Tag Archives: haze

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Forest and Cliffs

September 17, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Yosemite forest, with many dead and dying trees, and cliffs near Bridal Veil fall

In early September, about a week after returning from over a month of international travel — and missing the entire month of August in the Sierra! — I finally got to “go home” to the Yosemite high country for a few days. I camped in Tuolumne Meadows, traveled briefly to the East Side along US 395, and returned home via quick stops in Yosemite Valley, Oakhurst, and a favorite winter bird spot in the Central Valley. It was a quick trip, but just enough to get me back in contact with the mountains. (It also let me take an early look at the upcoming seasonal changes. The signs of fall in the Sierra are clear: corn lily plants dying off and falling over, bilberry reddening meadow edges, little spots of yellow on plants high up on rocky slopes, a few golden willow leaves here and there, and a general sense that everything is slowing after summer’s frantic burst of life.)

I rarely visit Yosemite Valley in the summer, preferring almost any other time to the crowds that go there during the vacation season. Although this was a post-Labor Day visit, and the biggest crowds had departed, there were still lots of people there. After a visit to the Ansel Adams Gallery, where a show celebrating the role of photography in the parks was close to concluding (it included five of my prints), I started to head out of the Valley. As I passed this spot I caught a glimpse of drought-killed trees (with the help of bark beetles), other trees standing tall, and the cliffs around Bridal Veil fall. I noticed it too late to stop… so I took one more loop around the roads of the lower valley and came back to make this photograph in the afternoon light and haze.

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

Photographs: Central California, Photographs: Nature

Coastal Forest, Fog

August 10, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Fog obscures a coastal forest at Point Lobos State Reserve

Many people who don’t know the California coast imagine it to be a warm and sunny place. It can be, but often it is actually foggy and damp and cold — and not a place where you’d want to lie on your towel trying to work on your tan! That iconic sunny weather does occur, especially if you go farther south, but the cold and foggy weather is more typical. Surprisingly, I much prefer the cool and foggy to the clear and sunny, and I don’t think I’m the only photographer who would rather see almost any conditions other than blue sky clear days.

On this January day I headed over to Point Lobos after hearing that there would be both clouds and big surf. In many places in this part of California the coastal hills drop precipitously and directly (or nearly so) straight into the ocean. Here at Point Lobos there is an area of flat, forested headland between the ocean and the mountains, but right behind the park the mountains do rise in layers, and on a day like this one the details of the successively higher ridges often disappear into the fog.

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

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Trees, Ridge, Morning Haze

August 2, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Trees stand in morning light along a glaciated granite ridge, Yosemite National Park.

Many things characterize the unique personality of the Yosemite National Park high country, but for me the glaciated granite slabs and domes are the primary defining features. You can find them elsewhere, but here they seem to be almost everywhere you look. They include areas of pure rock, sometimes almost without fractures and with almost nothing growing. More typical though are scenes like this one, where the granite is fractured, sculpted by ice, littered with erratics, and interspersed with trees and plants that have managed to find a way to live on what seems like bare rock.

On the final morning of a recent visit to the park, before I had to break camp and head home, I went out looking for ridges like this one, topped with trees and photographed in the back light of the morning sun. Beyond the ridge and trees lies the upper end of one of the great canyons of the park, carrying a stream that eventually arrives in Yosemite Valley.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Forest and River, Evening

July 24, 2016 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Evening light comes to the Tuolumne River and surrounding forest

A scene like this can be deceiving, at least when it comes to assumptions about how it might be photographed. It is a peaceful and tranquil scene, and that impression supports the idea that photographing such a subject might be a slow, contemplative, and measured process: explore slowly, consider compositions, set up the camera and fine tune, wait, then photograph.

Nothing could be further from the truth. At this time of day — unless one is photographing a subject that has been specifically planned and scheduled in advance — things happen with extraordinary speed, especially when it comes to the transitions of light. For example, the last light coming through the forest to strike the central tree lasted only moments. Knowing this, as soon as I saw it I photographed more or less instinctively, working quickly and hoping that I would have time before the light was gone— which it was only a moment later.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: haze

Forest and Cliffs

Coastal Forest, Fog

Trees, Ridge, Morning Haze

Forest and River, Evening

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