Tag Archives: foliage

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Aspen Leaves on Snow

October 17, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Frost covered autumn aspen leaves lying on new-fallen snow, Sierra Nevada

Early October is the time of the annual aspen color transition in the eastern Sierra Nevada. For me, the combination of the dramatic color change and the seasonal weather changes clearly denote the fact that summer is over and that we are heading toward the cold part of the year. (I like this – I find that the fall through spring seasons are more photographically compelling, and I’m no longer a “hot weather person.”) While October in the Sierra can bring some beautiful and even warm days, there is not question that nights are both longer and colder, and the occasional passing weather front will drop enough snow to make it feel distinctly winter-like.

Although we knew that much of the iconic color at North Lake had already passed, we decided to go there anyway on this morning and look for more subtle things that remain. The road past the lake is on a north slope and we drove through plenty of recent snow as we passed along this shoreline in 22 degree temperatures. As expected, most of the trees had lost their leaves already, though we also found some trees that still held enough colorful leaves to make the visit well worth our time. And, when those leaves fall, they don’t simply disappear! On a snowy morning like this one they collect in piles on top of the snow, providing beautiful little compositions and highlighting the intensity of their colors.

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

Dogwood Thicket and Forest, Evening

September 9, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Blooming dogwoods among the conifer forest in evening light, Yosemite National Park

Among photographers and others who watch the seasons change in the Sierra, the spring blossoming of the Yosemite Valley dogwood trees is an important indicator that winter is over, spring is here, and summer cannot be far away. At the right time, in many locations in The Valley these flowers can bloom profusely, and this year’s bloom was exceptional. However, many who focus their visits on the brief (a week or two?) bloom in Yosemite Valley may overlook the beautiful though perhaps a bit different bloom that continues in the higher country.

I was in the Valley on this early May day for various reasons, but as evening approached I decided to drive up out of the Valley to a particular little tree-filled Valley where I often stop – in spring for the dogwood flowers and in fall for the autumn colors of these trees. I arrived during the hour before sunset when the late sunlight still shines over the top of a low ridge to the west and filters through the mixed forests to backlight the thickets of dogwood trees growing among the more typical forest trees of the area, and I spent the evening quietly looking and walking among the trees of this little section of forest.

(Note: This photograph was made in late spring, but it appears on my blog in early September… following the gigantic “Rim” fire in the vicinity of the northwest boundary of Yosemite National Park. From what I can tell from the fire maps on the Internet, there is a possibility that these trees are now gone, though I have not had a chance to check yet. They are/were on the west side of the road that formed one of the fire breaks, so I’m hopeful that they might have been saved. I’ll know soon.)

Photographs: Pacific Northwest, Photographs: Urban/Street

Trance Entrance

September 1, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A sign with multiple potential meanings, Pike Place Market

There are so many possible bad puns that could be made about the sign in this photograph, especially considering the city in which it was made and other things that were going on in town at that time. I’ll refrain.

On a free day during a recent trip to Seattle we decided to wander around downtown Seattle and do mostly street photography. We started out near Pike Place Market, where there are abundant opportunities to find not only the coffee and food we were seeking, but also lots of interesting “Seattlish” photographic opportunities. As we walked past an entrancing entrance to the Market, I looked up to see some wildly colorful flowers (not that you can tell here!) growing along the edge of the roof and partially hanging over the sign.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Pacific Northwest

Ferns, Olympic Peninsula

August 28, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Lush ferns grow along a trail through rain forest at Olympic National Park

On this day we initially planned to make a quick foray to North Cascades National Park, but I got a call saying that Olympic Peninsula web cams were showing relatively clear skies and that I should think about changing plans – so I did! Instead of heading north from the Seattle area, we headed west and took the ferry across Puget Sound, arriving to find clearing fog and some partial clouds, but quite a bit of sunlight. Taking the advice of someone who knows the Pacific Northwest better than I do, our plan was to first shoot down in the rain forest and then to head up to Hurricane Ridge near the end of the day.

We started at Sol Duc falls, a short one-mile hike from a parking area at the end of a side road. My mental image of these forests involves lush growth, cloudy conditions, and rain. The first was present, but both the clouds and the rain were missing. In some ways that could be a good thing, but shooting in the forest in the midday sun poses major problems. The main issue is so-called “pizza light,” with deep shadows and bright, sunlit highlights mixed together throughout the scene. When we got to the waterfall, that is precisely what we found. The fall is in a narrow gorge – and while the bottom of the gorge was in deep shade, beams of direct sunlight were striking the white water of the fall. While it might be possible to make a photograph of this subject in such conditions, it made a lot more sense to me to turn my attention to smaller scale subject that allowed me to better control the light – and this close up “intimate landscape” of a twisting group of ferns is one of the results.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: foliage

Aspen Leaves on Snow

Dogwood Thicket and Forest, Evening

Trance Entrance

Ferns, Olympic Peninsula

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