Tag Archives: curving

Photographs: Europe, Photographs: Italy, Photographs: Travel, Photographs: Urban/Street

Curving Street, Rain

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Curving Street, Rain
“Curving Street, Rain” — A narrow street curves though the Italian town of Arezzo on a rainy day.

Part of what I love about Italy is that many cities’ central areas are so old that they were laid out before motor vehicles existed. Consequently streets are quite narrow — in some cases only wide enough for pedestrians. The entrances to homes and businesses are right on the streets — no “front lawn, and no fences. These streets usually don’t follow a geometric grid design, instead radiating from a central square or following the contours of the landscape.

The old, central part of Arezzo, Italy includes areas that follow this formula — though there are also newer streets that are wide enough for some vehicle traffic. We wandered streets like this one on a rainy afternoon, when the showers made the cobblestones glisten.

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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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

Creosote and Curving Dunes

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Creosote and Curving Dunes
Curving sand dunes rise beyond a few scattered creosote plants.

Creosote and Curving Dunes. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Curving sand dunes rise beyond a few scattered creosote plants.

Well, this is becoming a bit ridiculous. More than once I thought I was at the end of this year’s Death Valley photographs. More than once I’ve been wrong, and a deeper dive into the files produced more images that seemed worthy of sharing. It appears that I’ve been wrong yet again! There’s this photograph, and I still see a few more that will get post-processing love in the near future.

We made a late afternoon visit to these dunes at the end of March. I felt that we’d need about an hour or an hour-and-a-half to photograph them leading up to sunset. The light looked promising in the afternoon and even as we arrived, but soon a thick bank of high clouds developed in the west. By “golden hour” the light was impaired by this development, though there were moments when the sun lined up with thinner clouds and the light took on a bit of a directional quality.

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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Curving Beach, Fog

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Curving Beach, Fog
Fog retreats to the shoreline above a curving beach near Point Sur

Curving Beach, Fog. © Copyright 2019 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Fog retreats to the shoreline above a curving beach near Point Sur.

This is the same location where I made a couple of other recently posted photographs — a spot along the Pacific Coast Highway not far from the town of Big Sur, where a long, curving beach runs out toward a peninsula that has long been the home to an iconic California light house.

Much to my surprise, I encountered really beautiful conditions on this morning visit to the area. The forecast had called for essentially clear conditions, but I was instead greeted by a persistent fog bank that remained right along the coast, stubbornly intruding into the hills in some locations, while pulling back and allowing sunlight over the ocean in others. This scene was dynamic as I photographed it, with the fog intermittently rising and falling or drifting across this scene, located near the delta of a river that empties into the Pacific near the small hill sitting on the beach.

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

Sculpted Sandstone

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Sculpted Sandstone
Sky light reflected on sculpted and curving sandstone in a Utah slot canyon

Sculpted Sandstone. © Copyright 2018 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sky light reflected on sculpted and curving sandstone in a Utah slot canyon

We have to change the way we think about the daily progression of light when photographing in slot canyons. I first learned this when photographing in the red sandstone country of Utah, but it is just as true in the relatively less colorful canyons of Death Valley or even in some places in the plain gray granite landscape of the Sierra Nevada. In most cases we are drawn to the warm, early morning light, with its long shadows and lovely color. But in the canyons that light can be far less compelling, and it may even just end up seeming drab. Once you reset your expectations you find that the best canyon light often comes in the middle of the day, when the sun rises high enough to directly illuminate the red canyon rims, and then this light bounces and reflects downward into the canyon depths.

I made this photograph in a spot in a Utah canyon that was perhaps an even better than usual location for reflected canyon light. The rock was red standstone. Late-morning sunlight lit the upper rim, and that light suffused the lower reaches of the canyon. But here the narrow section of slot canyon wasn’t very long, and some bluish light from the sky reflected on angled rock surfaces, introducing a striking color contrast to the scene.

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.

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