Tag Archives: highway

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: New England

Autumn Morning, White Mountains

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Autumn Morning, White Mountains
Colorful autumn forest in morning light, White Mountains, New Hampshire.

Autumn Morning, White Mountains. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Colorful autumn forest in morning light, White Mountains, New Hampshire.

I made this photograph on what I came to regard as the actual day of peak color in this part of the White Mountains. Here and nearby, the colors were noticeably more intense and widespread than the previous day, and one day later when some weather came through trees were dropping leaves and more bare branches were appearing. This photograph exemplifies an approach that I often like — using a longer focal length lens to isolate a small section of the overall landscape. Here I wanted to focus on the juxtaposition of the foreground trees and hill with the more distant pattern of the ascending gully.

Another aspect of this photograph is, I came to learn, typical of a lot of White Mountains autumn photography. It is often a challenge to get unobstructed access to longer and wider views of the landscape, partially because the forest are so dense and close-in, and partially because roads here tend to be designed without shoulders and with few places to pull over. Consequently, any place that does have a wider view seems precious. Here there was a small turn-out along the road, and if I put my camera in just the right spot I could manage to photograph between and over the nearer brush and trees… and obtain one of those long views.

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: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: New England

River Bank Forest, Autumn

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River Bank Forest, Autumn
“River Bank Forest, Autumn” — Autumn trees along the banks of the Swift River, New Hampshire

Perhaps you thought that I had shared all of my photographs from our early-October trip to photograph New England color. You might be wrong. I took a break from sharing those so that I could post some of the photographs from this year’s crop of Sierra autumn color images. And, I am not quite done with material either, so expect to see me alternate between coasts for a bit longer. Somewhere in all of this, there will also be some urban photographs from a brief visit to Manhattan.

I previously noted that it is often difficult to get longer views in the area of New Hampshire where we photographed. The forest is thick, grows right to the edge of roadways, and there are not many places to pull over. There are some openings, and when I found them I tried to take advantage. They came on a few routes that climbed to higher elevations, some areas with lakes and fields, and occasionally along rivers. This photograph is one of the latter, made while wandering along the banks of the Swift River, where I could photograph across and along the open areas above its course.

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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. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: New England

Peak New England Color

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Peak New England Color
“Peak New England Color” — A White Moutains forest of almost-exclusively hardwood trees at the peak of fall color.

This photograph, if nothing else, illustrates some aspects of how New England fall color is different from what I usually photograph in California, particularly in the Sierra Nevada. Out here the colors tend to be relatively uniform, usually yellow to brown, broken by occasional examples of other colors. For example, the great majority of our aspens turn yellow/gold, which is why the occasional red and orange exceptions attract so much attention. And the Sierra trees are far less likely to appear in huge, mountain-covering stands — they more typically line the bottom of a valley, run upslope along a gully or other feature, and are surrounded by green conifers.

So what differences can we see here? First, the hardwoods vastly outnumber the sparse conifer trees. (I like the contrast the latter provide, however.) The hardwood forest stretches for great distances — that area of the photograph is quite large but it is only a small portion of the fall-colored trees I could see here. The tree color is also much more diverse, here including every shade from green through orange and red.

Leave a comment or question using the form. (If you are reading this on the home page, click the article title to see the full article and the comment form.

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. Blog | Bluesky | Mastodon | Substack Notes | Flickr | Email

All media © Copyright G Dan Mitchell and others.

Photographs: Fall, Photographs: Fall Color, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: New England

Autumn Trees, Mountains, and Valley Fog

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Autumn Trees, Mountains, and Valley Fog
Colorful autumn trees and morning fog in distant valleys, New Hampshire.

Autumn Trees, Mountains, and Valley Fog. © Copyright 2022 G Dan Mitchell.

Colorful autumn trees and morning fog in distant valleys, New Hampshire.

This route across the White Mountains is — as I was warned and then witnessed — a very popular location for viewing New England fall color. While I like to investigate less well-known subjects as I get to know a place, since this was our first-ever visit to this region in the fall we started out by joining the hordes on this road. It is iconic and, as I often say, “there’s a reason it is an icon.” The autumn forests here are, indeed, spectacular and our visit coincided with peak color. (In case you wonder, it only took me a day or two to start exploring a few odd little gravel roads, too.)

While this viewpoint is popular and likely heavily photographed, on a morning like this it presents some aesthetic and technical challenges. The beautifully receding hills beyond the fog-lined valley are almost directly in line with the rising sun. This leads to flare challenges and to high contrasts between shadows and backlit foliage. Nearby trees, as lovely as they are, also impede on some of the longer views. But with the camera in just the right place, using my hand to shade the lens, and an exposure that captured scene data to be optimized in post… I think it works.

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.