Tag Archives: high

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Sierra Nevada

Sunset, Unnamed Lake and Great Western Divide

September 16, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A boulder sits in the still water of an unnamed sub-alpine lake in the Upper Kern River Basin as the sunset light streams over the Great Western Divide.

This photograph comes from a week-long pack trip with a group of friends into the southern Sierra Nevada, this year’s installment of our ongoing annual back-country trips. After crossing over 11,760′ Kearsarge Pass and then 13, 200′ Forester Pass we entered one of my favorite parts of the Sierra back-country, the high plateaus of the upper Kern River basin. This area is surrounded by peaks rising as high as 14,000’+ in almost all directions and the view is expansive because much of the area is a very high plateau with nearly level areas at and above 12,000′.

I have been in this general part of the Sierra many times, going all the way back to my college days when I came over Forester Pass for the first time. On this year’s trip we followed the usual John Muir Trail route down to Tyndall Creek and camped there on day 3. From here we decided to spend the next couple of days exploring a little-visited area to the west where the Kern River has its source and just below the impressive peaks of the Great Western Divide. The lake in this photograph is one of several beautiful but unnamed small lakes in the area in which we camped. Peaks of the Great Western Divide are beyond as sunset light streams between them.

This photograph is 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: Architecture, Photographs: New York City

High Line Park and IAC Building

September 15, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

People taking a summer evening walk along the High Line Elevated Park in Chelsea with the IAC Building and the 100 11th Building in the background, New York City.

I only spent a short time on one evening walking along the High Line Park, but I certainly found it to be an intriguing place, and one that I intend to visit again. I first stopped to photograph this spot when I saw a couple of musicians performing on the bench just beyond the people walking and standing in the foreground. But the “urban landscape” of buildings beyond is obviously very striking, especially in the evening light. I cannot identify all of the buildings in the photograph – my first attempts to find them via Google maps failed because the buildings are so new that you only see empty space and construction sites there. I finally determined that the building on the left with the “swooping” lines is the IAC Building, designed by Frank Gehry – which is obvious in retrospect. The taller building in the background (which I had taken to calling the “Mondrian building”) is the “100 11th” building, designed by a French architect named Nouvel.

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” (Heyday Books) is available directly from him.

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

Photographs: Architecture, Photographs: New York City, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Urban/Street

Brick Walls and Building Near High Line Park

September 14, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Brick walls and a building under construction above the High Line Elevated Park, New York City.

Another bit of architecture photographed from the High Line Elevated Park in Chelsea on a summer evening in August. The most interesting features of this evening included the “mackerel sky” clouds to the west, which are reflected in the windows of the upper building, and the warm light of early evening. The juxtapositions of angles and textures (especially the bricks and the glass windows) got my attention as we walked along the High Line. I cannot identify the building, but it appears to be under construction.

This photograph is 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: New York City, Photographs: Structures and Objects, Photographs: Textures, Photographs: Urban/Street

Parking Lot Near High Line Park

August 25, 2010 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Evening photograph of an urban parking lot near the High Line Elevated Park in the Chelsea area of New York City.

I photographed this parking facility from above as we started down the stairs at the north end of High Line Park. Since I was traveling light at this point I had no tripod – so I made this 1/8 second exposure hand-held. (Image stabilization can be your friend!) Lighting was, to say the least, tricky. Areas of the structure were in deep shadow, but there were also bright artificial light directly within the frame. By some miracle I managed to pretty much capture the full dynamic range in one shot.

These parking elevators are seen all over Manhattan, and they allow cars to be parked several deep on the vertical lift. This was the first time I had the opportunity to shoot one from a position that wasn’t on the ground, and the complicated mass of vertical beams filling the space and lit by artificial light sources seemed like an interesting subject. I haven’t seen the elevators in operation, so I still wonder how the lot operators manage to get the right cars at the top/bottom of each lift so that each person’s car will be at ground level at the right time.

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.

(Basic EXIF data is available by “mousing over” large images in blog posts. Leave a comment if you want to know more.)

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