Tag Archives: curve

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

Cottonwood Trees, Potholes

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Cottonwood Trees, Potholes
Cottonwood Trees, Potholes

Cottonwood Trees, Potholes. Utah. October 23, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Cottonwood trees grow in potholes in the curving sandstone terrain

In the evening of our first day camped in this somewhat remote Utah location, we left camp and headed to a nearby sandstone landscape featuring the sorts of gullies, potholes, rounded domes, steep inclines, and curving patterns that are so common in this part of the world. Later we would walk further into the landscape, but on this first evening we only had time for a short visit.

The group walked up a steep slope and came to a landscape that is perhaps familiar to many who know this region, with some features that are often photographed by those who visit. The light was “complicated” — at times a beautiful glow came through high, thin clouds, but at times the cover thickened enough to truly mute the light. It is tempting — unavoidable, actually — to photograph certain subjects here in the ways that I have seen before. On the other hand, I also like to see such subjects for what they are and not just for what others seen in them. Wandering around the curving sandstone and skirting the edges of large potholes, I looked for juxtapositions of these rounded shapes with variations in color and with the cottonwood trees that grow sparsely here. The foreground tree seems to be at just about the peak of autumn color, even though the other tree a short distance away is still almost completely green.

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

Tropical Leaves

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Tropical Leaves
Tropical Leaves

Tropical Leaves. Pasadena, California. November 28, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Lines and curves on tropical plant leaves at a Southern California botanical garden

We were recently in Southern California for a holiday visit to “our kids,” and once the food-focused festivities had ended (though they never completely end!) we moved on to other family adventures in the Southland. On the day after Thanksgiving we headed up to Pasadena to visit the Huntington Library and its museums and gardens. I had not visited this place before, though I was well aware of the Huntington wealth from reading about the California Railroad Barons, composed of Huntington, Hopkins, Crocker, and Stanford, names that Californians may be familiar with. (There is a group of four peaks in the “Recesses” area of the Sierra that are named after them.) Suffice it to say that Huntington was clearly a 1%-er among 1%-ers!

We visited several gardens while we were in Pasadena. I wasn’t there primarily for photography, though I usually travel with sufficient gear of the right sort (a small mirrorless system) that I can do real photography when the opportunity presents itself. While waiting for others I happened to see these beautiful big leaves and I made a few quick exposures, including this one. There are many things to like about these leaves as a subject: The sit on a boundary between realistic depiction and abstraction of form and line, their color is beautiful, they catch light in such interesting ways.

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: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Potholes, Dusk

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Potholes, Dusk
Potholes, Dusk

Potholes, Dusk. Utah. October 23, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dusk light on the curving pothole forms of Utah sandstone

The grand landscape is a wonderful and impressive thing, but a bit of dusk light on curving rock can evoke the fundamental qualities of a place. This was my final photograph of the day, made just before there was no longer enough light for the kinds of photograph I had in mind, and as it was about to become to dark to find my way out of this landscape. Earlier I had begun by photographing subjects that were perhaps more clearly specific to this location, but as I continued to photograph and as the light changed I made photographs that I think are less about the particular location and more about the feeling of such places.

The light was tricky on this evening. There had been sunlight earlier, and at times it had been the beautiful soft yet direct light of the sun coming through high clouds. But it has also been very muted at times, as the clouds became thicker, producing the a kind of flat and colorless light that is challenging. But earlier clouds can lead to later sky color as the sun drops near the horizon and lights up these same dull clouds from underneath. As I finished with some of the more obvious photographic subjects I began to look at the patterns and colors of the rocks as possible subjects of more abstract images, and it was at about this point that the sky opened up for a few minutes, producing light with colors ranging from yellow to red to burgundy. I made this final photograph of the evening as the tempo of the work slowed in luminous twilight, and this light combined with the natural color of the sandstone to produce intense and saturated colors on the sinuous shapes of the rock. A moment later we all realized that it had become quite dark, that we had not brought headlamps, and that we had to negotiate some tricky terrain in order to get back to where we started!

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: Chicago, Photographs: Urban/Street

Dissipating Structures

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Dissipating Structures
Dissipating Structures

Dissipating Structures. Chicago, Illinois. August 2, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Distorted reflections of a crane and Chicago buildings

Every so often I wonder about architects. For the most part we think of them — or at least I do — as folks who are as much about logic and structure as they are about design and form, and when they are about design they don’t usually seem to be particularly whimsical. (With notable exceptions.) Whimsical doesn’t fit the image or the expectations of the typical big business clients who might commission such towers as those found in an urban center like Chicago — these see like people who are more interested in cultivating an image of stability and wealth and power.

But then I look at the window reflections that are the inevitable result of placing plexiglas covered buildings in close proximity to one another and I have to wonder. Are these folk aware of the almost hallucinogenic shapes and forms that appear on the sides of these buildings? In fact, how many people on the streets are away of the abstract and bizarre visual show that is often going on overhead? Here, against the clean and mathematically perfect face of this building, neatly divided into equal grids of alternating shades of blue, appear bizarre visual monstrosities. A red construction crane warps upwards and leans precariously to the right as its upper elements simply fall apart into twists and curlicues. Sections of the reflected buildings are alternately minimized and expanded to gross degrees, and if you look closely at the resulting patterns you might find anything from aerial fish to faces to whatever else you want to imagine.

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.