Tag Archives: fallen

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

Broken Branches

December 16, 2011 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

The broken branches of a fallen tree on the ground in the back-country of Yosemite National Park.

These branches belong to what is left of a tree that fell in the area around our campsite in the north east section of the back-country of Yosemite National Park. On a couple of mornings during the time we were there doing photography, I began my morning by wandering a bit through this section of forest, meadow, and dried-up ponds, looking for whatever little miniature landscapes I might find.

Dried and broken branches of fallen and dead trees intrigue me, though they can make very difficult subjects to photograph. Light and color are tricky – too much light and it is difficult to get shadow detail without washing out the highlights; too little light and the subject can go flat and pick up blue tones. And sometimes the patterns are so complex and disorganized as to nearly defy my efforts to make any sort of compositional sense out of them.

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: Sierra Nevada

Dense Aspen Grove, Bishop Creek

October 31, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Soft light filters through the canopy of a dense aspen grove near Bishop Creek, California.

I think that these dense aspen forest scenes ended up being something of a theme for me this fall. In this one I tried to find as dense an example of aspen forest as I could locate and then to make a photograph that may perhaps evoke the combination of diffused light coming down through the depleted canopy of yellow leaves and the very tightly packed trees. The trees in this grove are relatively small and closely packed – so close, in fact, that in places it is very hard to move among them. I used an ultra-wide lens to try to both bring as much of this detail into the frame and to let me work very close to the nearest trees. The closest tree is probably no more than about a foot from the camera.

Working in such close quarters, very small changes in camera position end up having large effects on the composition. In the end I found myself repositioning the camera and tripod by fractions of an inch from side to side. Although it isn’t easy to see in this small jpg version, the complex detail of branches and leaves eventually recedes into the distance near the far edge of the grove and the grove becomes a bit lighter along that farthest fringe.

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

Aspen Grove, Filtered Light

October 27, 2011 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Gentle light filters to the forest floor within an autumn aspen grove near the south fork of Bishop Creek.

This is yet another of my familiar and favorite aspen groves in the south fork of Bishop Creek Canyon. Despite the fact that the frame is completely filled with trees in this photograph, the grove is not all that large, being a lot longer than it is thick. Behind me there is a gravel road and then a creek, and at the far edge of these trees the landscape abruptly opens up to talus slopes leading towards tall peaks to the south.

I like this spot for several reasons. For one thing, it is a bit off the beaten path since you have to leave the main road in a not-that-obvious spot and then follow a one-lane dirt road that winds through the trees. In addition, there is nothing obviously special or scenically attractive about this exact spot – the first time I stopped in this exact location is was primarily because there was a wide spot along the dirt road to park my car! This is another of those aspen groves that consists of densely packed and rather small and spindly trees. The trees are close enough together that it is actually rather difficult to walk among them, and I had to twist and turn and duck to get into this spot.

Partly because of the filtered light and the density of the trees, and partly because I shot with a very wide-angle lens, it seems like the edge of the grove is a long ways off and quite indistinct. By the point at the edge – which is probably just barely visible in a print – the detail of trunks and branches and leaves is so dense that the boundary is very hard to see.

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

Forest, Upper Yosemite Valley

November 28, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trees recede into the distance in a quiet forest in the upper section of Yosemite Valley.

Late in the afternoon, after the light rain had mostly ended, I stopped to try to photograph some dogwood trees that were getting their fall colors. I started by looking at some trees very close to the road, but then saw more interesting trees a bit further into the grove so I wandered a bit farther from the road. Soon I saw a couple of trails leading into more open areas near the river, so I kept walking. This led to a trail that headed up the Valley – I followed it and soon crossed the Merced River. Continuing on (and now well beyond the grove that I originally stopped to photograph!) I crossed again on a second bridge and soon noticed an interesting section of more open forest off to one side. As I wandered down into this area I saw that there were quite a few rocks along the otherwise level forest floor here, and after making a couple of initial shots I also saw that nearby the level forest floor began to give way to more hilly and rounded terrain with occasional boulders and small rocky hills. I left the trail and began to walk about slowly, just watching for interesting arrangements of trees, colorful leaves, and places where the light glowed through the forest canopy.

When I stopped to make this photograph (and several other exposures in the same spot) I was attracted by the relatively open forest through which I could see the vertical forms of the trees receding, and by the interesting arrangement of the foreground trees. The soft forest light on this cloudy afternoon also gave the leaves and needles a luminous quality.

This photograph is not in the public domain and may not be used on websites, blogs, or in other media without advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: fallen

Broken Branches

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Dense Aspen Grove, Bishop Creek

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Aspen Grove, Filtered Light

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Forest, Upper Yosemite Valley

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Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.

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Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.