Tag Archives: davenport

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

Sunset Bluffs, Pacific Coast

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Sunset Bluffs, Pacific Coast
Late-autumn sunset light on California coastal bluffs south of San Francisco.

Sunset Bluffs, Pacific Coast. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Late-autumn sunset light on California coastal bluffs south of San Francisco.

My recollection of this photograph is that I had gone to the coast between San Francisco and Santa Cruz on this late-autumn evening partially because I had heard that people I knew were meeting up there to photograph and get together for dinner at an area restaurant. If I recall correctly, things did not go quite as planned. I think I ended up in the wrong restaurant and didn’t find these folks, and eventually I wandered off to some nearby bluffs by myself — which actually suits me fine when I’m making photographs, too.

It was a late afternoon and evening of interesting conditions, the sort that may produce something very special but which are more likely, perhaps, to be a complete bust. There was overcast and some haze in the air, and the light in afternoon was not really spectacular — it was a bit flat and the overcast made it more dull as sunset approached. However, there was the potential for something interesting. The cloud bank that stretched away from the coast seemed to terminate offshore, and there was a gap between this edge and the horizon. If that remained, I knew that there might be a brief moment of spectacular light coming through this gap just before the sud dropped below the horizon. If the band of light is narrow the colors can be intense in its beam while remaining darker and far less intense elsewhere. As you can see, that is precisely what happened.

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

Coastal Bluffs, Clouds, Dusk

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Coastal Bluffs, Clouds, Dusk
Coastal Bluffs, Clouds, Dusk

Coastal Bluffs, Clouds, Dusk. Near Davenport, California. December 8, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Coastal bluffs along the Pacific coast near Davenport, California in dusk light

I made this photograph on a day when I had gone to the coast to try to meet up with a “photo walk” group that was photographing (and socializing) in various areas in and around Santa Cruz, California. I never did quite manage to connect up with them – it is a long story – but I did get to shoot along the coastal bluffs near Davenport in the afternoon and as the day came to an end.

In late afternoon the light was mostly gray, with high clouds from a passing weak weather front blocking the western sky. However, just minutes before sunset the sunlight managed to sneak through a gap along the horizon and momentarily suffuse the coast with beautiful and soft light. I made some photographs during that moment, but I was not done yet when that light faded. Some of the most interesting light can come after sunset, when there may still be a glow from the sky but when this light is more diffused and softer. As the evening came on, I continued shooting until it was almost too dark to find my way back to my car, making exposures that gradually lengthened until I was using a 30 second exposure! This is one of the long exposures, allowing the clouds to move a bit and the waves and surf to blend together into a sort of hazy mist.

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

Davenport Bluffs, Dusk

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Davenport Bluffs, Dusk - Dusk light on a series of bluffs marching south from Davenport, California
Dusk light on a series of bluffs marching south from Davenport, California

Davenport Bluffs, Dusk. Near Davenport, California. December 8, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Dusk light on a series of bluffs marching south from Davenport, California

This photograph comes from early December, 2012, when I attempted to join a group of folks on a “photowalk” in the Santa Cruz, California area. I was originally supposed to meet up with them at Henry Cowell park (for photography of redwoods), but missed that mid-morning rendezvous due to my own scheduling issues. I knew they would be heading over to the area near Davenport, just up the coast from Santa Cruz, a bit later in the morning. So I headed over there… and ended up eating my lunch along in a restaurant about 100 yards north of the restaurant where they were all meeting! Then I somehow missed the next rendezvous almost directly across the street, and instead ended up on nearby coastal bluffs to do my photography.

This photograph was the last one I made that evening, well after the sun had set. It was quite dark by this point, so much so that after I finished and packed up it was becoming difficult to see the path back to my car. Exposures were getting quite long – this one was, I believe, about 30 seconds long, and I had been successively opening up my aperture in order to keep the exposure time down to a reasonable half-minute. Often some of the most interesting and evocative light can come after sunset, sometimes well after sunset. The light softens and diffuses, as it comes from large areas of the sky and not from the point source of the sun. The colors change, heading toward blue but also including other subtle tones such as the pinks seen in the clouds in this photograph. And the longer exposures allow me to create a sort of fantastical effect by letting surf and spray blur out over the long exposures. (For a night photographer like me, such images also raise interesting questions about where the boundaries between “night photography” and just plain photography lie.)

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

Davenport Bluffs, Sunset

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Davenport Bluffs, Sunset
Davenport Bluffs, Sunset

Davenport Bluffs, Sunset. Near Davenport, California. December 8, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The last light shines on coastal bluffs and Davenport, California

On this early December day I had gone off to try to join a G+ “photowalk” that was purportedly taking place that day. I was looking forward to going to a few favorite local photography locations and to meeting some people who I’ve only known online. But it was not to be! I ended up being delayed at home and couldn’t leave in time to meet the group at their first location, Henry Cowell Park. I went with Plan B and figured I would try to join up with them at lunch in Davenport. I got there and didn’t see anyone, so I figured that I was early and I drove up the coast a bit. I came back to Davenport and thought they might be in one of the two restaurants, so I picked one and went in for lunch… by myself. (I found out later that, yes, they were in the other restaurant a hundred yards south.) After lunch I went across the road to the parking area when I thought folks might meet up, but still no luck – though I did see a few photographers out on the nearby bluff. I headed out there and finally ran into a couple of people from the group… which had gone down to a nearby beach area to shoot.

Finding interesting stuff up here on the bluff, I decide to work the location I found myself in rather than heading off and looking for something else. While the location was interesting, the light was initially unpromising. However, I thought there was a chance that things might improve later so I walked around and began doing some shooting. At one point, I talked to some other photographers about the somewhat bland lighting conditions and pointed out that it seemed to me that there was at least a chance that we might get a bit of interesting light as the sun dropped to the horizon, when the light can sometimes shine in below the clouds and produce some brief but beautiful conditions. This prediction turned out to be right, and I made this photograph just as the show was beginning, and warm-tone light was starting to hit the bluffs, beaches, and water.

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.