Tag Archives: broken

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

Fractured Rock, Reflected Light

December 16, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A few plants grow on fractured pink and blue canyon rock illuminated by light reflected from nearby cliffs

In my experience, the geology of Death Valley mostly features relatively subdued coloration. While this geology is laid bare by the lack of thick vegetation, the colors are mostly shades of gray, white, tan, with occasional blues and greens from mineral deposits. But you rarely will see here the intense colors of, say, the sandstone formations of the Southwest. (Sorry to disappoint anyone, but if you have seen some photographs featuring intensely colorful deposits in places like “Artist Palette,” you may be a bit disappointed to see the real thing!) This is not entirely bad news, as subtle colors can also be very beautiful, and even these colors can become intensified in the right light… and that does occur in Death Valley.

This photograph perhaps tells a story that is partially about the color of rock and a bit about the light, and is also about keeping my eyes open for the fleeting and sometimes surprising examples of color. I was in a place that is not known for brilliant colors, at least not in the walls of this narrow canyon. As I passed through a narrow and twisting section, two things happened, and even though I’ve been there before this was the first time that I noticed them at this point. First, the steep, almost seems cliff-like wall has fractured layers and slabs that remind me a bit of exfoliating granite that I know so well from the Sierra. These layers alternate pinkish rock (that this non-geologist thinks look like some sort of sandstone) with inner layers that have a blue cast. Second, at the right time of day when the light strikes the upper walls of the narrow canyon, the light reflects down into its depths and warms the color of the light, emphasizing these subtle colors to produce what is, at least for Death Valley, some rather striking coloration.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Decaying Tree

December 11, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The decaying stump of an ancient sub-alpine Sierra Nevada tree

I came upon this jumble of the remains of a very old and large tree while walking about on our first full morning camped at the spot where we would remain for six nights in the Kings Canyon National Park high-country. From our camp at about the 11,000′ level I walked uphill, intending to investigate a dome on the ridge behind us and to see if I could find anything to photograph around a small lake that I could see on our maps.

As I walked up the hill I passed through small meadows and by dried-up tarns with their barren rocks and the branches of various fallen trees. As I approached the location of the lake I had to find a route between rocks and various small but thick groves of trees. As I passed one of these spots I noticed this old tree in the (long) process of disintegrating. The boundary between these ancient and rugged living thing and rock has sometimes seemed fuzzy to me. While I understand that the rocks are far, far older than any tree, these trees grow so slowly, are often so twisted and gnarled, wind so intimately among the rocks and boulders, and are of a color that looks more like rock than wood.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Three Snags, Unnamed Sierra Cliff

October 14, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Three dead snags on a small ledge catch the late afternoon light at the base of a huge, shadowed cliff of crumbling granite.

I returned to the area near this cliff face almost daily during our mid-September photography trip to this region of the Kings Canyon National Park back-country. The area was rich with photographic subjects – sub-alpine ponds and larger lakes, late summer golden meadows, granite slabs and boulders, individual trees and forest, the surrounding slopes and cliffs, and the summits of ridges and peaks beyond. We photographed here morning and evening, and in sun and rain and clouds. Although we were in the area of almost a full week, we could easily return for another week and find plenty more to photograph.

This rugged and broken bit of cliff face had intrigued me before I thought to photograph it this way. It rose above the far end of the largest lake in this area, with talus slopes at its base and a higher ridge above. Beyond it other faces and slopes rose into a higher valley that was topped with very high and fractured ridge. At this late time in the summer season, the face was in shade in both the early morning and evening hours, with only some areas struck by light slanting across from one side or the other. While looking at the face I noticed a small group of three bare snags standing in the sun at the lower right and though that I might be able to contrast them with the larger rocky face, and include them as a way to suggest the large scale of the cliffs. The blue tones are, of course, because the rocks are in shadow, though some reflected light adds a glow to some of the rocks facing toward the left. This photograph may be a bit difficult to make sense of at a small web size, but my intention is to print it very large so that the details will be more visible.

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

Desert Automobile Graveyard

July 6, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A group of old automobiles abandoned and left to decay in a gully at an old desert mining site

I have passed this old mining site quite a few times, looked up at it, and kept going. On this morning I had a bit of extra time so I decided to pause and poke around a bit. Certain obvious signs of the presence of an old mine are clear from nearby, but a bit more exploration revealed a more extensive than expected site – as is often the case. Although an old gravel road headed into the area, I decided to first walk up the road, partly to avoid nasty surprises while driving and partly so that I would see a bit more – which is typically what happens when I’m on foot rather than inside my vehicle.

The gravel road twisted up a small gully and soon reached an area that revealed views of quite a bit more mining evidence than I had suspected. I’m certain that if I had continued to explore that I would have found even more, but I’ll save that for another visit. I often have this feeling that these sites should be much older than they really are, and I’m still somewhat surprised to find that some of them were electrified. The surprise at this location was the number of not-really-that-old vehicles that had been abandoned. They are decades old, but I’m guessing that they might date to roughly the WWII era or even a bit later which, in the grand historic scheme, isn’t all that long ago. Several of these vehicles had been abandoned, somewhat oddly, in the bottom of a wash that must flood at least occasionally, considering the amount of gravel that swamped their undersides. The back of this one was open, so I positioned my tripod just outside the car and shot through it toward the other abandoned vehicles. (If you find and explore such places, please be extremely careful to leave things as they are. The effects of our individual disruptions are cumulative and accelerate the destruction and eventual disappearance of these sites.)

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: broken

Fractured Rock, Reflected Light

Decaying Tree

Three Snags, Unnamed Sierra Cliff

Desert Automobile Graveyard

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