Tag Archives: golden

Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast, Photographs: San Francisco

Departing Freighter

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Departing Freighter
Departing Freighter

Departing Freighter. San Francisco, California. March 14, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A freighter heads out of the Golden Gate and into the Pacific Ocean on a winter morning

I was on my way to a location north of the Golden Gate Bridge, having left home while it was still dark and crossing the bridge as the sky just begin to lighten. As I often do when I pass by here, I left the main highway for a short time and went up a ways into the Marin Headlands to see what sort of early morning light might appear over the San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge. The lights of the City were still on at this early hour, so I first photographed in that direction.

There was a variety of types of clouds around the Bay—fog to the south and east, high clouds above, and a bit of general haze everywhere. As the sun came up behind the East Bay clouds and fog there was a bit of color, though the effect was subtle. A bit later this very large freighter approached the bridge as it prepared to leave the bay. It was one of the largest that I have seen pass beneath the Golden Gate Bridge. I went back to shooting other subjects, but my attention periodically went back to this ship as it moved farther off shore. Eventually a bit of muted sunlight hit the boat and some light came to the higher clouds as it headed on toward an off-shore fog bank and then, I imagine, a much longer voyage across the Pacific.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist 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: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Trillium

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Trillium
Trillium

Trillium. Muir Woods National Monument, California. March 14, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

A single trillium flower rises about leaves against a dark background

For a variety of reasons I decided to make this a black and white photograph, even though the trillium flower is a beautiful thing to see in color, especially when softly lit by light filtering down through the redwood forest and when there is a dark, amorphous background. Because the colors can be striking, perhaps the pure form of the flower may be more visible in black and white. In addition, in many ways working in monochrome permits me more flexibility in the post-processing stage.

These flowers blossom every March at Muir Woods, the closest place I know where I can reliably find them. After a number of years shooting there I have a pretty good idea of both where and when to find them, and this flower was along one of the trails where hundreds of the flowers can appear during a short window just before the start of spring. This year I visited perhaps a week after the peak—though there were still new plants pushing up from the ground—and the drought seems to have reduced the number and quality of the flowers a bit. But a single flower is still enough to make a photograph!

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist 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.

Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Redwood Branches, Morning

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Redwood Branches, Morning
Redwood Branches, Morning

Redwood Branches, Morning. Muir Woods National Monument, California. March 14, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Coast redwood branches in morning light, Muir Woods National Monument

In the middle of March it seemed like a typical California end-of-winter day… sunny, warm, and wildflowers beginning to bloom. (Those of you in colder climates perhaps are envious, but some of us here miss winter and feel a slight be of regret when the warm season begins to arrive. ) We ended up at Muir Woods very early in the morning—so early that the official entry kiosk was not yet open and that we got a parking space in the first parking lot! We wandered into the park and walked up through the redwood forest that borders the creek that runs down the valley through which the main, popular trails run. A few hours later, when tour buses arrive from San Francisco, this place would become noisy and crowded, but at this early morning hour it was still quiet.

We moved on toward a trail where trillium flowers are easy to find, a trail that parallels the creek some distance up the side slope. Although my attention was mostly on the ground on the uphill side of the trail, where the trillium were blooming, I also kept an eye on the valley on the downslope side. From this vantage point it is possible to get a rare straight-on view of the trunks of the redwoods, and occasionally the morning sun would make it all the way down into this valley and back-light redwood and other trees. Here I was taken by the three primary layers in this little scene. The foreground redwood branch are curved and bright green in the morning sun. Beyond are moss-covered branches that almost glow in the back-light. And beyond all of this are the dark and shadowed forest trees on the far side of the canyon, not yet in the sunlight.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist 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.

Photographs: Coastal Redwoods, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Purple Trillium Flower

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Purple Trillium Flower
Purple Trillium Flower

Purple Trillium Flower. Muir Woods National Monument, California. March 14, 2014. © Copyright 2014 G Dan Mitchell – all rights reserved.

Purple trillium flower beneath the canopy of the redwood forest, Muir Woods National Monument

The annual blossoming of the trillium flowers at Muir Woods is always a reminder that spring is just around the corner. These flowers bloom in the first half of March, in wild abundance in non-drought years. The number of flowers seemed smaller this year, most likely due to the historic sequence of three very dry years in California, with the current season being perhaps one of the driest on record. Fortunately, after several months of virtually no rain at all, the tap was turned back on briefly in the past month and there is now at least some moisture in this redwood forest environment.

After photographing here for some years, I have a pretty good idea of when and where to look for these flowers. Although it took me a bit of time to get there, as I was distracted along the way by other subjects, I eventually headed straight to a familiar trail that traverses a hillside above a creek. Here there are many trillium plants, and in the morning theory are still in the soft light that is most conducive to photographing them. Since there are usually quite a few of the flowers, I tend to almost think less about the individual flowers and more about their placement against the background of other forest elements and about what sort of light they have. Here I found a flower that was in a position such that I could shoot down onto it, placing leaves behind the blossom, and which provided a darker background without a lot of distracting detail.

G Dan Mitchell is a California photographer and visual opportunist 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.