Tag Archives: hill

Photographs: Death Valley, Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Southern California

Desert Plants, Black Hill

April 8, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Morning light on desert arrow weed plants at the base of a black hill, with Death Valley Buttes receding into the hazy distance

This was very nearly the last photograph I made on my recent early April visit to Death Valley National Park. I try to go there to photograph at least once each year, and I’ve probably visited during the first week of April more often than at any other time. This tends to be a transitional season in the park, at least in my experience, and the conditions can range from cool to downright hot. On this visit it was, for the season, “downright hot” – temperatures with in at least the mid to high-nineties every day, and rose to just over 100 degrees on one day. This is not unheard of at this time of year, though it is on the high side of normal for the first week in April. This trip was a challenge for other reasons, too. On the second day I encountered a significant sand storm with accompanying winds, and the light was not exactly cooperative. On two mornings and two evenings clouds shut down the golden hour light, and there was quite a bit of general haze.

On this morning I figured I would do an hour or two of shooting before returning to camp to tear everything down and start my drive back home. I started by going up just past the turn off to Wild Rose Canyon, with the plan being to shoot some long distance photographs of sunrise light on some mountains that I have been thinking about shooting. The sunrise itself was more or less a washout – the atmosphere was so murky that I wasn’t even quite sure when the sun cleared the horizon! Eventually I did get some soft directional light from the sun, but I was finished with this subject somewhat quickly. I decided to go with a backup plan to photograph the Mesquite Dunes with a long lens. As I worked this subject I decided to head a bit further east and see if I could get anything from the backlight coming across the low hills above Salt Creek, and as I traveled that direction I passed this small black hill, where I have photographed before, and saw these backlit arrow weed plants and the more distant hills near Death Valley Buttes in the morning haze.

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Photographs: Nature, Photographs: Northern California

Winter Fog, Ridges

February 3, 2013 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Winter fog wraps around the lower slopes of Marin County mountains along the Pacific coast north of San Francisco

This was the sort of day of photography that I have learned to accept as something that comes with the territory. I was up hours before dawn, and on the road shortly after that, with an idea of photographing in the redwoods of Marin County north of the Golden Gate, or perhaps of photographing along the coast where high surf was predicted. As I got on the road I noticed that there was some fog about, which is fine as I often like photographing in such conditions. Nearly an hour later as the time of sunrise approached, I noticed that the day was not becoming light very fast and, in fact, things were looking quite gray. I crossed the Golden Gate in fog, stopped briefly on the north side of the bridge, and wasn’t able to see much of anything. I continued on to the Muir Woods area and parked. As I sat in the car, it became clear that there wasn’t going to be much in the way of compelling light here, either. (I’m not one to insist on incredible light, so when I say that the light wasn’t promising… I mean it!) I soon decided to leave and go up the coast a ways. As I drove I figured out that the murky light was the result of a combination of thick coastal fog, generally hazy conditions where it wasn’t foggy, and above it all the high clouds of a passing weather front.

While finding myself in conditions like these doesn’t exactly make me happy – who wouldn’t prefer beautiful light and easy subjects!? – I don’t get upset about it any more. In order to find really special subjects and light one must simply go “out there” a lot to increase the odds. Special things are special at least partially because they are not ordinary, and we cannot expect stupendous conditions on every outing. I shoot enough to have had the good fortune to almost regularly encounter truly wonderful conditions and to have some idea how to work with conditions that are merely good. But along with this good, I also have to accept the possibility – certainty, actually – that there will be some days when it seems like nothing happens. This was one of those days. I enjoyed being out and about, and I explored a few places that I had not visited before. I gave up on some ideas, tried others, and when the light was clearly not going to be good in the forest, I headed for the coast. When that didn’t work, I headed into the hills. It was what it was! Eventually, I ended up at the Mount Tamalpais State Park high in the Marin hills, and around one bend in the road the view opened to the west and I could see the ocean of fog bumping up against ridges below me and stretching on out over the ocean – so I stopped and made the only photographs of the day that worked. It wasn’t a great day… but it was still a good day!

Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Red on White, Sandstone

December 21, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

A vestigial layer of red sandstone forms small, layered mounds atop patterned white rock, Zion National Park

All over the southwest, where various layers of sedimentary rock meet, it is possible to find odd and surprising juxtapositions of the different layers. In many places a bit of a higher, harder layer will remain above the softer material below, creating hoodoos and mushroom-shaped structures. Sometime the upper rim of a canyon will be lined with a layer of the harder rock, while there is a steep drop-off below. Here, bits of the darker read sandstone, with different types of layering and different texture, sit on top of the smoothly curving and finely layered underlying lighter rock.

I had seen this spot in Zion in the past – it isn’t all that hard to find – and even photographed it from a greater distance and different angles. This time I decided to approach more closely, walking out on the wave-like formation of the lower, lighter rock and passing around these small reddish prominences. I made this photograph on the same day I made many of my other most recent Zion photographs, a day when the light varied tremendously due to winds and cloud cover. One moment this spot was hit by brilliant sunshine, and a moment later it was in shade – and the changes did not always synchronize between the near and far elements. I made this photograph during a moment when the direct sun was largely muted by passing clouds.

Photographs: Desert, Photographs: Nature, Photographs: The Southwest, Photographs: Utah

Backlit Trees and Sandstone, Afternoon

December 10, 2012 G Dan Mitchell Leave a comment

Afternoon sun back-lights trees and brush in the sandstone high country of Zion Naitonal Park, Utah

I love this “sea of sandstone” country from the higher elevations of Zion National Park, especially early or late in the day when the low angle sun catches the tips of the needles and leaves of the trees and bushes. The rock formations have a combination of sculpted large features and rough and angular small features that I like as well.

Several times this year I had the opportunity to spend good portions of days along the Mount Carmel Highway through the park. Between the well-known tunnel and the east border of the park, the surroundings are filled with this sort of landscape: small canyons, deeply worn stream beds, knobs of stratified red sandstone, and trees and plants managing to grow anywhere they can get a bit of soil on this rocky terrain. As I travel this road it seems that juxtapositions of these components are constantly forming, sometimes so quickly that I don’t have time to stop. However, because I have been over this road quite a few times now, I’m beginning to understand a bit more where and when to look. The idea here was to line up a couple of almost parallel hill structures, each topped by backlit trees, against the backdrop of shadowed and stratified rock.

G Dan Mitchell Photography

Tag Archives: hill

Desert Plants, Black Hill

Winter Fog, Ridges

Red on White, Sandstone

Backlit Trees and Sandstone, Afternoon

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