Tag Archives: day

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature

Marsh, Fog, Evening Light

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Marsh, Fog, Evening Light
Evening light on San Joaquin Valley marshland

Marsh, Fog, Evening Light. San Joaquin Valley, California. December 17, 2015. © Copyright 2015 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Evening light on San Joaquin Valley marshland

This photograph represents the flip side of an observation I made in a separate post regarding another photograph that I made on this mid-December evening. The comment had to do with the contrast at the end of the day between events here that happen suddenly and those that unfold more slowly — a simulations slowing down and speeding up of events at the end of the day. The speeding up events include sudden departures and arrivals of large groups of birds. The slowing down part is exemplified by this photograph. (For the EXIF file data aficionados among you, the EXIF data shows an incorrect time of day for this photograph. Ah, well…)

As I photographed other subjects I had slow moments to look around and take in static elements of the scene. Late in the evening, as the light color warmed, I saw the effect this had on the brown reeds and the trees, many of which still had a few fall leaves left. While the near trees are quite clear, being lit by this beautiful side-light, the details of the further trees are muted just a bit by haze, and the more distant sky’s color is muted by this incipient fog. A few remaining geese along with some ducks sit almost completely still in the shallow water.

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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Morning Musings, Site News

What’s With the Daily Photographs? (Morning Musings 9/28/14)

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Mo's Cloud
Mo’s Cloud. Sierra wave cloud over the Long Valley California. May 28, 2005. © 2008 Copyright G Dan Mitchell — all rights reserved. (posted on my blog in July 2005)

Owens Valley near Mammoth, California. May 28, 2005. © Copyright G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved..

It occurs to me that many people are probably aware that I post a new photograph every day — but that few know how long I’ve been doing this nor my reasons for this seemingly obsessive task. Today I’m sharing a bit of the back story.

I’ve been building and operating websites since about 1995.  I’ll skip over a bunch of other interesting (to me) steps in the previous millennium and my first adventures with weblogs (now known as “blogs”) in the 1990s — though this could be a story for another day. Early on I created a blog about backpacking and other outdoor subjects called “Dan’s Outside,” and it gradually came to hold more and more photographs. At some point — likely around the time I acquired my first DSLR in the early 2000s — the photographs began to be the primary focus, and in 2005 I created a photography blog. The photograph at the top of this post was one of the earliest I shared, back in July of 2005.

Although I have not kept careful records, it looks like the daily photograph posts probably began to appear about a month later in August 2005, and they have continued mostly without a break since that time. That’s a lot of photographs! I haven’t actually counted, but it must be getting close to 3000 or more.

It would be reasonable to ask why I have done this. Continue reading What’s With the Daily Photographs? (Morning Musings 9/28/14) →

Morning Musings

Favorite Time in the Range of Light (Morning Musings 8/31/14)

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Thoughts about seasonal light in the Range of Light…

Sunset, Lower McCabe Lake, Shepherds Crest, and Virginia Canyon - Afternoon storm clouds clear from the sunset sky above Lower McCabe Lake, Shepherds Crest, and Virginia Canyon, Yosemite National Park.
Sunset, Lower McCabe Lake

It is no secret that I can find something to love about every season in the Sierra Nevada — the storms and snow of winter, the wildly flowing water and new growth of spring, and the lazy days of summer that bring easy access to the high country. But if I had to pick one perfect day in the Sierra high country it would be in fall.

This ideal day would come some time between the middle of September and the middle of October, when it becomes increasingly clear that summer really is ending and that winter really is on its way. This is not a wild season — no giant winter storms, no raging rivers and waterfalls, no spectacular growth and colorful fields of wildflowers. It is a quieter time. The crowds are almost all gone, and the people you do meet there are more likely to be those with a deeper relationship with this range.

The light is beautiful — perhaps as beautiful as it gets — and perhaps even more precious because it doesn’t last as long on these shortening days of the late season. The sun is lower in the sky and less intense, and there is often a muted, golden quality to the light, amplified by the golden colors of dry meadows, the beginning of fall colors, and softened by seasonal haze. And it is all the more sweet because we know that winter is just around the corner and that these days will end very soon.

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: Pacific Northwest, Photographs: Wildlife

Two Trumpeter Swans in Flight

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Two Trumpeter Swans in Flight
Two Trumpeter Swans in Flight

Two Trumpeter Swans in Flight. Skagit Valley, Washington. December 3, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A pair of trumpeter swans in flight above Skagit Valley farmland on a cloudy and rainy day, Washington

I had about four or five hours in the Skagit Valley area of Washington in the beginning of December, after the tasks I had gone to Washington for were completed early. I drove up from the Seattle area in the rain, and it was still cloudy, windy, and rainy when I arrived – just what one might expect in December in the Pacific Northwest! The last time I had been there, a year ago, I had encountered amazing flocks of snow geese in a field near the road not far from where it rises to cross the river, and my first thought was that I’d see if this was a regular event or if I had just been lucky the previous year. I must have been lucky! This time there was not a goose to be seen, at least at first, at this location.

Given this development, I decided to poke around on some back roads in the area and see if I could get close enough to trumpeter swans to photograph them with my meager little 200mm focal length lens – about half the length of what I would usually use for this sort of subject. By moving carefully, using my car as a blind, and sitting quietly and waiting, I was able to get a few close shots of the swans in a field. I soon figured out that they would occasionally lift off and fly to another nearby field where there were other swans, so I positioned myself (in the car) between the two flocks and settled in to see what would happen. Sure enough, before long groups of two or more swans started to fly my direction and pass close to the car, usually rising a bit as they passed over. This pair made a bit of a turn around me, so I photographed them against the cloud-filled sky.

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.