Tag Archives: crack

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

Tree and Sandstone Cliff

Leave a comment
Tree and Sandstone Cliff - A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.
A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

Tree and Sandstone Cliff. Zion National Park, Utah. April 3, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

If this photograph looks familiar, it may be because it is! A few weeks back I posted another photograph of more or less the same subject but in landscape orientation rather than portrait orientation. There are, no doubt, many examples of interesting trees growing out of surprisingly small cracks in the faces of sandstone cliffs in Zion and other similar areas, but I spotted this one in the “Big Bend” area of Zion Canyon, where I had stopped to photograph some spring cottonwood trees along the Virgin River.

I love the juxtaposition of the rich greens of the tree with the reds and browns of the sandstone cliffs. In many ways, these are two of the main colors of this part of the Southwest – with the addition of the blue of the sky. That palette of green, red, and blue is everywhere. And there is actually a bit of the blue here, too. The interesting coloration of the dark areas of the rock seems to be partly the result of reflections of the blue light from the blue sky that was above and behind my camera position.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Dead Tree and Sandstone Cliff

Leave a comment
Dead Tree and Sandstone Cliff -A dead tree stands in front of a sandstone cliff, Zion National Park
A dead tree stands in front of a sandstone cliff, Zion National Park

Dead Tree and Sandstone Cliff. Zion National Park, Utah. April 3, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A dead tree stands in front of a sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

Along the Mt. Carmel Road through Zion National Park, the higher elevation areas tend to feature a lot of lighter color sandstone, which I understand may be the remnants of ancient sand dunes. For the most part, these formations tend to be lighter in color than the strikingly red tones of the sandstone cliffs found lower in the park, in the Zion Canyon of the Virgin River for example. These “highland” rock formations have their own appeal, including a wide variety of patterns including beautiful curving shapes.

But that isn’t what you see in this photograph, even though I made it in the highland area. As we rounded a turn at one point, ahead of us and then to the right was a very large and close cliff of red sandstone, and it was still in the afternoon shade. I like shade! Not only that, but in front of this cliff were several large trees that were not only out of the shade but which were also backlit. I like back-light! So we stopped and I photographed those trees. But as I worked on them I also noticed this skeletal and very deal old snag of to one side. I like old snags! Because the rock was in the shade yet lit by reflections from across the canyon, the red tones of the sandstone were intensified. There were a couple of challenges with this scene. The overall luminosity range is not great, the colors are all affected by the reddish glow from the cliff and the light from across the small canyon, and the tonal level of the tree is not that different from that of the rocks. In order to get the tree to stand out at least a bit against the rocks (something that was more obvious on the scene and looking at it in 3D) some work was necessary in post, especially some fine work on the tree itself.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Tree and Sandstone Cliff

2 Comments
Tree and Sandstone Cliff - A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.
A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

Tree and Sandstone Cliff. Zion National Park, Utah. April 3, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

After a bit of a break, I’m back with a few more photographs from my early April shoot in various parts of Utah. To recap, this was – believe it or not – the first time I had photographed in that state. It was tremendous to experience what was to me a brand new landscape, especially since I far more often continue to work the wonderful but familiar subjects of California. We began our visit at Zion National Park, spending several days mostly in Zion Canyon along the Virgin River but also getting up to the high country to the east.

I made this photograph on a morning when we visited Weeping Rock, one of the well-known features of Zion Canyon. We may well have been a bit too early in the season, but I ended up more or less stumped by trying to find a way to photograph that feature that pleased me. However, on the walk to and from Weeping Rock I made several photographs of other features in the area that I like a lot. (One was a photo I shared earlier that included a close-up of a branch with new spring leaves.) If I recall correctly, I may have seen this tree growing out of cracks in the massive sandstone walls while at or just below Weeping Rock.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Fractured Sandstone Cliff, Plants

Leave a comment
Fractured Sandstone Cliff, Plants - Plants grow among craks of a fractured sandstone cliff, Zion National Park
Plants grow among cracks of a fractured sandstone cliff, Zion National Park

Fractured Sandstone Cliff, Plants. Zion National Park, Utah. April 4, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Plants grow among cracks of a fractured sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

On my first morning in Zion (we had arrived there the previous afternoon) we headed up into the park and Zion Canyon, though which the Virgin River flows. Although I was more or less not looking for icons to photograph, I had stopped along the way to photograph that icon, the view of the Watchman from the bridge on the Mt. Carmel highway. (At least I could console myself that I was not shooting it at the usual sunset time, but instead in the early morning. ;-) After a brief stop for that purpose, I headed up the canyon with a plan of visiting the Weeping Rocks and seeing what sort of photographs might be possible there.

After a short walk up to the rocks, I figured out that it wasn’t going to quite be my photographic “cup of tea.” However, along this walk I did find some other interesting subjects. One that I’ve shared previously was a very close view of some brand new spring leaves on the trees that grow along the trail. Another subject was the nearby sandstone cliffs that here come down close to the level of the trail. One area nearby featured immense vertical blocks of the striking red sandstone, with interesting crack systems and some plants growing in the cracks. I made several exposures of this area in full shade, and this vertical composition is one that I like a lot. I’ve probably said this before and I’ll no doubt mention it again, but for a guy who is so used to shooting the equally impressive but much less colorful granite of the Sierra, the colors of these rocks proved irresistible! And the color variations are amazing – here you can see some areas where the color trends toward purple.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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.