A mini-bouget of spring pink mallow blossoms in meadow grasses.
Photos are temporarily being shared without additional commentary. Watch for commentary to resume in late summer.
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.
Believe it or not, this is a color photograph, made on a late-autumn morning in California’s Great Central Valley. The dense tule fog did not simply reduce visibility — it also drained the color right out of the landscape. Foggy landscapes can have color — the blue tones of thick fog in the very early hours, and the warmer tones of shallow fog glowing in sunrise light. But in this case it was a bit later, and the colors of the earliest light had faded and backlit fog glowed and muted the color.
When photographing a subject like this I find myself on a fine line between not enough fog and not enough detail. Sometimes the fog is so thick that a subject that seems visible in person has so little contrast that it almost is invisible in a photograph. But too much definition and the mystery of the fog diminishes. Here I think I have hit the middle ground — there’s perhaps just enough detail to delineate the broad features, but many fine details are missing or softened.
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.
A tree grows in a crack in a large boulder set in forest and reflected in a quiet Sierra Nevada pond.
Although the indications are more subtle than in the wildly colorful aspen groves, this is also a Sierra Nevada fall color photograph. It is not a familiar icon — not remotely so! — but it seems to be “iconic” to me, in the sense that it captures something of the quality of this season when things seem to slow down in preparation for the coming winter.
What are the subtle autumn signifiers in this photograph? There is one obvious feature in the tiny patch of yellow leaves at the far right. But those grasses lining the banks of this small pond are another indicator — while they are still green at their bases, the upper tips have gone to yellow and brown. There is something about the quality of the light, too. It always seems softer to me at this time of year, especially in shaded areas like this one.
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 and Amazon.
An oak tree surrounded by wildflowers and new growth, as an early spring storm clears.
This is the green season in California right now, although our opportunities to get out and experience it directly are limited right now. While I can get out for a daily neighborhood walk during our mandatory “Stay At Home” order, that keeps me mostly within walking distance of home. There is spring to see and experience locally, but not quite the same way as when I travel. So for now I’m tracking my way through my raw file archives, roughly following the current season, and rediscovering photographs that I left behind in the past.
I made this photograph on a beautiful early spring evening in California’s Temblor Range last year. It had been a day of those wonderful spring storms, when light and shadow and showers sweep across the green landscape, one after another. Late in the day I went to this elevated location and looked back across a valley through this oak tree as the storm clouds began to clear from the west.
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 and Amazon.
Photographer and visual opportunist. Daily photos since 2005, plus articles, reviews, news, and ideas.
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