Tag Archives: church

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: United Kingdom

Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great

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Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great
Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great

Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great. London, England. July 6, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Main interior space of the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew the Great, London, England

Photographing this old church and surrounding facilities might serve as an example of what can happen if you don’t follow the crowds to the usual places when visiting a famous city such as London. Or, more accurately, it might be about what can happen if you do follow the crowds to those (deservedly famous and popular) places and then just wander off a bit aimlessly to see what else you might find.

We had initially been, if memory serves, sort of in the area of Trafalgar Square. At some point we ended up walking some blocks away from here to an area that we much less busy, since it was a real work area and this was a weekend. We were hungry, so we looked around for a pub and had some lunch. Leaving the pub we looked up the street and saw some interesting looking older buildings, so we just headed over that direction to see what we might find, and soon we saw the grounds of and entrance to the Priory Church of St. Bartholomew. At least on this day, this was not exactly a place swarming with tourists. In fact, there were hardly any. We decided to pay the small fee and spend a bit of time wandering around inside this very old church that is, in many places, filled with wonderful light. I made several photographs inside that I like, and in each one of them this light is a central feature. On a slight technical note, this is one of those photographs I made on this trip with the little Fujifilm X-E1 camera, here using the 14mm prime lens and shot handheld.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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

Tall Trees, Meadow, Autumn

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Tall Trees, Meadow, Autumn
Tall Trees, Meadow, Autumn

Tall Trees, Meadow, Autumn. Yosemite Valley, California. October 30, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Tall trees grow in a row in a meadow backed by cottonwood and black oak trees with autumn foliage

I guess I just can’t help myself when it comes to photographing in this Yosemite Valley meadow area – or in similar areas, for that matter. As I’ve written before, during the time of the year when the days are shorter and the sun is lower, the light in some of these places is constantly changing – pre-sunrise and post-sunset soft “blue hour” light, early and late direct sun over the upper edges of cliffs, shadow right after dawn and before sunset and when cliffs interrupt the light during midday hours. Other changes take place on a longer cycle – the stark quality of winter, snow covering everything when winter storms arrive, morning fog, trees newly green in spring or yellow and gold in fall. And there are many more things to see than just the “landscape size” things – wildflowers, fallen leaves, frost, and more.

So, yes, I visited and revisited the meadows during this fall’s end-of-October visit to The Valley. While I often focus on the black oaks that grow in these meadows, here I decided to focus on evergreen trees. This group stands almost evenly spaced in a row. I struggled with how to deal with their height when shooting from a relatively close distance, and then realized that by not including the whole tree I could emphasize the vertical lines of their trunks and perhaps suggest the even higher parts of the trees that are not visible here.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
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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: Architecture, Photographs: Germany, Photographs: Urban/Street

Heidelberg Hauptstrasse

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Heidelberg Hauptstrasse
Heidelberg Hauptstrasse

Heidelberg Hauptstrasse. Heidelberg, Germany. July 12, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Looking down the Haupstrasse of Heidelberg, Germany from the Heidelberger Schloss

The “Altstadt” (old town) of Heidelberg is packed together in all of the interesting ways that seem so very different from what we typically find in the USA, where many towns, especially in the west where I live, mostly evolved in the post-automobile era. Heidelberg is, to say the least, considerably older than that! Very narrow streets (what Americans might call “alleys”) twist and turn and the buildings are packed closely together and right up to the edge of the street. Where the “road” portion of the streets is (barely) wide enough to let a vehicle pass, the sidewalks have been reduced to little more than a foot or two wide.

I made this photograph from the hill above the town where the famous Heidelberg Castle sits. We had walked up there for the obligatory tour of the castle – and an impressive thing it is! – and afterwards we walked along the hillside beyond the castle to where there is a park and some clear overlooks of the town and the Neckar River. For this photograph I put a long lens on the camera and focused on the hauptstrasse (main street) that runs the length of the old town, here running from near the Heiliggeistkirche (Church of the Holy Spirit) and on towards the newer portion of the street.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | 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: Architecture, Photographs: Germany, Photographs: Structures and Objects

Heiliggeistkirsche, Heidelberg

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Heiliggeistkirsche, Heidelberg
Heiliggeistkirsche, Heidelberg

Heiliggeistkirsche, Heidelberg. Heidelberg, Germany. July 12, 2013. © Copyright 2013 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Interior view of the historic Heiliggeistkirsche in Heidelberg, Germany

From near or far, this “Church of the Holy Ghost” visually dominates the old section of Heidelberg, Germany. On the ground, it a city of small and narrow streets and many small shops, its size sets it apart, as does the somewhat larger amount of open space that surrounds it. From a distance, the mass of the main building and the height of the church tower draw attention. The church has a long history, having been rebuilt several times and having served both Catholic and Protestant worshippers… some at the same time. (Apparently, at one point the church was partitioned so that both could use it at the same time.)

We stopped in a quite a few churches during out July 2013 trip – and who wouldn’t, given that they are often very impressive architecturally and historically. Like many of the large churches, this one seems to create a space filled with air and light, though it is less decorated that some of the others in which the walls are almost covered by various scenes. There is a lot of plain white wall in this one! We decided to visit the tower for the panoramic view it provides, and I stopped along the climb in this rear balcony area to make a photograph looking toward the brighter main section of the church.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist whose subjects include the Pacific coast, redwood forests, central California oak/grasslands, the Sierra Nevada, California deserts, urban landscapes, night photography, and more.
Blog | About | Flickr | Twitter | Facebook | Google+ | 500px.com | LinkedIn | 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.