. I wait for still moments, I try to shoot near the apex of the branch movement, and I may make quite a few exposures, knowing that many of them will not be sharp enough. Luck was with me on this one though. Not only is the branch still, but right at this moment an attractive round “mini-whirlpool” formed in the water behind the branch and interrupted the darker water with a bit of reflected blue sky.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Dogwood Flowers, Sunset Light

May 14, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The flower-laden branches of a dogwood tree hang above the Merced River in sunset light

In the evening we had pulled off the road near the place sometimes called “Gates of the Valley” (and occasionally by other names), but I was not especially interested in photographing the famous and iconic scene that many stop there to photograph. I wouldn’t rule out photographing it, but it would have to be an exceptional evening to warrant adding my contribution to the uncounted photographs that have been made of the Merced River, Bridal Veil Fall, and El Capitan from this spot. We stopped for dogwoods.

I have photographed the dogwood blossoms in this area plenty of times in the past, and at the right time there can be a lot of flowers here. This was one of those right times, since it seemed like an exceptional spring for production of dogwood blossoms. Initially I had my eyes on some trees on the north side of the road, but first I thought I’d wander east a bit. That turned out be a good direction to walk for several reasons – I unexpectedly ran into friends who were also photographing here, and I found one beautiful tree that was hanging its blooms out over the waters of the Merced River. I then headed back to the west, stopping to talk to other folks (it seemed like everyone was out photographing dogwoods on this evening!) and then continuing on past the pull-out, stopping along the way to make more photographs of dogwoods and the forest in evening light. Before long I ended up at a well-known bridge over the Merced – where, yes, I ran into more friends! When I got there I almost felt like I was ready to call it an evening, but then I saw the low angle near-sunset light coming up the river and recalled a bunch of flowers I had seen there earlier in the day. I thought it might be interesting to shoot almost straight into that light and use a long lens to “get close” to the flowers and to throw the background along the river out of focus. The result is a dogwood flower photograph this is a bit different from most that I shoot.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Lupine, Sierra Nevada

May 7, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A thick patch of spring lupine flowers high in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Range, California.

We had time for only a one-day trip to Yosemite, timed to coincide with the peak of the dogwood bloom season in the Valley. We left very early – way before dawn – with a plan of arriving in the Valley not too long after the sun came up. (This time of year, arriving by dawn in the Valley would require a 2:00 a.m. start time – and, in some ways, the Valley itself isn’t so much a dawn photography subject.) After we entered the park on highway 120 I started looking for some dogwood trees that often blossom a bit later – since the light was good here it would make more sense to stop and shoot that to keep driving to arrive further on when the light wasn’t as good.

We saw a couple of trees thick with flowers, and quickly turned around to drive back to them. We spent some time photographing these trees and then moved on. (Unlike in a typical year, there was no snow at the junction with the still-closed Tioga Pass Road, and areas that would usually be full of run-off water seemed largely dry.) The area, burned twice in recent years, along the road as it descends toward the Valley is often a good place to find wildflowers. I wasn’t expecting too much in this drought year, and for the most part I was right – but at a turn-off we suddenly came upon a very large patch of beautiful lupines and stopped to photograph. I’m crazy about shooting into the light, so I got down low and photographed these flowers with the light coming from almost directly behind.

Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Trillium Flower and Leaves

March 28, 2013 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

A single trillium flower grows in the redwood forest of Muir Woods National Monument

I was brought up mostly in the San Francisco Bay Area. (I like to describe myself as a “virtual native” of California, since I’ve lived here since I was four years old.) When I was a child my parents would often – or so it seemed to me – bundle us into the family car for day trips to many of the nearby areas where I photograph on day trips today: Point Lobos, Pinnacles National Monument (now National Park), San Francisco, Big Basin State Park. One of the main attractions of Big Basin is the presence of coast redwood trees. I suppose that because I’ve always known trees this large that they don’t shock me the way that they do visitors who haven’t seen them before – but every once in a while I realize just how remarkable their size is.

However, with all of my youthful visits to redwood forests, it seems odd to admit that I never saw the trillium flowers there until I was much older. In retrospect, I’m pretty certain that visiting such places was a warm weather event in my family – and trillium blossoms appear at a time of the year when things are still distinctly wet and chilly. Now I try to see them every late winter and early spring, and to photograph them if possible. With this goal, I made a one day trip to the redwoods of Marin County north of San Francisco last week, making sure to arrive very early, before the hordes of tourist buses would arrive from nearby San Francisco. I managed to get a couple of hours in the deep early morning shade of the redwood forest to photograph these flowers before the sun and the other visitors arrived, making photography less appealing. Those who may not have seen the plant in the wild might be surprised at its form. Beneath the three trios of leaves/flowers that you see in this photograph, the whole affair is supported on a single long and bare step that rises vertically from the forest floor. The flowers, which can range in color from pure white through pink to a sort of dark and dusty burgundy, don’t last long, and if you aren’t there during the short interval when they blossom you might not notice them at all.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: bloom

Dogwood Branch, Whirlpool

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Dogwood Flowers, Sunset Light

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Lupine, Sierra Nevada

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Trillium Flower and Leaves

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

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