Tag Archives: garden

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Jack Frost Plant

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Jack Frost Plant
Jack Frost (brunnera) plants growing under a forest canopy.

Jack Frost Plant. © Copyright 2023 G Dan Mitchell.

Jack Frost (brunnera) plants growing under a forest canopy.

In one section of the garden we occasionally visit to make photographs, there is a small grove of (mostly) dogwood trees which are in an area shaded by larger trees. These dogwoods were done blooming when we visited, but they provided wonderful, deep shade to smaller plants growing beneath.

All sorts of interesting stuff grows in this shade, but on this visit I was mostly attracted to leaves. (Most of the flowers were already spent.) This clump of Jack Frost seemed downright lush, with not a damaged leaf in sight.

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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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Beneath the Blooming Dogwood

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Beneath the Blooming Dogwood
Looking upwards toward dense spring dogwood flowers.

Beneath the Blooming Dogwood. © Copyright 2023 G Dan Mitchell.

Looking up toward dense spring dogwood flowers.

Continuing with the spring dogwood theme, for this photograph and its sibling that I shared earlier, I came at the tree from a somewhat different perspective. Typically we photograph this subject so that we can view the flowers without a lot of interference. But here I placed myself where I could aim upwards and shoot through foliage.

Photographing this way fills the frame with light, and instead of the more typical top light,here the light glows down and through the leaves and flowers. On top of that the more distant canopy and flowers become soft and luminous as their focus fades.

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 | Facebook | Email

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.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Columbine Flower #2

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Columbine Flower #2
A columbine flower, photographed in soft light at a San Francisco Bay Area garden.

Columbine Flower #2. © Copyright 2023 G Dan Mitchell.

A columbine flower, photographed in soft light at a San Francisco Bay Area garden.

As I wrote recently, my initial acquaintance with Columbine flowers came high in the Sierra, where a white specimen grows in rocky, alpine terrain. To me, those flowers defined the concept of “Columbine,” and it did not really cross my mind for a long time that there might be others.

I may be slow, but eventually I figure things out. Visits to more civilized gardens eventually taught me that there are other varieties of this beautiful flower. We found several on a recent visit to a garden here in the San Francisco Bay Area one evening. I decided to let much of this flower be soft and out of focus, only putting some of the yellow center in sharper relief.

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 | Facebook | Email

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.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Dogwood Flowers and Leaves

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Dogwood Flowers and Leaves
Spring dogwood tree blossoms nestled in a bed of green leaves.

Dogwood Flowers and Leaves. © Copyright 2023 G Dan Mitchell.

Spring dogwood tree blossoms nestled in a bed of green leaves.

Let me begin by telling a story on myself, a story about looking for the perfect arrangement of dogwood leaves. When I first photographed them quite a while ago, I carried in my mind some incipient images of what I thought the photographs might look like. One of those images was derived from an Ansel Adams photograph of a spray of the flowers laid out in a lovely composition.

I would wander around Yosemite Valley and nearby locations looking for something that had the same quality. I wasn’t exactly trying to duplicate his photograph — just to see the blossoms in that way. But every arrangement was imperfect. The flowers didn’t line up correctly, there were gaps, something was distracting in the background. How did he find such a perfect arrangement? Well, I eventually learned, he did not “discover” it, he took flowers and arranged them by hand!

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 | Facebook | Email

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

Scroll down to leave a comment or question. (Click this post’s title first if you are viewing on the home page.)

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