Tag Archives: foliage

White Mountains Panorama

White Mountains Panorama
Peak autumn color along New Hampshire’s Kancamagus Highway.

White Mountains Panorama. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Peak autumn color along New Hampshire’s Kancamagus Highway.

This is not my typical photograph — and in more than one way. I have already written that this year marked our first photography of the famous New England fall color, but another difference is probably less apparent. This is an iPhone photograph! I’ve been carrying various iPhones for years, but I rarely use them photographically for anything more than quick snaps and record shots. But we recently upgraded to the iPhone 14, and on this trip I decided to see what I could do with the thing. Its ability to make quick — and quite decent — panoramas, even in some challenging lighting conditions, is remarkable.

Aside from that technical issue, this photograph also exemplifies some of what makes East Coast fall color experience so different from the Sierra Nevada color that I have photographed for years. Most obviously, entire forests are almost exclusively hardwood trees, their color stretches almost unbroken across miles of terrain, and the colors are so varied. I’m still processing the experience and thinking about the relative attractions of this kind of autumn photography compared to kinds that are more familiar from my years in the Sierra.


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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Silver Cascade

Silver Cascade
Silver Cascade, New Hampshire

Silver Cascade. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Silver Cascade, New Hampshire

One of the fun things about photographing in an entirely new area is the opportunity to “discover” subjects for the first time. Don’t get me wrong — I still discover new things in familiar places, just not quite as often. During our New England autumn color trip it seemed like there were new things everywhere we looked. After our first-day visit to a well-known and iconic autumn color location I remembered seeing a side road… so we went back and took it. Eventually it took us past this waterfall, located not from from one of the ubiquitous New Hampshire “notches.”

As we drove up this road we saw people stopped at this location, so we figured there must be something interesting there. We pulled over and saw a cascade coming down a narrow band of rock from the higher mountains. Compared to some of the waterfalls that I see in the Sierra this one seemed pretty small. But it was also quite charming, with water traveling this way and that across the rocks, passing trees and bushes with fall foliage, and finally splashing down in a small pool. I left the roadside stop behind and climbed up a good distance to make this photograph.


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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.

New Hampshire Forest, Autumn

New Hampshire Forest, Autumn
Multi-colored autumn foliage in New Hampshire’s White Mountains.

New Hampshire Forest, Autumn. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Multi-colored autumn foliage in New Hampshire’s White Mountains.

We paused along the Kancamagus Highway to photograph at this large turnout, a place with a parking lot next to a rocky river, where the opening in the forest above the water let a bit more light into the edge of the forest. Just about every variety of New Hampshire autumn color was present where the forest ended at the river’s edge.

I have noted that there are not a lot of places where a photographer can get a bit of distance on such trees — often the opening for roadways is narrow and there isn’t usually a wide shoulder along the highways. The forest is quite dense, especially by comparison to the mostly-open forests that I’m familiar with in the Sierra Nevada. Within the density there is also tremendous diversity, with many kinds of trees growing closely together and, in the autumn, producing a kaleidoscope of almost all of the fall colors one can imagine.


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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

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Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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Autumn Lake, New Hampshire

Autumn Lake, New Hampshire
Autumn colors reflected in a northern New Hampshire lake.

Autumn Lake, New Hampshire. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Autumn colors reflected in a northern New Hampshire lake.

Since this year’s New England visit for fall photography was our first, we decided to combine some sure-bet locations with enough time to go out and explore. Our sure bet was in New Hampshire’s White Mountains region, and it was as spectacular as the descriptions suggested. With the help of good luck and good advice, we managed to be there at exactly the peak of fall color. After our first day visit to an obvious, iconic location, we started to push out the boundaries a bit, turning up various roads that took us elsewhere, and discovering interesting things in the process.

We stopped at this lake during a long, looping drive that took us further north. The tall ridges of the White Mountains aren’t seen here — this is a region of rolling hills that is appealing in a different way. We stopped at this lake because it provided open views and the water came right up to the roadway. Once we got out and went to work we saw more ways to photograph it. In addition to the obvious nearby trees and the reflection of those trees and the sky, the distant hills are also blanketed by autumn colors.


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, Amazon, and directly from G Dan Mitchell.

Blog | About | Twitter | Flickr | FacebookEmail

Links to Articles, Sales and Licensing, my Sierra Nevada Fall Color book, Contact Information.

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All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others as indicated. Any use requires advance permission from G Dan Mitchell.