Tag Archives: capitol

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Utah Morning Sky

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Utah Morning Sky
“Utah Morning Sky” — A cloud-filled dawn sky aboe Capitol Reef, National Park, Utah.

Back in 2014 a friend and I met up at Capitol Reef National Park for a few days of photography. I was on a long trip, first shooting in Southern Utah alone before we joined up at Capitol Reef. (Afterward I met other friends at Grand Staircase-Escalante, made a quick visit to Boulder, and eventually joined my family at Zion.) I made this photograph early in the morning on the day we headed into the back country along Notom Bullfrog Road.

Although my main goals were further down this backcountry road, soon after we turned onto it the sun rose and the early morning light illuminated a beautiful cloud-filled sky. We had no choice but to stop! We quickly found a high location with a panoramic view and set up to photograph this marvelous sky and light.

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G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Cliff, Boulders, and Tree

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Cliff, Boulders, and Tree
A solitary tree growing among fallen boulders is dwarfed by a sandstone cliff, Capitol Reef National Park.

Cliff, Boulders, and Tree. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A solitary tree growing among fallen boulders is dwarfed by a sandstone cliff, Capitol Reef National Park.

Earlier on this late afternoon the had worked our way into an wide accessible sandstone canyon with tall walls, lots of boulders, and trees placed in interesting places. As the afternoon wore on these tall red rock cliffs that had been so interesting in better light began to bring an early twilight, and we decided we were done for the day. We hiked back to our vehicle, loaded up, and began our trip back out of the canyon.

We headed a short distance north and then the road jogged west and opened to the fading light as the sun set. (It sets a bit early here on the west side of Capitol Reef as the terrain slopes up noticeably to the west.) We immediately stopped, unloaded, and went to work photographing. The light was somewhat unusual, and it somehow desaturated the red of the sandstone. In this narrow section the wall on the north side is quite abrupt and steep, and its base is littered with boulders that have fallen as it has eroded over millennia. Among the giant boulders a single tree grew.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Autumn, Red Rock Country

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Autumn, Red Rock Country
Autumn colors appear in red rock country, Capitol Reef National Park.

Autumn, Red Rock Country. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Autumn colors appear in red rock country, Capitol Reef National Park.

As best as I can recall — it was eight years ago! — I must have stopped alongside the road through Capitol Reef National Park to make this photograph, probably not far from the Fruita park facilities and campground. The photograph is looking more or less north along the front of the tall red rock formations that face to the west here.

This is a different view of this landscape than that presented in my recent photographs from the deep within the canyons. This is more about the grand, open landscape of this area, with long lines of stratified red-rock formations, great expanses of broad valleys, trees and brush, streams and rivers, and immense sky.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

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Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Juniper, Sandstone Cliff

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Juniper, Sandstone Cliff
An old juniper tree growing at the base of a sandstone cliff, Capitol Reef National Park.

Juniper, Sandstone Cliff. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An old juniper tree growing at the base of a sandstone cliff, Capitol Reef National Park.

As I recall it now, quite a few years later, this tree stands on a rise at the base of a large section of sandstone cliff in a place where a canyon makes a sharp bend. It is not a particularly remote or obscure spot, but the cliff is remarkable in terms of the late-day lighting and the patterns on the surface of the rock. The lighting was special — and challenging! — because the section of the canyon is aligned such that little direct light gets there. This means that much of the light is either from the very blue sky or reflected from very red cliffs, creating some almost otherworldly color effects.

My recollection is also that I found it a little complicated to get the compositions I was looking for here. I remember it as one of those places that is remarkable but which doesn’t necessarily present easy photographs. My archive of raw files supports this — I see a variety of different attempts at the subject, and each of them grappled with issues of juxtaposition and with objects that interfered with the composition. In fact, this version of the scene works because I found a different approach to cropping it that managed to eliminate one of this distractions.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist. His book, “California’s Fall Color: A Photographer’s Guide to Autumn in the Sierra” is available from Heyday Books and Amazon.

Blog | About | Flickr | Facebook | Email

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.