Tag Archives: branches

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

Metal Walled Building With Door, Tree and Lawn, Night

March 6, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Night photograph of a metal walled building with a door, sidewalk, lawn, and tree – Mare Island Naval Ship Yard.

This is a bit of a different sort of night photograph compared to the others I have posted in this recent series. (Most of those were shot at some distance from my subjects – generally old, historic buildings – and in very saturated and colorful light.) Near the end of my evening shoot at Mare Island in late February I was walking back from a dark and lonely corner of the place when I passed a more modern facility, an out-patient clinic of some sort. This facility is something of a stark contrast to the surrounding area. The building is relatively new and the walls are not the usual brick and/or corrugated metal, but instead are a more modern-looking sort of metal paneling. There is landscaping, including small patches of lawn and small trees. And the light is completely different. Elsewhere in the darker areas of Mare Island the lighting tends toward yellow, coming from sodium vapor lamps, though it also includes green and occasionally other hues. But here the light is fairly neutral and actually looks almost white. I wasn’t quite sure what to do! :-)

But then it seemed to me that it might be interesting to see what I could do with this modern (though not flawless) structure and its surrounding landscaping. Here a small door, partly blocked by some sort of signs, leads into a very small section of a building and is lit a bit mysteriously from above. Sidewalks lead away from the door and a small, forlorn patch of lawn sits near the corner of the building, with a single leafless tree supported by stakes. When I saw this spot and when I look at the photograph now I get this feeling that there should be some story behind all of this… but I have no idea what it might be.

G Dan Mitchell Photography | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Email
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: Wildlife

Egret in Flight

January 28, 2011 G Dan Mitchell 1 Comment

Egret in flight above water at Cosumnes River Wildlife Preserve, California.

I’ve been fascinated by egrets since I first found out about them in a class back in college. Later I discovered that they are quite common in my part of California – back when I was a cyclist riding a few hundred miles every week, often in the country, I discovered that one or more can be found in just about any drainage ditch, slough, or creek bed with water in it during the winter months. More recently I realized – yes, I’m slow about some things! – that they are also found during the winter at places like Point Lobos, where they walk on top of kelp to hunt for small fish.

So I wasn’t the least bit surprised that a couple egrets were the first recognizable birds (to me – I’m no bird expert!) at the Cosumnes River Wildlife Preserve and in the surrounding countryside. Shortly after I crossed the road towards the slough, where many birds are found in the shallow water there, I spotted one alongside a creek bank nearby. I was able to get fairly close to this one and make some photographs as it more or less stood around on the bank doing whatever it is that egrets do. But soon it became uneasy about my presence, even though I was almost completely still and quiet, and it took off for a spot a bit further away. As the bird took flight I panned along with its motion, not paying a lot of attention to anything but the white bird, and I got a short series of photographs as it passed behind some brush alongside the water.

While I can and did make some very sharp photographs of this and other birds standing almost still near the water, I prefer this one with its bird slightly blurred from motion as it flew, and with the out of focus intervening vegetation somewhat interfering with the view of the bird. To me this sort of image better captures the dynamic nature of the bird in low level flight.

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

Snow Dusted Oaks, El Capitan Meadow

January 23, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Snow dusts winter oak trees in El Capitan Meadow, Yosemite Valley.

A thick-trunk mature black oak fringed with snow stands in front of a grove of smaller oaks in El Capitan Meadow, Yosemite Valley. The small branches in the upper part of the tree are so thick that they almost create a cloud-like effect in this light, as the low angle winter sun leaves the Valley floor in shadow. A few leaves still remain on the lower branches of the tree.

G Dan Mitchell Photography | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Email

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, Photographs: Yosemite

Forest, Upper Yosemite Valley

November 28, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trees recede into the distance in a quiet forest in the upper section of Yosemite Valley.

Late in the afternoon, after the light rain had mostly ended, I stopped to try to photograph some dogwood trees that were getting their fall colors. I started by looking at some trees very close to the road, but then saw more interesting trees a bit further into the grove so I wandered a bit farther from the road. Soon I saw a couple of trails leading into more open areas near the river, so I kept walking. This led to a trail that headed up the Valley – I followed it and soon crossed the Merced River. Continuing on (and now well beyond the grove that I originally stopped to photograph!) I crossed again on a second bridge and soon noticed an interesting section of more open forest off to one side. As I wandered down into this area I saw that there were quite a few rocks along the otherwise level forest floor here, and after making a couple of initial shots I also saw that nearby the level forest floor began to give way to more hilly and rounded terrain with occasional boulders and small rocky hills. I left the trail and began to walk about slowly, just watching for interesting arrangements of trees, colorful leaves, and places where the light glowed through the forest canopy.

When I stopped to make this photograph (and several other exposures in the same spot) I was attracted by the relatively open forest through which I could see the vertical forms of the trees receding, and by the interesting arrangement of the foreground trees. The soft forest light on this cloudy afternoon also gave the leaves and needles a luminous quality.

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.