Yes, more dried mud! As I have written before, for reasons that still mystify me, this is an irresistible subject for many landscape photographers… and I’m no exception. What explains it? The colors? The contrast with surroundings? The fractal shapes?
Continue reading Fractured Surface
We were on the upper Big Sur coast on this June morning, photographing large surf along with sea stacks and steep cliffs. I first worked that subject from some distance using long lenses, then moved right down to the edge of the water for intimate landscape/seascape images. Eventually I decided to head back up and away from the immediate coast, and as I walked I came across this little cascade.
I thought that the angle of the falling water below the little gully was interesting, and I like the back light an rim light on the edges of the rocks. The combination of thin fog and ocean spray added a muted quality to the atmosphere. The biggest challenge here was that the primary subject, the falling water, was in shadow, and this muted its brightness a bit.
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
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I had a free morning in mid-April, so I headed over to Point Lobos, barely more than an hour’s drive from here. I might have gone on down the Big Sur coast, but road washouts have closed that route for now. So Point Lobos it was! I arrived to gray weather — high fog and not much in the way of interesting, directional light. But eventually the clouds began to pull back toward the coast and soft, directional light appeared.
Point Lobos always rewards a slower pace. There’s a lot to see here, and even more to see if you linger and start to notice things that you might miss by passing through quickly. The edges of this cove are lined with rocky strata that gradually dip into the water. Winter surf pushes all sorts of interesting stuff up onto the shoreline, and I enjoy walking slowly here and seeing what I can find. The small colorful pebbles are everywhere, but the larger white rock was the special find.
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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.
The rocks in the center of this photograph are large enough that it is hard to believe that they were washed into this position by heavy winter surf along this section of the Pacific coastline. But that’s the fact of the matter. That surf erodes the underlying rocks, moves large rocks and even boulders around like toys, and deposits layers of multi-colored pebbles like those caught between these rocks and the underlying stratified formations.
Photographing at this cove at Point Lobos is always an invitation to slow down and just look. There are potential subjects everywhere, many of them rather small, but they are easily overlooked if you don’t adopt a very contemplative and quiet perspective. And because the area is right at the surf line and often overrun by high waves, I find something new and interesting every time I visit.
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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