Tag Archives: highway

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Dusk Haze, Stinson Beach

September 8, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Dusk haze from northern California forest fires colors the sunset sky above Stinson Beach.

The typical wildfires of September and October are a mixed blessing. They are most certainly tragic for those whose homes and livelihoods are affected by them, and Californians have learned to take their dangers very seriously. At the same time, fire is a natural part of the ecology in this part of the world, and a healthy environment for forests and grasslands seems to require periodic fire. In any case, the fires can also seem like a mixed blessing. If you go to areas affected by the smoke at this time of year – and it happens essentially every year – looking for clear vistas, you may well find them impeded by smoke and haze. On the other hand, if you look at this phenomenon just a bit differently you may find that the hazy atmosphere can produce its own visual magic – and especially at sunset.

This is another of several photographs I made at the end of the day just below Stinson Beach, as we climbed into the headlands hills of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area near sunset during our drive back down the coast from the Mendocino area. With this sort of atmosphere it is hard to know in advance just how things will evolve – will the day simply come to a quiet and gray conclusion, or will the golden hour light illuminate and color the atmosphere in brilliant sometimes almost unbelievable ways. The entire sky did not look like this, but down close to the horizon and right above the shoreline extending from Stinson Beach it did light up with a very colorful glow, so I used a long lens to limit the angle of view to the most colorful portions of the sky and haze.

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

Tree and Pinnacle, Pacific Sunset

September 6, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

The last evening light falls on a tree and a rocky pinnacle high above the Pacific Ocean north of San Francisco, California.

On the return drive from our late-August sojourn to the Mendocino Coast, we returned to the Bay Area by the less efficient but more spectacular route and drove the coast on Highway 1, the “coast highway.” For the most part the road hugs the coastline, alternately dipping down to the shoreline and climbing to the tops of very tall coastal bluffs, and occasionally running inland for a short distance. We stopped in Point Reyes Station for dinner (and we can now heartily recommend Osteria Stellina!) and then continued on – and as we did I began to get a sense of where we might be for the golden hour light. It seemed like we would likely pass Stinson Beach – which seemed fine, since I didn’t have an interest in photographing there – and be somewhere south of there in the Marin Headlands.

As we ascended the high and steep road perched along the cliffs south of Stinson Beach, a lot of stuff started happening all at once. I knew that we were getting very close to “that” light, when we spotted a lone coyote along a ridge above the road… right below a large ridgeline rock and above which the nearly full moon had just appeared. Really! So we obviously had to stop and see what we could do with that subject – which turned out to be more difficult that I had thought. At about this time other likely “targets” started to appear, and I photographed back towards Stinson Beach, directly into the sun-lit haze from northern California forest fires. Then I looked closer to my location and saw this windswept tree catching the last bit of light, with a single rugged pinnacle behind it, and beyond that the surface of the Pacific Ocean, fading into the mist and picking up the pink tones of the setting sun.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Ocean & Coast

Island, Coastal Bluffs, and Distant Shore

September 1, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A steep and rocky island backed by coastal bluffs and a distant shoreline, northern California coast, Mendocino County.

The last time I passed by this section of the California coast highway in Mendocino County, I also stopped to photograph this scene – but was less happy with the result. This section of the coastline, like much of the meeting between California and the Pacific Ocean, consists largely of high coastal bluffs, interspersed with the steep canyons where creeks and rivers meet the ocean, with many rocky islands ranging from tiny to huge. The two-peaked island in this large cove fits more into the huge category and it is backed by two fingers of land where the high bluffs extend toward the ocean. In the far distance, a section of curving coastline is barely visible through the haze.

Recently someone asked me about how I decide whether a photograph will be black and white rather than color. I admitted – and it turns out that many feel the same – that often I am not certain when I make the exposure. Roughly speaking, the black and white photographs come about in perhaps three ways. Sometimes I like the subject but the color rendition just isn’t working the way I had hoped, so I try it in black and white and “discover” that I like it that way in post. On other occasions, at the time of exposure I sort of wonder if it might work in black and white and I make mental note to try it that way in post. In the third case, I “know” (with only a small amount of doubt) that the image is going to end up in black and white and I shoot the scene with that in mind. This is one of those photographs – I was almost certain that it would end up in black and white as I stood high on a bluff next to highway 1 making the exposure.

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California, Photographs: Sierra Nevada, Photographs: Yosemite

Plants, Granite, Morning Light

August 31, 2012 G Dan Mitchell 2 Comments

A few sparse plants grow in thin cracks in granite slabs, Yosemite National Park.

Portions of the Sierra high country in Yosemite have been heavily glaciated. The evidence is widespread and familiar in all of its variations: domes, U-shaped canyons, remnant glacial ice-fields and a few vestigial glaciers, glacial erratics everywhere, a terrain crossed with the remains of lateral, medial, and terminal moraines. And it places, such as this area along Tioga Pass Road, there are huge expanses of granite slabs, sloping and rounded nearly solid rock broken by cracks and dikes and surrounded by the debris of gradual erosion.

Lots of things managed to live on and in these slabs. The tiniest cracks collect sand, then dust and gravel, and soon small plants spring up and even wildflowers. In some places – including the more distant ridge in this photograph – large trees manage to sustain themselves by growing entirely in these cracks. In this photograph I juxtaposed the nearby small plants crowing in a couple of shallow cracks with the receding sequence of rolling dome-like ridges with shattered rock and a few trees, some of which catch the early morning sun, with details softened by the (perhaps unusual, for landscape photography) use of a small aperture to minimize depth of field.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: highway

Dusk Haze, Stinson Beach

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Tree and Pinnacle, Pacific Sunset

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Island, Coastal Bluffs, and Distant Shore

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Plants, Granite, Morning Light

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

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