Tag Archives: face

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

Murphy Point and Murphy Hogback, Evening

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Murphy Point and Murphy Hogback, Evening - Evening light on the brow of Murphy Point, with Murphy Hogback leading to the right and the areas of the Green and Colorado Rivers confluence and the Needles beyond, Canyonlands National Park.
Evening light on the brow of Murphy Point, with Murphy Hogback leading to the right and the areas of the Green and Colorado Rivers confluence and the Needles beyond, Canyonlands National Park.

Murphy Point and Murphy Hogback, Evening. Canyonlands National Park, Utah. April 6, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Evening light on the brow of Murphy Point, with Murphy Hogback leading to the right and the areas of the Green and Colorado Rivers confluence and the Needles beyond, Canyonlands National Park.

When I photographed from the Green River Overlook in Canyonlands National Park back in early April, I arrived there in the evening with one shot definitely planned out ahead of time (though the conditions were, as they often are, a bit of a pleasant surprise once I arrived) and one sort of half planned. The first was a shot across the rugged terrain to the west and southwest through which the Green River has carved a deep and twisting canyon. The second was of more or less the same subject, but shot in vertical format with a longer lens and tracking some of the formations out toward the horizon.

Once there, I quickly figured out my shooting location – to be honest, there are quite a few options and unless you include cliff-top foreground subjects you don’t have to be terribly particular. I composed the first, landscape-orientation shot and then sort of went back and forth between that image and the vertical shot as the light evolved. As I did this and the low angle light began to cut through some of the haze a bit more, the terrain to my south that I had not really thought about earlier started to look a bit more interesting. From the Green River Overlook, the upper sandstone cliffs first curve back away from the river canyon, then run south, and once again extend a bit out into the canyon at Murphy Point, the impressive prominence at the left side of this photograph. One thousand feet below, Murphy Hogback – a flat-topped ridge – extends further toward the Green River. Beyond that the terrain extends into the distance, full of features that were unfamiliar to me but still very impressive – a series of plateaus, often with white rock edges, steep drop-offs into deep canyons, more distant and barely visible towers and other formations. From what I’ve read since then, I’m pretty certain that beyond the shoulder of Murphy Point, I am seeing the area roughly where the Green and Colorado Rivers meet and beyond that the area known as The Needles.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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

Tree and Sandstone Cliff

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Tree and Sandstone Cliff - A tree grows from a crack in the face of a redrock sandstone cliff, Zion National Park.

If this photograph looks familiar, it may be because it is! A few weeks back I posted another photograph of more or less the same subject but in landscape orientation rather than portrait orientation. There are, no doubt, many examples of interesting trees growing out of surprisingly small cracks in the faces of sandstone cliffs in Zion and other similar areas, but I spotted this one in the “Big Bend” area of Zion Canyon, where I had stopped to photograph some spring cottonwood trees along the Virgin River.

I love the juxtaposition of the rich greens of the tree with the reds and browns of the sandstone cliffs. In many ways, these are two of the main colors of this part of the Southwest – with the addition of the blue of the sky. That palette of green, red, and blue is everywhere. And there is actually a bit of the blue here, too. The interesting coloration of the dark areas of the rock seems to be partly the result of reflections of the blue light from the blue sky that was above and behind my camera position.

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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” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

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

Murphy Point, Sunset

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Murphy Point, Sunset - Sunset light on Murphy Point, photographed from Green River Overlook, Canyonlands National Park
Sunset light on Murphy Point, photographed from Green River Overlook, Canyonlands National Park

Murphy Point, Sunset. Canyonlands National Park, Utah. April 6, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Sunset light on Murphy Point, photographed from Green River Overlook, Canyonlands National Park.

We spent the better part of a day scouting around the “Island in the Sky” section of Canyonlands National Park, partly with the goal of figuring out where to be for golden hour light. In the end, the very first place we had really considered ended up being the place we came back to – the Green River Overlook. While quite a few landscape photographs can be somewhat spontaneous and a matter of quickly taking advantage of ephemeral conditions, the decision to photograph at the Green River Overlook was quite the opposite. Not only had I decided that I wanted to shoot at this location, but I had even worked out the composition of the shot that I wanted.

With that in mind, we came back here almost an hour before actual sunset, confident that the photograph I had in mind would be waiting for me. And it was! That photograph was shot looking roughly west or a bit south of west and across the canyons dropping into the Green River. But I also had quite a bit of time to look around at other possible subjects as the light slowly transformed. The steep upper cliffs of (what I believe to be) Murphy Point stood to my south and the sunset light began to intensely color their red rocks during the final few minute of sunlight. So I took a moment away from the shot I had come for, pivoted the tripod this direction, and made a few exposures. The geology seen in this area is amazing. Layer upon layer build from the bottoms of the river canyon, through the side canyons and onto the lower plateaus. Then shattered rock stacks up against the tall upper sandstone cliffs that are topped by the relative flatlands of the “Island in the Sky” area. Here the low angle side-light from the setting sun reveals a lot of the more subtle details of this landscape.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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

Sandstone Towers, Moon Rising Through Clouds

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Sandstone Towers, Moon Rising Through Clouds - The full moon rises in a cloudy sky above sandstone towers, Arches National Park, Utah.
The full moon rises in a cloudy sky above sandstone towers, Arches National Park, Utah.

Sandstone Towers, Moon Rising Through Clouds. Arches National Park, Utah. April 5, 2012. © Copyright 2012 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

The full moon rises in a cloudy sky above sandstone towers, Arches National Park, Utah.

These rocks are near but not exactly part of the windows area at Arches National Park, where we ended up at the end of our first day there. We had arrived in Moab in the afternoon and then driven up into the park very late in the day – more or less gasping in amazement at the geology we were seeing for the first time – and finally ended up in this area just before sunset.

I’m repeating a story I wrote about earlier, so I’ll make the first part short. There was beautiful light leading up to sunset, and there were some interesting clouds in the sky to the north. However, it was extremely windy, making longer exposures as the light faded a real challenge and also making lens changes unwise. After sunset I ended up in the shelter of some rock towers where I found some protection from the wind. I knew that this was going to be a full moon night, but I was a bit concerned that by the time it was high enough that the ambient light would be somewhat dark, making it very difficult to photograph the twilight surroundings and the very bright moon in a single exposure. But as the moon rose and I found a location from which I could position it and the rocks together, high thin clouds partially obscured the moon and allowed my longer exposures for the dim foreground to work. I might have used a longer lens, but the thought of changing lenses in the blowing wind convinced me to just go ahead and shoot with the lens I already had on the camera – and in the end I think that let me produce a more natural view of the moon than I might have achieved with a longer telephoto.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer 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.