Tag Archives: dark

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

Eroded Gullies at Zabriskie Point, Morning

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Eroded Gullies at Zabriskie Point, Morning
Eroded Gullies at Zabriskie Point, Morning

Eroded Gullies at Zabriskie Point, Morning. Death Valley National Park, California. April 6, 2006. © Copyright 2011 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Low angle morning light illuminates a tortured landscape of eroded gullies at Zabriskie Point, Death Valley National Park.

I recently “rediscovered” this photograph while undertaking a major review of the past eight years of my raw files. (And, yes, that task is just about as much fun as you might imagine. It would actually be pretty unbearable except that every so often I find some photographs that I had perhaps forgotten or overlooked, and I also come across images that remind me of experiences that took place some time ago.)

This photograph was made, as virtually anyone who has visited the spot recognizes, by pointing my camera about 90 degrees to the left of the classic Zabriskie Point views. Timing was important, as the early light is just skimming across the tops of these tortuously eroded gullies, picking out the ridges between them but leaving the lower sections in shadow. But good fortune also played a role here. Death Valley is usually a clear blue sky kind of place, but on this morning I had clouds! At dawn, if I recall correctly, the clouds actually interfered with the light a bit. But as the sun rose the clouds provided a more dramatic background than plain blue sky and created some softer and diffused light that gave just the right sort of dynamic range for photographs.

On a technical note, if you are viewing this in the right web browser you can mouse over the image and see a summary of basic EXIF data. (Sorry, but this feature only works in web browsers – if you are viewing email, etc. you’ll need to visit the version at my blog to see the EXIF.) If you do check the EXIF you might notice that this photograph was made with a very humble example of photographic technology, the Canon Digital Rebel XT. This camera is a 8MP cropped sensor “consumer” camera that I acquired when I first tested the waters of DSLR photography. (I had actually used digital cameras back in the 1990s, but not for serious photographic work.) Those who wonder which of today’s current DSLRs might enable them to produce interesting and effective images might consider what could be done with such a humble camera. ;-)

G Dan Mitchell Photography
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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.

(Basic EXIF data may be available by “mousing over” large images in posts. Leave a comment if you want to know more.)

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Dogwood Blossoms, Forest

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Dogwood Blossoms, Forest
Dogwood Blossoms, Forest

Dogwood Blossoms, Forest. Yosemite Valley, California. May 7, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A dogwood tree blooms in the forest of Yosemite Valley.

I have a feeling that I need to try a largish print of this one – there is so much detail in the scene that it is almost hard to make sense out of it in a small jpg. In the late afternoon I had wandered along the north edge of the Valley until I reached a point a bit east of the Ahwahnee Hotel. Having finished in this area, I headed around the hotel grounds and toward the Merced River and the former campground areas that were closed after the epic floods of a decade or so ago. This area is in some spots largely overgrown by thick, low plants and in some places I know that there are some good specimens of dogwood.

Although it was early in this year’s dogwood bloom cycle, I found a couple of very good trees in this area, and these two were almost completely in bloom. The forest here is quite dark and thick, and especially during the early evening time when I arrived this made the density of the vegetation seem even more impressive. The idea here was to fill the frame with flower-laden branches with the strong vertical lines of the forest trees behind, but also with detail everywhere in the frame.

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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

Dogwood Bloom and Leaves

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Dogwood Bloom and Leaves
Dogwood Bloom and Leaves

Dogwood Bloom and Leaves. Yosemite Valley, California. May 7, 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An early dogwood blossom and leaves in Yosemite Valley, California.

There is not a lot to add to the previous post that came along with the black and white version of this photograph – but for anyone who didn’t see the earlier post I’ll offer a short description. I had been at the Ansel Adams Gallery reception for Michael Fry’s exhibit there in the middle of the afternoon, and after a very enjoyable hour and a half or so viewing his wonderful prints and schmoozing with various folks who came for the reception, I decided to wander off to the east along the base of the north walls of Yosemite Valley, at first heading in the general direction of the Ahwahnee Hotel. Near there I stopped at a tree that I have photographed previously, when I shot the autumn colors of the leaves draped across a large boulder. The new flowers were just starting to appear, so I climbed up on the boulder and spent some time photographing before continuing my wandering out towards the Merced River.

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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

Dogwood Bloom and Leaves

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Dogwood Bloom and Leaves
Dogwood Bloom and Leaves

Dogwood Bloom and Leaves. Yosemite Valley, California. May 7. 2011. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

An early dogwood blossom and leaves in Yosemite Valley, California.

This is another plant that I’m on a first name basis with. I know this particular dogwood rather well, having first been attracted to it one fall while walking along the north side of Yosemite Valley looking for leaves against rock. At that time the fall-color leaves of this dogwood tree were draped across the top of a low, flat boulder. When I’m in this part of the Valley, I often walk past this tree to see what it is doing. On this first weekend of May, the tree was just getting its first blossoms of the spring season, and I was able to clamber up on top of the boulder, set up my tripod, and make a few close-up photographs of the flowers.

I originally figured it would be a color photograph but as I worked on it I started to think it might be interesting in black and white, too. (You’ll get to decide – the color version will appear tomorrow.) Besides having to wait for the slight breeze to pause so that I could make a 1/8 second exposure, another challenge was the dynamic range between the bloom and the rather dark background. I tend to slightly underexpose the highlights, since digital capture is not kind to over-exposed whites. Then I work in post to bright the brightest parts back up to where I think they should be, but without letting anything blow out.

For dogwood fans, the “word on the street” had been that these flowers were coming along a bit later than usual this year. But on this day it seemed like they were suddenly starting to appear in many of the usual places in the Valley. I’m expecting them to peak between now and perhaps a week or so from now, and later on at higher elevations. One potential wrinkle is the possibility of snow in the Valley on Sunday!

Update: There is also a color version of this photograph.

G Dan Mitchell Photography | Flickr | Twitter (follow me) | Facebook (“Like” my page) | 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.